28/08/2015
Another beautifully written article by our very own Emma Thomson, about our latest network camp with the Polish Scouts!
On the 3rd of July, the camp between Alty Towers (Altrincham Network) and the Scouts from Garwolin in Poland began, although the Polish Scouts had not yet joined us as we began to set up camp. We left the scout hut on Friday morning and headed to Stott Park on the shore of Lake Windermere, with a trailer full of everything we could possibly need for the camp – except a
colander, but we’ll get to that later... Once we arrived, we set up the tents for ourselves and the Polish scouts who would be arriving the following night, before setting up the mess tent and the equipment tent, before relaxing for the rest of the day, and all talking round the campfire for much of the night.
Saturday was a lazy day for all involved – after a lie in, the majority of the afternoon was spent either in or around the lake, with people kayaking to their heart’s content, reading their books and making the most of the sunshine before the predicted rain would fall. Soon enough it was time to cook dinner, which was rapidly eaten, before an intense game of Kwik Cricket commenced. It didn’t take long for the competitive sides of certain team members to appear, with some of the bats causing the ball to disappear into the woodland temporarily! Once the game was finished, half of us headed to the minibus in order to meet the Polish scouts at Liverpool Airport. After sleeping on the nice warm, minibus, we all stepped out into the cold and headed towards Arrivals. Once we got there we began looking for some familiar faces, as we had already met half of the Polish Scouts when we went to Garwolin to camp last summer, and soon enough there they were. We said a happy hello to old friends, and an excited hello to the Scouts we had just met, before embarking on the long, sleepy journey back to the campsite – which would take around two hours. Once we got to the campsite we were greeted by the remainder of our group who had stayed to set up the campfire, where we all had a warm drink whilst getting to know each other a little (and breaking the news that there would be no opportunity to shower until Thursday evening at the earliest...it didn’t go down too well!). We briefed them with the plan for the next day, before all heading off to bed as it was half past two after all!
Sunday morning was greeted by a whistle calling us all to the flag pole where we were told to go and put our swimming costumes on for dips in the lake before breakfast. However, the dips did not go to plan, with one of the Polish Scouts, Kamil, cutting his foot on the floor of the lake...not a great start to their week in England! Once his foot had been cleaned and bandaged up, we all had breakfast – with the porridge expertly cooked by Peter (who was widely complimented for his new found porridge-making skills) – before Scouts Own. Scouts Own was a great experience, with several highlights; we were each given a rock which we had to write a fear we had about the camp on by using another stone, and all throw it into the lake, and also we all made a bracelet to remember the camp and the friends we had made – with each bracelet having a bead that represented the old
friends we had, and the new friends we would make over the course of the camp. To end the Scouts Own we invested Annie into Alty Towers Network – of which many photographs were taken of the occasion! Several of us decided that it was probably best to take Kamil to hospital to check out his foot – just to be on the safe side – so off he went with Andy to the nearest walk-in centre, while the rest of us stayed and built a bivouac. We collected branches and trees from all around, with lots of moss and ferns to offer a waterproof layer – it took us around three hours to build the impressive bivouac, which even had a door and was named Moss Cottage! Before we headed back to the fire
for lunch, we decided it was a good idea to try and fit all twelve of us into the bivouac which could comfortable hold only around four people in...but it made a great photo and a bonding experience!
Lunch was backwoods cooking, which the Polish scouts had not experienced before, and they greatly enjoyed it – even if it did mean it was at least an hour until any food could be eaten! As a result, it was a very late lunch, late enough that there was only a few hours left until dinner, so we all decided to sit round the campfire and get to know each other further, which also meant that we were all there to welcome back Kamil when he returned from hospital on crutches! Two other Networkers arrived for the night shortly before dinner, and joined in the ‘Two Truths, One Lie’ game, which ensured that we all got to know each other much better! Once we had eaten dinner, cooked by three people who were designated on cooking duty according to the rota we had created, we all played wide games – which mainly involved playing manhunt in the darkness – before we had a warm drink with some cake and then headed off to bed.
On Monday morning there were much fewer people at dips (to no-one’s surprise) and a large breakfast was eaten by all, before the packed lunches for the day trip ahead were made. We all got in the minibus and headed to Keswick, again with most of us fast asleep on the journey, before we arrived in the slightly rainy town. The first destination was the Pencil Museum, an attraction which some of us had visited before. Particular highlights included the jokes (e.g. ‘a horse can be taken to water, but a pencil must be lead’...), the largest colouring pencil in the world (which was surprisingly tricky to find), and the colouring in table (even if it was intended to be used by young children). Once we had eaten lunch, we headed to the Puzzle Museum which did not disappoint. All of us were captivated by at least one thing in the museum, although most of us seemed to be attracted to a room which was on such a steep incline that you felt you were going to fall over, but things would still roll seemingly uphill due to the impressive gradient of the room...although the physics was simple enough, none of us could truly get our heads around it – just like the puzzles that could be attempted in the shop (a considerable number of us left particularly frustrated). Once we left the museum, we all headed towards the shore of Derwentwater, where we sat and admired the view for a while before heading back to the minibus. Once we arrived back at camp, we began to make dinner, after which we all sat around talking for a long time, before we had an early supper and all headed off to bed – we had to be up early the next day for gully bashing...
At half past six the whistle signalled to us to head to the flag pole, and we were told about the day ahead – most of the group would head off to gully bashing, and those who couldn’t participate in gully bashing for various reasons would drive into Bowness to explore the local area. During breakfast, the sandwiches for lunch were made, before the group who were going gully bashing left for their adventurous activity! A standout moment for many was when one member of our group, Annie, fell off a rock in slow motion and landed in the river, seemingly too quickly for anyone to fully grasp what was going on before it was too late... Fortunately, Annie was wearing a helmet so
received no permanent damage (although several bruises), and luckily saw the funny side to the incident! Meanwhile, the group of us who headed to Bowness had a similar scare when we thought
Kamil’s foot was bleeding through his bandage due to a dark shape beneath his sock, so we began to walk to the nearest walk-in centre. About half-way there we decided to check the bandages without his sock on, and found that the dark shape was in fact a plaster...much to our amusement! Once the group returned from Bowness (after tea and scones), we had a lazy afternoon looking after camp whilst waiting for the other group to return, where we heard many funny stories of the day’s events, including the aforementioned incident! We had started dinner for those who were on cooking duty to allow them to get warm by the fire before beginning dinner properly; dinner was finished rather quickly – it seems gully bashing works up quite an appetite! After dinner, camp sports was set up (potentially not the best idea on a full stomach) which involved being split into two teams, crawling
under a net, doing a sack race, solving an anagram, apple-bobbing, finding a piece of chocolate in flour using only our mouths and then running up the huge hill behind camp, before running back down to the finish line...it was surprisingly exhausting! We all collapsed into the chairs around the campfire before quickly having a hot drink, and going to bed relatively early as we were all so tired!
On Wednesday, our last full day in the Lake District, we headed into Ambleside after breakfast. We boarded the ferry which took us across the length of Lake Windermere, where we passed some
beautiful scenery and houses, whilst making the most of the plug sockets on board the ferry to charge our phones! When we arrived in Ambleside, we split into groups of eight – with four Polish
scouts and four Network scouts in each – and wandered around Ambleside, looking at different attractions, and again making the most of the small amount of sunshine! When we returned to the
campsite, after a delightful minibus ride consisting of singing and dancing to some of S-Club 7’s greatest hits, we continued the singing and dancing whilst cooking dinner. The corned beef hash
which was the evening’s meal went through interesting stages of cooking, especially due to the addition of a little too much water...but went down very well with the Polish Scouts – apparently it bears a strong similarity to Polish goulash, at least once lots of Brown Sauce was added! After all chatting for a while, it was time for the campfire to begin, lead by Holly and Ella. The campfire was great fun for everyone, with some of the actions to songs getting potentially terrifyingly intense (particularly ‘There Aint No Flies On Us’...), whilst the Polish Scouts sung us some traditional songs they sing at campfires. Once the campfire had ended, we all sat around for a while and continued to sing different songs we all knew, before all heading to bed. Around half an hour after we went back to our tents (some of us knew what was about to happen, so hadn’t bothered to fall asleep) Andy began to shout at everyone to get out of their tents and put their uniform on – it was genuinely scary, even for those who knew what was going on! We then walked through the forest in complete darkness trying not to fall over the roots that were all over the place, until we reached the shore of the lake where three of the Polish Scouts, Czarek, Damien, and Kamil, had made a campfire to allow us to invest Magda (one of the Polish Scouts). It was clearly an emotional experience for Magda and everyone was very happy for her! Once we had all hugged Magda, we began to walk back to the campsite, where garlic bread was put on the campfire so that everyone could enjoy a pre-bed snack, after which we stayed up talking before it was definitely time for bed – we would have an early start in the morning!
With Thursday morning came the day we would leave Lake Windermere behind us, and with that came the smallest number of us going for dips in the lake yet! For breakfast we used up most of the leftover food, which was quite a large amount, before deciding to pack down the tents once we had moved all of our belongings to the other side of the field – which seemed a lot further away when you were carrying lots of heavy things! Once we had finished packing up the remainder of the site, we officially closed camp by the flagpole before eating our packed lunches in the sunshine by the lake. Before we knew it we were in the minibus on the way to our Scout hut, accompanied by yet more S-Club 7, as well as Busted, and many more of our childhood favourites playing through the speakers – which managed to lull most of us to sleep until we arrived at the scout hut. When we got there we unloaded the trailer and lay all of the tents out to dry, before we headed off for a long awaited shower! Following our return from the showers, we ate dinner and then it was time for the Cub meeting, which was a lot of fun. After Cubs had ended, we decided to watch the film Frozen on the projector, as it was a film that we could all sing along to – and did! The film was enjoyed by
everyone, even if many of us did have a nap before it finished, and it was a great moment with us all singing along to ‘Let It Go’! As most of us could barely keep our eyes open at that point, we decided it was time for bed, and we were all looking forward to sleeping in a warm, dry room after our time by the lake!
The next morning we woke up and had breakfast before making our way towards the Interchange to catch the tram to Manchester. We had to get off the tram a few stops earlier than we intended due to there being work done on the lines, but we headed straight to the Museum of Science and Industry. When we arrived we split off into two groups of eight again, and explored the museum and all of the exciting things it contained! It was greatly enjoyed by all, although especially the Polish who were interested in learning all about the history of both Manchester itself and the UK as whole!
After we had eaten lunch outside the Arndale Centre, we headed inside to Poundland – a shop which many of the Polish girls spent forty five minutes in! We then headed to Piccadilly Gardens, which was to be a temporary base camp while some of us headed towards Primark, after which we all enjoyed the sun in the gardens before heading back to the Scout hut. On our return to the Scout hut we were given fish and chips, it was the first time some of the Polish scouts had ever tried mushy peas, in preparation for the energy we would need for the Beaver meeting! When the Beaver meeting began we all played games with the Beavers which involved a lot more running around than some of us had done in a while, but it was great fun, and we also watched two Beaver’s get invested and one move up to Cubs! Next it was time for the Scout meeting, which again consisted of more games, and more running around, but also some of the barbecue foods that the scouts didn’t want!
After taking lots and lots of photos, including fake selfies, the meeting ended and it was time to embrace some ridiculous dance moves whilst listening to Euro-pop...the dream. Once we had exhausted ourselves from dancing, it was time to watch Pitch Perfect; to our surprise it had Polish subtitles available, which came in very useful! The film was enjoyed by all of us, with there being lots of laughing throughout! However, too soon it was time for bed, as the end of our last full day together drew to a close.
On Saturday morning the tiredness hit us all like a brick, and we could barely drag ourselves out of our sleeping bags, but we had to pack up all of our things as it was almost time to say goodbye. Once we had had breakfast, we all headed into Altrincham to show the Polish scouts our local town; as with Manchester, the pound shops were particularly popular! After we had returned to the Scout hut we all prepared to say goodbye to both our old and new friends; the Polish scouts gave us some parting gifts of a key-ring each, along with a necker, a t-shirt, and some of the badges they wear on their uniform to split between us – which were very quickly divided between us as we fought for our favourites! It was then time for us to load up the minibus with all of the bags in order to take them to the airport, before we had to say farewell. We were all sad to see our friends go, and after we took the final photograph of the camp we waved off our friends as they headed towards the airport, knowing that some of us would see them soon at ‘Drop into Poland 2016’ – something we are greatly looking forward to!
