May was a good month for getting out and about at your Scout Group. Apart from the Group Camp at the beginning of the month, (which we reported on last month), we’ve also attended the Norfolk County Scouts organised Water Activities Weekend at Decoy Broad and been on an expedition hike/camp.

Fourteen Scouts and Explorers had a very full and challenging long Bank Holiday weekend filled with Camping, Kayaking, Canoeing, Stand up Paddle boarding, Bell Boating, junk raft building as well as some land based activities like shooting, Tomahawk throwing and backwoods cooking with around 150 other Scouts and Explorers. The weather was wet for a lot of the time and lightning meant that water based activities had to be suspended briefly but everyone had a good time, the craft tent was a popular place to escape to when the weather was wet.

On a much hotter weekend earlier in the month 5 senior members of Pioneer Troop had a memorable time on a Hike/camp. They navigated and hiked 5 miles whilst carrying their personal and camping kit. They then camped in a wood, cooked expedition food on camping stoves, had a campfire. Next day they packed up the camp and found their way and hiked 2 miles to a pickup point. This was a new experience for them and they rose to the challenge well.

Other Sections have been busy at the HQ site. Our youngest Section -Squirrels, learned about ducklings and chicks with a visit from several of each. The Beaver Sections have been very active with Ninjas gardening and learning about working together in teams and Warriors worked on the Communication badge having fun sending messages in morse code.

Cubs have been outside a lot, Wolves had an athletic session and built bug hotels and carried out some experiments to work on their Science badge. Tigers, in small teams, did some cooking on camp stoves.

We have been fortunate to have the project for the development of our allotment for our members to grow things in accepted by Tesco for one of their grant schemes. Diss, Aldeburgh and Saxmundham Tesco stores will soon feature our project with two others from the start of July to the end of September. They will issue tokens to shoppers to vote to rank them for grants of £500, £1,000 or £1,500. Please take any opportunity you can to get the tokens and vote for us!