Richard, one of the Scout leaders wrote this post about a recent competition...
Every year,
in October, the Hertfordshire County team organise an event called Peak
Assault, open to all Groups in the County. The event is for Explorer Scout
teams (14.5 – 18 year olds), Network teams (18-25 year olds) and Senior teams
(25+). An element
of this event is the secret location – you turn up and get on a coach on the Friday
night, and get driven to ‘somewhere hilly / mountainous’ in the UK.
3rd
Ware, and Ware and District were well represented at the 2012 event – 3 senior
teams (all from 3rd Ware plus a representative from 1st
Great Amwell –two mens’ teams – the A-team and the I-team, plus an all girl
team, none of which had previous experience of the event), 2 Explorer
Scout teams (one from Lygean in Ware,
one from Armynage in Buntingford) and a Network team (from the Caveo Network –
there’s one for the Latin Scholars amongst you).
There was a
rather ominous start to the event, as we awaited the arrival of the coach at
Chauncy school whilst it poured with rain. The coach took us around the M25
(taking a diversion via Slough to join the M4 because of the traffic). Heading
West along the M4 meant there was effectively only 2 places we could be going –
Dartmoor or the Brecon Beacons. Several hours and a Burger King meal later, a
failure to turn left at Bristol and a journey over the Severn Bridge meant
there was only one place we could be going – the Brecons.
We arrived
at our destination, Llanthony in the Black mountains (Eastern end of the Brecon
Beacons), at 2330, and went about setting up camp. The rain that had met us at
Chauncy school had disappeared and it was dry and clear.
The format
of the event is slightly different for the Explorer Scout teams – they do the
event as a 2 day expedition, taking all their kit with them and camping out at
a pre-determined ‘high camp’. The Network and Senior teams return to base camp
on the Saturday night, doing the event as 2 day walks.
The event
itself is essentially a wide scale orienteering event. You are handed a couple
of 1:25000 maps plus a sheet of (8 figure) map references of the checkpoints,
along with their scores (the further away / more remote they are, the higher
the points value – this year the checkpoints were worth 3, 6 or 8 points). Each
checkpoint is a 1.5 foot high metal post, with an orange circle on top,
attached to which will be a orienteering stamper with a unique pattern. The
competition is to locate as many checkpoints as possible, stamping your sheet
to prove that you had located the checkpoint. Being only 1.5 foot high, some
checkpoints are very challenging to locate and really test micro navigation
skills – esp. challenging when using maps dated 12 years previously which had,
amongst other things, an entire forest marked which had now been felled.
There are
more checkpoints to find than time available, so decisions have to be made as
to which ones to attempt and which ones to leave – for every 5 mins late back
from your 8 hour allocation, 1 point is deducted.
Once the
tents were all up, there was a short time to admire the beautiful stars (it’s
amazing how many stars you can see when there’s little light pollution – it was
stunning, you could even make out the Milky Way). As we gazed up and our eyes
scanned the horizon, we noticed these rather large hills surrounding us. With
those in mind we turned in ready to get up a few hours later.
We were very
blessed this year to have a fantastic support crew to do the catering – Richard
Knight and Michael ‘Weasel’ Walkerdine, who looked after us so well all weekend
– a huge thanks to the pair of them. We got up to be greeted with bacon butties
and hot tea. Wonderful. All too soon it was over to kit check (there are
mandatory kit requirements) and then to start day 1. We did the kit check in
the dark and by the time we actually started it was just about light enough to
mark the maps (you are only handed maps and the list of checkpoints once you’ve
completed kit check) and make a decision as to which checkpoints to go for
The team I
was in decided to go for all the checkpoints on the ridge (incl. Ben Mawr) on
west side of the valley – since there were more points available from the
checkpoints. Any spare time we had left would be used to get ones on the other
side of the valley. Many teams came to the same conclusion, albeit route
selection was somewhat varied.
A slog up to
the top ensued, meeting our first marshals towards the top of the climb just
before we bagged our first checkpoint. A walk along the ridge followed as we
picked off more checkpoints. One of our most challenging of the day was the
checkpoint furthest from base camp on this side of the valley. It was marked
beside a Boundary Stone…..although in reality it was no longer there causing us
some doubts as to whether we’d found the right checkpoint. We guessed we had,
grabbed the stamp and moved on to collect the others. Despite another challenging
one hidden amongst a load of bracken, we successfully located all the
checkpoints we were aiming for and decided to head back to base camp via the 3
point checkpoint on the eastern side of the valley. A checkpoint that, despite
being a little tricky, we successfully found. This find was to prove
significant in the final reckoning.
We had
bumped into both the other senior teams, and our Network team whilst out and
about – all of whom had picked different routes. The Caveo network team, I-team
and Insanity team both came back within the 8 hour time slot. The A-team went
for a different tactic of deliberately getting back late (and thus incurring
penalty points) – whilst trying to pick up enough checkpoints on the eastern
side of the valley to give them a net gain of points. The A-team were very
reticient to admit how many points they’d earned themselves at the end of
Saturday, meaning they’d either done well (as I thought), or gone a little
wrong.
After a
short sleep to recover, a superb Richard / Michael meal of pasta bolognaise
followed by chocolate sponge and custard was provided, after which we all
retired to a local bar to socialise and share thoughts and experiences.
On Sunday,
after another bacon butty and tea breakfast, all three 3rd Ware
Senior teams picked the same strategy – pick off all four 8 point checkpoints
up on the Eastern ridge. The ridge actually forms part of the border between
England and Wales, and is part of the Offa’s Dyke footpath (so you could say
the event took us to 2 different countries). After 2.5 hours the I-team were
back in base camp, followed by the A-team, the Caveo Network team and then
Insanity. Shortly afterwards the Explorer teams returned and we set about
packing up.
Once we were
all back, we loaded all kit into the bus and awaited the prizegiving. In all,
it was a pretty successful prize giving for Ware and District – the Caveo team
won the Network competition and in the senior competition the 3rd
Ware teams came 3rd, 4th and 9th. I think the Lygean Explorer Scout team came
10th in the Explorer competition.
To try and
put into context the amount of height the teams had to climb – over the course
of the 2 days most teams climbed the height of Snowdon from sea level. The
A-team climbed this sort of height on the first day alone.
Everyone
from 3rd Ware seemed to enjoy it. The dry weather certainly helped,
and it was great for the Leaders, who put in so much time and effort during the
year on behalf of the young people, to have an event that they can take part
and compete in. Everyone seems to keen to take part in next year’s
event………wherever that might take us. Let us know if you want to join us next
October.
