Douglas & St. FinBarresScout Group – 2nd 6th 47th 93rd Cork

This post is written by Scouter & Rover Scout, Ruairí.

July 3rd
Today woke up to a harsh surprise, like a cold Christmas, we were woken up at 4:15 but Sean Taaffe with a stick screaming that there was an emergency we were required for, that once we rushed to the ready we then discovered was not an emergency, but we were doing a surprise night hike, given 60 seconds to grab everything we could, given a mysterious bag, and a list of peculiar objects picked from the perplexing mind of Sir Seán Taaffe, the only of which we didn’t succeed was bringing home a live hare for our messiahic Camp Chief.

This activity was a surprise to most of us Rovers (Except me although I didn’t know which date it was on) as this event was once a staple of DSF summer camps, with the tame patrol hikes we go on each year historically being these surprise events as these are, and one Rover planning meeting when the only Rover who showed up was me I suggested it.

As we tredged down the road to the nearby town, we discovered the bag contained a load of bread, fruit and a can of Low sugar Low fat Tesco Beans. As we made our way into the town the first thing we discovered was a bus stop, that would take us into the city centre, with the buses coming every 3 hours, but the next one being in another 15 mins, (5:15). This regional bus at an obscene hour in the morning was remarkably full.

From getting the bus into Belfast we then Hiked back to the site, it was long and mainly on side roads, but we got home early enough, so early that we where back before some leaders had woken up.
The Scouts and Ventures did Axe Throwing and other on site activities, and then for dinner in the evening they had a themed cooking competition, each patrol getting a different country and having to make a 3 course meal.