Woggleknot.com – An Explorer Scout's Blog

I haven’t posted for a while because I’ve been spending a lot of time revising for my GCSEs and I decided to have a break from Scouting while I got my exams over and done with, so I could get more revision done. Today I finished my last exam so I’m completely free from school now. I’ve got over two months to relax and not worry about any school work, but I guess that’s all going to change when I start college in September!

Tonight was my first night back at Explorers and we were on the high ropes course. We had to climb up a big wooden pole and when there was four of us up at the top we all had to hold on to each other and lean back. That was probably the hardest part – we really struggled to keep our balance because we were all stood on a tiny platform. Jumping off was fun – they let me down quite fast when I didn’t expect it, and the adrenaline rush felt great!

After that part of the high ropes course we had to work in our teams of four to climb something called “Jacob’s Ladder” (well, I think it was called that…). It’s a giant rope ladder and the further you get up the further the rungs are apart – you need to a small length of rope and help each other to climb up. I’ve never made it to the top (but that’s something I’d like to complete before I leave in two years!) but I think I managed to get one level further than I did last time, which I’m quite happy about.

It’s good to be back!

Well I’ve been getting quite a lot of exercise over the last few days with my explorer unit. On Sunday we went for a day hike somewhere around Denby dale. It wasn’t that strenuous and It was more like a leisurely stroll. The main focus on the hike was to allow people to improve their navigational skills with the map – I think some people improved.

Tonight was brilliant fun too! I just got back from trampolining at the sports centre and I feel kind of dizzy. I’ve done trampolining at school and the trampolines aren’t very good there so it took a while getting used to the ones at the sports centre because they’re a lot bouncier.  I think by the end of the night I’d improved a bit.

And because I haven’t officially started my D of E physical recreation yet, I might do trampolining instead. Just a thought…

I have exams this week so YET AGAIN I won’t be able to go to scouts. I’m gonna have to miss explorers to revise. This is starting to get annoying now. I’ve missed scouts the last two weeks because of all the snow and stuff.

I should be able to go and help out on thursday though

We’ve had an extremely cold start the new year and it’s brought both benefits and complications. The main benifit was being able to go home from school early on Tuesday and get the day off on Wednesday, but because of Icy roads near where I live I couldn’t get a lift down to Bradley to help out at Scouts. But meh, my Xbox saved me from boredom.

Monday was an awesome night. We went to LazerZone and played 4 or 5 games or Lazer Tag. A bit pricey at £10 but it was great fun. Although I’m not really that good at it. I came last place in the first 2 games then I came ALMOST last in the rest.

I’m hoping to go on the 2011 Jamboree in Sweden and I heard that there’s a selection weekend sometime in February. I’m gonna be going to that and I hope to get one of the guaranteed places with the W.Yorkshire contingents.

I need to push this blog out further so more people read it and that selection weekend might just give me a brilliant oppurtunity to do so…

I should have posted this extremely short post last week but I’ve been busy being lazy, playing computer games, skateboarding and doing school work.

Last week on Monday we went bowling with Explorers. We hired two lanes and split up into two different teams. I’m not too good at bowling because the only bowling I’ve played recently is on Wii Sports. However, it was still great fun and I can’t even remember which team won.

I meant to post this at the weekend, except two things stopped me. One, I was really tired and couldn’t be bothered after walking all night, and two, my cat had to get put down. So I wasn’t exactly in a blogging mood.

But anyway, this year’s nighthawk was as great as last years, although unfortunately my team didn’t win. All of my team, except for me, dropped out of the competition and I had to join another team. I’m not holding anything against them though, some of them really didn’t seem to be coping well. But I decided to carry on and finish the walk anyway, even without a chance of winning. It was still fun, and still an achievement to me.

Unfortunately, I forgot to get my certificate of achievement before we all went home, but I don’t really care. My ID card that’s been clipped to say I’ve reached the finishing point is enough for me!

Tonight at explorers we had a “traditional scouting night”.

First, we were split into two teams. One team went to fetch firewood, and one team (the one I was in) went to get a bag of ropes. There were two challenges. For one challenge, each member of the team had to learn a knot each and show it to the leaders. For the other challenge, the team had to make a fire.

My team didn’t do so well on the knots but the other team did. However, their fire wasn’t very good and ours was, so we ended up winning overall.