Over the Platinum Jubilee Bank Holiday weekend, over 300 young people joined together to celebrate 70 years of Queen Elizabeth's reign by taking part in 4 days of action packed activities!
Thursday morning saw the young people and their leaders arrive to set up their camping area's and to get ready for our very own trooping of the Colour by parading behind 5th Carlton Scout Band, down the drive to the flag pole for our opening ceremony.
After a couple of rounds of PLATINUM, PLATINUM, PLATINUM - JUBILEE, JUBILEE, JUBILEE it was time for the camp activities to get underway. The Crown Jewels hunt saw each team being handed a series of clues, and needed to find a Jubilee Themed picture and make a note of the letter to be able to spell out a location at the end of the hike. Whilst the Scouts ventured off site for a hike, the Cubs remained on site and completed their hunt around Sherbrooke Campsite. In addition to the hunt, the Cubs and Scouts were able to create some special collages of HM The Queen to celebrate the Jubilee.
Following on from their success during the pandemic, Thursday evening saw our very first District Quiz Night with questions ranging from the Queens pets, to identifying lyrics to some well known songs. Whilst waiting for the results, and the winner to be announced, the microphone was passed to Central Notts DC Daniel who had some Chief Scout Awards, and Adult awards to present to some of the participants, before announcing the winners of the Quiz being Gemini ESU.
Before long, and with the night starting to draw in, it was time to head back to our own campsites. Most groups had set up an alter fire in their site, so at 9:45pm when the Nation came together to light beacons to celebrate the Jubilee, Central Notts had a plethora of mini beacons celebrating the historic occasion.
Friday morning the Cubs and Scouts awoke to the sound to vehicles coming onto site bring a wide range of activities for the Jubilee Activity Day. Through the course of the day young people were able to challenge themselves, by climbing to new heights on the climbing wall and making use of their exploring skills in the caving van, to learning some more traditional Scouting skills on the Bush craft base, and for some Cubs and Scouts learning to safely use an Axe and Saw for the very first time. Even some of the Leaders couldn't resist getting involved in some of the activities during the course of the day!
When the Activities had finished in the evening, some of the District's Beavers had come out to join their Groups for a night away from home in advance of the Squirrel and Beaver Scout Activity Day, but before the Beavers could think about that it was time for the Campfire, which saw over 250 voices join together in song with rousing renditions of Campfires Burning, Hello My Name's Joe and many, many more!
Saturday morning we welcomed for the very first time Squirrel Scouts and some more Beaver Scouts for the Squirrel/Beaver Activity Day, additionally we were honoured to welcome Sir John Peace the Lord-Lieutenant of Nottinghamshire, Alex Peace-Gadsby Deputy Lieutenant of Nottinghamshire and Councillor Sue Saddington from Newark and District Council who had all come out see the District celebrations.
After another parade down the Sherbrooke Drive, with the Beavers and Squirrels, all participants of the camp were addressed by Sir John, who is the Queen's Representative in Nottinghamshire. Following this, it was onto the Village Fete Activities. All of the activities had been created by the Groups on Camp and included a Donkey Derby, Tin Can Alley but by far the most popular was 'Dunk the Leader'. Saturday also saw the Tuck Shop opening, and some of the Scouts fundraising for their adventure in Korea as part of the Nottinghamshire Contingent for the upcoming World Scout Jamboree
At 12pm all activities closed and tables started to appear on the campsite drive for the Sherbrooke Street Party. From 12:30pm, all of the Groups had arrived with party food, and there were even some party hats and crowns creating a true party atmosphere. All of the young people joined in with a round of Sweet Caroline, before some party tunes began to play out of the PA System which resulted in a conga being performed around Sherbrooke Campsite!
During the Street Party we welcomed another couple of special Guests when the Mayor and Mayoress of Gedling Cllr Peter Barnes and Mrs Sandra Barnes joined the party. Shortly after their arrival the Beavers, Cubs and Scouts were able to welcome Paws, The Nottingham Panthers Mascot, complete with a UK neckerchief, to the party who joined in dancing and posing for photos.
Saturday Afternoon saw all activities resume, with the addition of traditional races from Sack Races, to Egg and Spoon races before the Tug O' War competition got underway.
Saturday evening saw our closing ceremony of Camp, with awards being presented for the Best Bake in all Sections, The Team Challenge Winners and the Village Fete Activity winners being crowned before the Union Flag was lowered for the final time.
Saturday evening then saw all of the young people participate in the Silent Disco on the main field of Sherbrooke, however we're not sure that it was entirely silent - especially when Sweet Caroline played over the headsets!
And so after months of planning, 4 days of camp have come and gone. It was fantastic to see so many young people being back together and celebrating such a historic occasion in such a memorable way. Thank you to all of the Leaders, parents and particularly the young people for making the Camp the success it has been.
As you can probably imagine, we have a large number of images to process, and will be uploading these to the gallery below, and onto our Social Media channels so keep an eye out to see if you have been spotted in our Camera lense.....
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