Form III Bushcraft Diary
Form III Bushcrafting Trip to Boughton Woods - June 2018
Day 1
The excitement was palpable as Form III, accompanied by Mr Parsons and Mrs Quinton, arrived at Boughton Woods for a three-day bushcrafting adventure. The children were met by camp staff including Camp Leader, Sian, and Tribe Leaders, Simon and Lauren.
On arrival in the camp, there was a tour and a safety briefing. The children then followed their ‘tribe leader’ and learned how to build a camp fire. With three roaring fires going and juicy burgers cooking away on the grills, everyone sat back, chatted and relaxed. Burgers and onion rings have never tasted so good! And being outside made everyone even more famished!
The children had fun learning some riddles and playing games, doing camp crafts and hunting for wood for the camp fire.
Next they were split into three tribes: The Wild Wolves, The Five Star Tulu’s and The Highly Flammables!
Each tribe made a tribal shelter, using fallen trees, branches and foliage, and a fire for their shelter. For supper there was spaghetti bolognaise and delicious, chewy, gooey brownies, cooked over the campfire.
The evening activity was a game of Predator and Where is my Monkey? Lots of running around, laughing and enjoyment!
Time for bed – on the first night, the girls slept in the tipis and the boys could choose between the tipis and their shelters. Lights out at 9.30pm – everyone was fast asleep by 10.00pm.
Day 2
Everyone woke at 7.30am to the smell of pancakes wafting through the camp. The children had firsts, with lemon and sugar or syrup or berry compote, then seconds, and some even had thirds! Then they played ‘the stick game’ until everyone had figured out the secret puzzle of how to play it.
Next up, there was a session on first aid in the wilderness with a staged Casevac - casualty evacuation - in a home-made stretcher. This was followed by a cooking demonstration, with the tribe leaders and Mr Parsons preparing three salmon and cooking them over the fire, and a bush tucker challenge where volunteers ate the salmons’ eyes - bravo to Hattie, Anabelle, Harry G, Heath, Alex and Rosie!
Everyone gathered around the camp fire for a super lunch of noodles, salmon and veggies, accompanied by more singing and games.
In the afternoon, Camp Leader, Sian, butchered a rabbit and explained the process of hunting rabbits as vermin. She skinned the rabbit and showed us the organs before giving the children a rabbit to skin, gut and butcher. They used their knife skills and did a fantastic job.
The ‘Survival Skills Lesson 101’ went down a treat. There was lots of discussion and some biology questions. Mrs Quinton was very impressed with the children and their willingness to be hands-on.
Next, the children were shown four kind of traps: dangle, strangle, tangle and mangle. After supper, the children made their own traps, although they didn’t set them.
Supper was brilliant, the wood ovens had been loaded and the fires set in the early afternoon. By supper time, the coals were red hot and the children made pizzas which were crispy and delicious. They ate them on their laps under the yurt.
The light faded and the rest of the evening was spent with the tribe leaders telling stories around the campfire. The children were transfixed with Sian’s recall of her summer spent in America pretending to be a deer. Very funny!
On the second night, the girls had the opportunity to sleep in their shelters. Lauren, Lola, Alessia, Nada, Rosie and Hattie were so excited and slept really well!
Day 3
Up at 7.30am, the children had a monster breakfast of hash browns, sausages, beans and bread and butter. During our stay, fruit was available throughout the day enabling the children to top-up with apples, pears and satsumas if they felt peckish.
Everyone walked off-site and went to the archery field. Sian gave another safety briefing and taught the children how to fire the arrows. Tribe Leader, Simon, showed us all how to knot a cord wristband which was harder than you might think!
The children put on masks and did a super-charged game of Archery Sniper – a competitive game where you have to fire at disks and shoot them out of their frame with rubber ended arrows and then shoot at each other! It took their archery skills up a notch and was enormous fun. They also had a go at tomahawk throwing - ‘Mum and dad would never let us do this at home!’
The children returned to camp for a lunch of hot dogs and corn on the cob.
Home time and everyone thanked the camp staff and said goodbye.
The bushcraft staff said that our Ashfold children were the most inquisitive, polite and well-mannered children they had met this season. The chef said she hadn’t heard as many ‘Pleases and Thank Yous’ on previous camps.
Well done to Form III for representing Ashfold so brilliantly!
The children left the camp reluctantly – they had had a wonderful time and got so much out of their stay. As they walked out of the woods towards the exit, they sang their camp song one last time, ‘I’ve been eaten by a big white polar bear.'
Polly Quinton
Head of Junior Department
