Our march up to the battle of Hastings became a crawl and we arrived very late on Friday night /Saturday morning after traversing a couple of car accidents.  Undeterred the Brooklyn scouts mucked in and made the most of the weekend.

Saturday morning arrived before we knew it and was full of activities around the Hawkes Bay showgrounds.  Archery, horizontal bungee, gigantic volleyball to name a few, a mighty effort was given by all, resulting in lots of fun.

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The afternoon saw us set off to Weka Point for water activities, where there was a water slide, swimming, flying fox and floating down the river on inner tube truck tyres. A splashing good time was had by all.  We arrived back at camp had a quick dinner and prepared for the night’s virtual campfire.  This was held on the back of a truck where all the troops did skits.

Sunday was another great day, where the final preparations for battle were done, the battle rules of engagement were provided and they were into it, flour bombs going everywhere.  After a number of battles  the troops cleaned up the battle field and trudged back to camp.  We had lunch, packed up the camp and headed back home to Wellington.  We arrived at 8pm exhausted ready to go home for some rest.

Outstanding effort by our youth, who showed resilience and determination, resulting in another great camp.

The scout hall was rock’n with our youth receiving awards left, right and centre.  The highlight for everyone was Nick Heitger’s Chief Scout Award.

The Chief Scout’s Award is the supreme award within the Scouting section (ages 10 to 15) and is only given to Scouts who have made outstanding achievements in their scouting lives.

The Brooklyn scout troop beamed with pride when Inspector Chris Bensemann (Wellington Area Commander, NZ Police) present Nicky with the prestigious award.

We had a new Patrol Leader (Harry Thornburrow) and three new Assistant Patrol Leaders (Jamie Scott, Joy Brownlie Williams and Rebekah Gibbs) appointed, which will be a good challenge for these individuals.

This was the perfect opportunity to award a large number of personal badges to our youth while so many parents were present.

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It was great to see so many scouts take up the challenge of kayaking, even the cold wind was no barrier.  After the safety briefing  it was onto the water into the harbor for some fun games.  What a fantastic sight to see the 24 scouts out on the water.

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We had a great time on the trip. some only to the summit. Which is a great option for less confident cyclists and also meant you could shuttle the car across to Featherston.
Others went over and through to Featherston – there is a dedicated cycle path from Cross Creek to Featherston which is new and was a great option so kids don’t share the road with cars.  With some doing the incline twice (there and back)!!

Great weather for it, really good ride. I think everyone had fun.