By: Blonde One
Apart from the difficulties in planning, the recent Gold DofE trip was very eventful.
The day started quite early on with a case of mild hypothermia. Luckily the patient was treated with hot chocolate, cookies and an orange group shelter.
Just before lunch we had a broken ankle that required emergency treatment and then a efficient helicopter evacuation. The group settled down to cook themselves lunch (since the stoves and tents were already out after the broken ankle). This resulted in a quite serious burn for a Young Leader. The group quickly dealt with this and got going again to finish their route. We thought we were home and dry with the minibus in sight when we had a serious case of LMF (lack of moral fibre, or grumpy teenager-ishness). The group found this tricky to deal with but the Young Leaders soon stepped in to demonstrate strategies to deal with it.
It was a very busy day but luckily it was all just training! The Young Leaders, it seems, are excellent actors as well as leaders!
Did you get a real helicopter to take part?
I am quite good at organising but a real helicopter was beyond my skills! Imagine the group’s faces though, if one had appeared over the hill after they made their mock 999 call.
They like their training ‘real’, don’t they? What fun!
Love it… as real as it gets! The most memorable Scout camps were always the ones with several “first aid incidents”. One such occasion included a knife in the thumb, axe in the hand, foot in the billy can of boiling water (don’t ask), feint as a result of blood, and a secret mcdonalds for the leaders due to all said time consuming incidents. Ho hum!