Balfron Scouts

Scouts at Barrwood 2016

Last weekend we had a Scout trip to Barrwood, our District campsite that we visit at least once a year. We packed loads of activities into the weekend so here are a few photos.

We got a chance to show off our new sign...

On Saturday we had a great afternoon on the reservoir, the Network Scouts that were there helped us with the assault course run, kayaking and raft building...

...and on Saturday we also had time to put up bivouacs which we slept in on Saturday night. Some had hammocks and some built their own shelters with the tarps.

The night before, on Friday, we had four Scouts stay in the permanent bivouac at Barrwood, the foxes den.

A lot of time was taken up eating...most of which we actually cooked ourselves on the fire...

...and on the last morning we used up the final shred of energy we had on the "Angus Davis" climbing wall.

2 minute clean up

Back in May we did a 2 minute clean up of Donaldson Park using the new litter bags donated by Clean Up Scotland.

Each Patrol had just 2 minutes to run around the park collecting as much as possible. As you can see, you can collect a lot of litter in just two minutes!

Beavers conquer Dumgoyne

This weekend the Beavers had a wonderful day climbing Dumgoyne. It was a lovely sunny day for walking but the hill was very high...so they all did very well to make it to the top.

They found a geocache on the way and Calum even magically produced ice poles at the top to cool everyone down.

Cub camp in Barrwood

Last weekend we went off to Barrwood, possibly our favourite place to camp. The leaders had loads of activities planned and we started off with a quick run-down of what we were going to do.

Quite a few of us had been here before but for those that were new we went on a long walk around the site. On the way we found the playground...

...and the "ice boulder" which Eileen explained was from a huge mile deep glacier that used to sit here in the last big ice age which took the boulder from the nearby mountains and plonked it here when it melted.

Once we were back at camp we put up our tents. We were almost the only group on the site so we had plenty of space to spread out.

After a quick bit of lunch we got onto our main activities. We did first aid, learning about Dr. ABC, how to make a splint and how to tie a sling.

Then it was down to fire-lighting, always a favourite activity in Cubs. There was not a single match in sight as we used flint and steel to light first cotton wool balls and then twigs, making our fires bigger and bigger.

We had to be careful of long hair getting in the way and had to do a bit of cub scout improvisation.

As ever there was lots of food - huge fajitas, piles of sausages as well as dampers cooked on the fire and tons of cake, supplied by our brilliant parents.

Our activities continued with den building, some of them were good enough to sleep in (maybe we try that when it's a bit warmer).

...and we also went caving in the great tunnel system that they have created in Barrwood.

On Saturday evening we finished the night with a campfire and talent show. We had some amazing acts, short plays, jokes an wonderful monologues...some very funny and some which completely bemused the leaders.

After a good night's sleep we woke to a very damp campsite so we took refuge in the barn and made clay trolls out of any natural material we could find. Then we hid the trolls around Barrwood for others to find when they came to camp here.