Flint and STeel

“All you need to do is point your feet, squeeze your bottom in and under, pull your sides in-and-up, torso long and strong, shoulder blades pulled down, make your head float and have a beautiful face.”

As a parent and a scout leader, I look on them with pride but also feel a desperate wrench; knowing that a quarter of a million children under 18 slipped past the unscrupulous recruiting sergeants to fight in the first world war…. and who knows how many have since.

We were alone was until I skidded round a crusty lava flow, fell off and landed upside down on the path, exfoliated. A walker appeared from nowhere and asked if I was ok. I still have no idea where they came from.

It is World Arthritis Day and I’m thinking about camping with arthritis. Arthritis affects everyone differently, but here are a few things I have found help me enjoy a night or two under the stars. 

I had a go at a Via Ferrata ‘Iron path’ climbing in Switzerland and became at one withmy adrenal glands!

It is a canvas realm, the preserve of those that live there, just for a weekend.

Single malt, a ball or a mate? I ask Scouts and their leaders; what are your camp essentials?

If there is any yearning ache I have never really admitted to, never wanted to utter, never wanted to have exposed: It’s that tug of feeling lonely. Next week is Loneliness Awareness Week so I have been thinking could camping alone help certain kinds of loneliness?

It’s been Menstrual Hygiene awareness week! So, I got thinking of what camping is like whilst we bleed; it’s annoying but certainly not going to ruin our fun outdoors. How to boss wild camping on your period!

It’s a Tuesday evening in the middle of the GCSE exam period. A sunny blue hue May evening and 25 assessment addled teenagers sit together in a field. Each has a blade. A sharp blade. A blade where a slip and you bleed, a fall and it’s worse.