Larch Hill and Chicken Huts

The sun, a bunch of scouts and Larch Hill what more could you want?

The arrangement was to arrive at Larch Hill from 6pm onwards. Our beaver colony were also on site in the tented village as part of their summer camp but so were hundreds of other beavers from other groups for a Beaver weekend, so we didn't want to get caught up in traffic etc etc. Pacing it out worked well for everyone concerned, parents dropping off after work and scouters arriving from work.

We had 12 scouts join us this time. We had hired the Adirondack shelters aka the "chicken huts" for the night.

A little bit more, shall we say open plan, than the tent option. Whilst waiting for the kids, and whilst a couple of the scouts collected fire wood, myself and F couldn't wait but to get the fire started. We had a our kindling, hay, char cloth, cotton wool covered with Vaseline, more kindling you name it we had it! We got going with some flint and steel..., F got the sparks, no better woman, it was hard, just striking it all the time, we got the odd ember, we were so close, but not a team to give up we persevered. Then our very helpful cub scouter, Dimi, joined in. "One second" he says.. and produced a ferro rod and steel striker from his pocket. We were gobsmacked! And how long was he standing there looking at us trying to get our nests lit ? We straight away commandeered his ferro rod etc and got our nests lit and off we went.

The scouts were on wood collection duty. For the larger pieces of fallen dead wood they sawed them down to a more manageable size, even if they didn't need to be too much smaller, what scout doesn't like sawing wood!! So well done boys and girls, you really got dug in to it. I was pleased to see that our firetastic Jossica was a fellow fire starter!!

The scouts got their turn to light fire (there are two types of fire pits near the shelters). They got it going very quickly and quickly appreciated why a big supply of wood is of paramount importance and the matchstick, pencil, thumb rule is not just silly words :).

We were joined by two venture scouts around the campfire, who also joined us for the main hike to the delight of the scouts!

We were joined by a venture scouter, Mary a little bit later on, thanks Mary.

Oh and a beekeeper! One guess who!

The night went without incident.

Early morning start, wake up time was 5am. We got our stuff together, had a quick snack and got ready to go.

We were on our way.

A couple of hours later we reached our destination... Fairycastle..

We spotted some colour on the horizon, it was a little beaver!!

It worked out perfectly, Silke and her team of leaders and beavers arrived within minutes of us. We all sat together and chatted and ate our sandwiches. Soon though it was time to move and head back to camp.

See our previous hike post for details and more pics of the walk back down to Larch Hill.

We were on another mission and that was to get breakfast. Thank you Mary, Catherine, Dimi and Thomas for having food ready for us tired and weary scouts after an early rise and long walk it was great just to be able to flop down and get fed!