A little after 3PM on Friday afternoon, leaders from Newry and Cookstown came together to set up camp, in preparation for the Cubs arrival at 7 – 7:30PM.
Once the Cubs had been shown to their tents to drop off their gear, all of the Cubs and the leaders came together at the flag pole for the first flag break of the weekend. Newry taught Cookstown our chant, discussed our plans for the weekend and chatted about the boundaries before the Cubs were allowed free time to socialise and burn off some energy.
Before it was time to settle down for the evening, the Cubs enjoyed a nice warm cup of hot chocolate and some pancakes for a wee bit of supper. Followed by some time for the Cubs to play card games and prepare for bed.
On Saturday morning by 6AM all of the Cubs, Newry and Cookstown alike were up and ready for the day. Whilst some of the leaders prepared breakfast, others headed out to set up a scavenger hunt. Before they were split in to teams for their activities, the Cubs enjoyed more free time to explore and play.
The scavenger hunt took them in to the forest and around the lake, each group given only a compass and sheet to mark down their answers. Accompanied by a leader they made their way around each clue and landed back at camp an hour or so later, where they finished their scavenger hunt with a race to find the candles hidden in the trees.
After all that running around, the Cubs were ready for their lunch, they enjoyed some sandwiches, fruit and bars before getting ready for their next activities.
The afternoon activities consisted of rotational bases of pizza and scone making, a teamwork puzzle and an assault course. All of the bases were enjoyed, however, from the looks on their faces, the squirty cream on a homemade scones fresh out of the dutch oven was the most popular.
By the time we were all cleaned up from our bases, it was dinner time, where we all enjoyed some burgers, sausages, mash and vegetables, which went down a treat. Our cubs were very good at completing different tasks to help the leaders all weekend, such as doing the dishes and taking out the bins as they were earning pins that they were able to display on their neckerchiefs. This was a great incentive, and even once the pins were put away, the cubs were still extremely helpful and learned a lot when breaking camp.
That night, the rain poured so sadly we couldn’t have a traditional campfire, but we made do and still managed to pull off some of the best smore’s yet for supper, a couple of the cubs even made up a poem that they performed in the dining shelter. Once all the smore’s were devoured, the Cubs got ready for bed, and it wasn’t long before they were all asleep after a long day of fun.
Sunday morning, everyone helped to clean up and break camp, after breakfast. The Cubs learnt a great deal about putting away tents safely to avoid damage, and how to store them. After some help from the leaders, they were able to do the last tent independently which is not only a great help but a significant accomplishment in the Cub section.
Before Cookstown’s bus arrived to collect them we had our last flag break and said our goodbye’s. And finally, once all of the gear was put away, and most of the Cubs had been collected, at 11am, the sun came out.
I’m glad the sun came out..! (eventually)