Scouts - District Camping Competition

On the long weekend in September the Brackenhurst Rover Crew hosted the annual Eland District Camping Competition at Arrowe Park.The theme for this years competition was Star Wars and patrols from 1st Brackenhurst, 1st Germiston, 3rd Kensington and 1st Wychwood competed for the trophy.

Everyone arrived on Thursday night and began setting up camp. Building activities continued until quite late to prepare for the first inspection at 09:00 on Friday morning. After first inspection the results were less than impressive, with no patrol managing to achieve the 50% camping standard. We were closest with 49%, but a miss is a miss.

After inspection the days activities began with light sabre training, code breaking and rescuing one of the patrol members from a lava pit. The scouts were also given a chance to work further on their campsites. After lunch, each patrol build a "tank" and attacked the other patrols with water balloons and flour. Of course the rovers got involved here. The cleanest patrol at the end of the activity was judged to be the winner.
After dinner, the scouts built "pods" and raced them to various check points around Arrowe Park

Saturday dawned with another inspection. This time, things were much better, with Brackenhurst and Kensington beating the 65% camping standard. Kensington took the camping standards trophy for the day with 78%. The activities of the day then began with the scouts building and racing "Imperial Walkers" while the rovers tried to take them down. The patrols were then mixed for some friendly games of dodge ball before lunch

STAs over the weekend included making a Star Wars Chess board, a light sabre and a R2/D2 model. After Saturday's lunch the R2 models were put to the test on the R2/D2 obstacle course. The scouts also had "alternative" weapons training (in case they lost their light sabres). This base was enjoyed by most as they got the chance to shoot padded arrows at the other members of their patrol.

Saturday night was a judged meal, with each patrol entertaining two Jedi Masters. I was not present, but it seemed all meals were decent. After adding in the scores from the judged meal, it was very tight at the top with Brackenhurst in 2nd place, just one point behind Kensington.

Time for the last inspection. Both Kensington and Brackenhurst achieved 80% camping standard, but Brackenhurst scored 7 more points, meaning they won the trophy by a slender margin of 6 points. To loose on the last inspection was disappointing for us, but we were right up there and in the end there can only be one winner.

Well done to Brackenhurst, but I'm still very proud of what our patrol achieved.

More photos.......