Today was the annual Adelaide Foothills District Cub Pinewood Derby.
While Scouting person and I didn’t get to the whole event, Golden Grove Cubs placed 1st and 3rd overall in the event. This follows last year, when a Golden Grove Cub also took 1st place. Interestingly enough, this year’s 1st place is friends with last year’s 1st place winner.
All who took part enjoyed their day.
Today, a small but determined team participated in this year’s NavFest: Beach. This year, the starting point was at Point Malcom, Semaphore Park.
The team took part in some navigation and map planning activities before sitting down to plan their route. Deciding on team name provide to be challenging.
Eventually it was sorted (We are Here For The Ice Cream) and so was the planned route.
We headed off, but unlike others, the cubs did not run, and we think that was a bit of a relief. It ensured we were able to stay as a group from the get go.
Over the course of 2 hours, the group covered a distance of 7 ½ km, which included a stop for ice cream.
Once again, the team came in about the middle of the field, with a score of 460 points. Not a bad effort and certainly continually improving on the points gained, as well as improvement in their map reading skills. This alone makes doing NavFest a worthwhile activity and we are looking forward to doing it again next year.
Today, getting up was a bit later than yesterday. But it was a full night of sleep!
This morning’s main activity was the Tube Slide! It was certainly a great way to expend some energy.
Once the youth members had their fill of running up the hill with the tubes, and sliding down, we headed back to the Bunkhouse, to start packing before lunch.
While having lunch, and finishing packing up, Baloo was busy counting Camp Cash. This is the group’s camp version of patrol earing points to be the winning camp patrol. Baloo then makes a Camp trophy with the winning Patrol Name and patrol members listed on it.
Soon, parents were arriving and it was time to do the closing of camp. This included the announcement of the winning camp patrol. We are wondering how long it took for the youth members to fall asleep in the cars on the way home.
As expected, it was an early start to the day! First Day of camp, what can we say? Always an early start on camp!!!
Once we had sorted
breakfast, it was time to head over to Challenge Hill, done in the patrols they
were sorted into the previous evening. From there, we headed up to the top of
Cardiac Hill, to do some tree Planting. This had been organised by Woodhouse,
and our group had included it as a part of our group camp program. We think
they had more people than they had initially planned on, as the trees were
planted so quickly.
While the Cubs, Scouts and Venturers were tree planting, the Joeys were on a
youth led Joey Hike. They even packed their lunch to go. We hope they had a
awesome time
These two activities took us to lunch time, and we certainly appreciate the Parents who attended to help in the kitchen.
The Joeys returned not long after lunch and, in their patrols, they went out and did some orienteering around Woodhouse. We stayed back in the Bunkhouse, as we had a bit of a late-night last night, and this little sheep needed some rest to recover.
As a group, we attended a combined Story Telling and campfire session, run by Woodhouse at 4pm until 6pm. Agan, it drew a crowd, although I suspect our group was most of that crowd!
Once we had tea, the group headed back out to the campfire for the evening, to relax. Slowly over the course of the evening, the youth went to bed…
Today, Golden Grove Cubs and Joeys joined around 100 other Joeys and Cubs (120 in total including Golden Grove) from Adelaide Foothills District for Archery at Woodhouse Campsite.
While the archery was only a couple of hours, we spent the day at Woodhouse doing a variety of activities besides the Archery.
Golden Grove Cubs and Joeys had fun doing Challenge Hill, as well as the Tube Slide. Several did the Labyrinth after their parents picked them up.
It was a awesome day, and we are sure a number were asleep early on Saturday night.
Today is ANZAC Day.
ANZAC stands for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps.
Anzac Day falls on the 25th of April each year. The 25th of April was officially named Anzac Day in 1916.
On the 25th of April 1915, Australian and New Zealand soldiers formed part of the allied expedition that set out to capture the Gallipoli peninsula. These became known as Anzacs and the pride they took in that name continues to this day.
The Anzacs landed on Gallipoli and met fierce resistance from the Ottoman Turkish defenders. Their plan to knock Turkey out of the war quickly became a stalemate and the campaign dragged on for eight months.
At the end of 1915, the allied forces were evacuated. Both sides suffered heavy casualties and endured great hardships. Over 8,000 Australian soldiers were killed.
The meaning of Anzac Day today includes the remembrance of all Australians and New Zealanders killed in military operations. It is a public holiday in both countries.
Many Scouts and Guides in Australia and New Zealand attend Dawn Services, Marches and Overnight Vigils in both countries.
Scouting person and I attended the service last night, as mentioned in the previous post, which was the start of the overnight vigil at the Smithfield Memorial Gardens.
Golden Grove Scouts had a number of youth members attend dawn services around Adelaide, including Elizabeth RSL and Tea Tree Gully RSL.
Scouting human and I attended the Adelaide March, along with the group’s Joey Leader and one Cub / family. Getting into town was an experience and a half – a bus that didn’t turn up, a mad dash to Smithfield Train Station, line up for a coffee (that is a story in itself), the thought that we were going to have rain for the March (it cleared and didn’t rain) and running into Guide Leader friends in the line at the toilets in Adelaide Train Station!
From here, Scouting Human and I headed to Glenelg Oval, to watch Sturt take on Glenelg in a rematch of the 2023 SANFL Grand Final. The SANFL (South Australian Football League) do this every year, schedule the 2 grand finalists in a rematch on ANZAC Day. While the grand final is played itself at Adelaide Oval, the ANZAC Day game is played at the home ground of the winner. Hence, why we went to Glenelg Oval today.
Today, Sturt (our team) won, and really did well, certainly made up for the Grand Final lost last year.
From here, it was time to head home. It had been a long day, but the weather held, we were able to pay our respects to those who served, and see a game of football.
Lest We Forget
This evening, I attended, with Scouting human, another leader from the group (Joey Leader), and several youth members an evening Anzac Day Eve service.
It was slightly shorter than a regular Dawn Service, but it also signaled the start of the overnight vigil at the Smithfield Memorial Gardens.
It is a City of Playford run event and a smaller event, handy for those who are not able to deal with large crowds.
Today is Clean Up Australia Day. This year, Golden Grove Cubs joined with Friends of Cobbler Creek for their event. Cobbler Creek had 3 clean up sites and the Cubs were at the one around the playground area. This is useful to do as it was away from roads and therefore the risks of accidents are greatly reduced.
We had several Cubs and Joeys attend
the event this morning and they all did Golden Grove Scout Group proud.
Everyone we spoke to after the youth had left were impressed with their behavior and how well they worked this morning.
Well, done to all who attended today.
This evening, the Cub Unit went for a walk-through Carisbrooke Park. It was a chance to get out of the hall, and to add some km to the Walkabout Badge. It was a great night to get out and about, to do something different, ensuring that the Cubs are getting a varied program.
Overall, a great chance to get out and do something different.
Today, we had one team entered in the NavFest:Beach. It was also our 1st activity away from the hall for the new scouting year.
While we had two teams last year in NavFest:Beach, this year we only had enough for one team.
The team covered 7.5km during the event and did very well for themselves. The improvements included distances covered, as well as the number of checkpoints they were able to get stamped (therefore increasing their points they were able to use for the over all total (therefore increasing their points they were able to use for the total). They finished very respectfully in the middle of the rankings.
Overall, a very enjoyable activity and the leaders are, at least, looking forward to the NavFest event to be held in September – it will have a playground theme! We are bound to be at that event when it occurs.
