MORE than 500 locals enjoyed an adventure-packed weekend of camping to celebrate 100 years of Scouting. The organisation’s Rue Maingy headquarters was turned into a fun-filled playground, with young people ranging in age from six to 25 enjoying a variety of activities during the two-night event.
Guernsey’s Scout Association took part in the national bid to spend half-a-million nights under canvas, with more than 200,000 Scouts from across the UK simultaneously camping.
Beavers, Cubs, Scouts and Explorers enjoyed activities that marked each of the decades since the creation of Scouting - night-time roller-skating, camp fires and bogie racing (box cars).
Activities co-ordinator Terry Ashworth said the weekend event also gave each of the island’s groups a chance to showcase their best skill.
‘For example, one group is very good at pioneering so they will be giving the other groups a demonstration,’ he said.
‘We are encouraging all the groups to give some sort of display to show off their skills.’
He said organisers struggled to contain campers’ enthusiasm.
‘They were all really hyped up and it was quite difficult to get them to calm down and go to sleep at night.’
He said the weekend was all about the young people.
‘We are looking forward to the future of Scouting and these young people are the future. The camping weekend is all about them enjoying themselves and it went like clockwork so we are delighted.
‘The activities will help them with their social skills and, of course, this is the first time some of them will have ever camped before. The weekend was supposed to be one big adventure and I think it was.’
The key to the success of the event was that organisers had put on something for everyone and every young person had a different favourite.
Hugo Meredith, 14, loved the wide games.
‘It’s been excellent. The enormity of it all has been great. The wide games were the best because they used a lot of the big fields and there was a lot of things to collect.’
Kayley Girard, 11, said the whole camping experience had been a lot of fun.
‘Racing the go-karts was the best event we did,’ she said.
‘Everyone had lots of fun doing that and it was really good to look at as well as taking part.’
Sophie Meader, 10, said a lot of the activities gave the young people a sense of achievement.
‘I helped build a go-kart and it was a really great achievement when we could watch it race. Ours won as well, which was really good.’
Article posted on 28th May, 2007 - 12.00am
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