An Era is (Camp)over

Hello dear readers, I write this entry after being deprived of much sleep but I shall type away through the lack of sleep just for you.

So last night was the Young Rangers Campover and my last Young Rangers event, after five years of going to them. Shortly after arrival we headed to the birch clearing that would be our camp for the night. We were sleeping under ponchos spread out and tied to trees. The lack of trees in our part of the clearing meant we had to use a lot of rope to actually reach the trees and our little shelter made of three ponchos used fifteen pieces of rope!

Whilst the fire was warming up and the food was being prepared we played around with some hoops, mostly by attempting to jump through them as they rolled along the ground. I have no athletic ability of any kind so everyone found my attempts to jump through them rather entertaining. Someone at the camp had to leave for hospital after an incident with a stick caused a cut above their eyebrow. They were fine though apparently.

For tea we had sausages and a vegetable “soup”. In fact it was more water than vegetables so we ended up calling it broth instead. There were some jacket potatoes available too but the one I ended up with looked like a lump of coal, so I didn’t eat it.

After another mild accident and a child had recovered from being away from their mother, we headed out for a bit of orienteering in the dark. It’s hard enough to find the stupid posts in the light but in the dark it’s another matter and everything looks a little different. We found all but one of our assigned posts though with the missing one hiding somewhere in the bushes. We eventually headed back to camp and sat round the campfire for a bit. Here we told a few jokes and a lot of banter went around, especially when one of the young rangers said, as a joke, that his girlfriend was pregnant. He said it very seriously for a minute and this led to us making constant jokes about the upcoming birth of his first child.

We eventually returned to our shelters but we sat up and chatted ‘til gone 1AM and then I had to deal with a snoring person by my feet. I did get some sleep but I awoke at 5AM to the sound of a cockerel crowing, a cow mooing, the dawn chorus and the local car boot sale doing it’s first announcement of the morning. Also it was freezing cold so I figured I wasn’t getting any more sleep and went and sat by the fire. One of the young rangers regretted bringing a hammock when he was woken up by being tipped out of it.

A couple of hours later we had breakfast which consisted of bacon rolls and Rice Krispies. I was lucky enough to get an extra bit of bacon as it was my last time. Some toast was attempted to be made but it was more like charcoaled bread. I still ate it though.

For the last few hours, we did some fishing. I was so close to completing another item on my list of things to do before I die when I got a bite from a rather sizeable fish but due to my inexperience I lost it. Some others caught some sizeable tench and a perch, much to the amusement of the little kids.

And then it was all over. I said some goodbyes and was promised a host of new Facebook friends, and my last ever young ranger’s session ended. Five years of Young Rangers and ten years of events at Moors Valley have come to an end. Pretty much everything in my life has come to an end recently and as yet I have no confirmation of a future. Fingers crossed.