By: Blonde One

Reading Blonde Two’s post a few weeks ago about Pen Haddow got me thinking about an adults role when it comes to encouraging kids to see the world.

Exploration is a very personal thing I think. They may be nowhere left on earth that is unseen by humans generally, but surely we must all do as much exploration of our own as is possible? It’s not good enough to just sit on the sofa and see the world through the eyes of amazing, inspirational people such as Pen Haddow and David Attenborough. We must all ‘get out there’ and see the world for ourselves. Our own adventures may not take us out of our home continent, country or even county but that’s beside the point. What is important is to see different things, experience a different way of living and wake up to a new view in the morning. Without these new experiences our lives would be quite dull and unfulfilled.

I am in a very lucky position to be able to work with some great kids and although I am with them for a very specific purpose, I like to encourage them to see the world. I encourage them to explore, both on Dartmoor and much further afield, and not sit back and let others do it for them. Some of the kids that I see regularly are beginning to get the idea and will tell me when they have been somewhere new or discovered something about another place that they want to see. It’s a great feeling to be able to influence the future in a positive way of the so called ‘xbox’ generation!

This Friday sees the Two Blondes walking with a group of kids on their first expedition (for many of them) in an area totally new to some of them. Surprisingly this new area is literally a few minutes from their front doors. I am pleased to think that new exploration can still be done (in a small way). Hopefully we will inspire these new ‘Pen Haddow’s’ to continue with their exploration.