Bronze Practice Expedition

The start of the expedition season saw the Bronze DofE group finally being tested in the New Forest. 21 students split into 3 expedition groups followed a 20km route over 2 days. For this first adventure we stayed at Tile Barn . This Hampshire run centre continues to expand its range of activities and I was impressed by their facilities once again. The picture above shows one of the groups in camp preparing the evening meal!

I have to say that I was highly impressed by the ability of the groups. This has been the first cohort of Bronze participants that I have trained for a while as I normally focus on the Gold level of the Award. The weather was very hot for the time of year, with some participants getting through 4 litres of water each day. The anticyclonic conditions did mean that it got very cold at night. I especially suffered as I had decided to rely on my sleeping bag liner and left my full bag at home!

The weekend wouldn't have been possible without the support of the excellent team of expedition trainers who gave their time voluntarily. A few lessons were learnt, including the difficulty of navigating some parts of the New Forest.

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High Impact, Low effort

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David Rogers

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