Duke of Edinburgh Award
Gold Award training sees pupils practice their outdoor skills in rainy Eryri terrain
Rydal Penrhos' The Duke of Edinburgh's Award Programme Leader, Dr Jim Lewis, recalls the latest Gold Award training weekend, which proved a real success - in spite of the rain!
Rydal Penrhos Gold DofE: Training Expedition Sees Pupils Navigate Rainy Eryri
Rydal Penrhos' The Duke of Edinburgh's Award Programme Leader, Dr Lewis, recalls the latest Gold Award training weekend, which proved a success - in spite of the rain!
"Our Gold DofE training experience was conducted over the weekend of Saturday 15 to Sunday 16 March. Nine Year 12 pupils, accompanied by myself and Mrs Rogers, ventured into a rather bleak and remote area of the Eryri National Park to pit ourselves against the demands of wild camping and navigation in reduced visibility.
"Conditions throughout were, shall we say, unfavourable! The pupils were confronted by extremely wet weather, meaning sixteen hours of continuous heavy rain (and when it wasn’t raining it was usually drizzling), as well as persistent low cloud making confident route finding a formidable challenge, combined with strong winds that kept us all awake pretty much all night.
"Looking back, it was a perfect opportunity to develop the requisite skills and resilience for the forthcoming expeditions later this year. At the time, well, let’s just agree that it wasn’t always exactly fun for all. To those pupils who managed to remain cheerful throughout – hats off!
"Once we had hiked up and established our camp on Saturday, we headed out for a few hours of damp navigation, improving on compass bearings, learning to use pacing to measure short distances, improving the accuracy of timing to estimate travel, and paying particular attention to the identification of small-scale contour features.
"It rained constantly throughout this ‘lesson’ and it was a welcome respite to return to the tents to get a bit warmer and slightly drier, if only for a short time. We were then blessed with almost an hour of light rain a little before sunset, which prompted us to emerge and cook a hot meal before it got too dark and the rains came back in earnest and didn’t let up all night.
"Sleep deprived and sodden, we packed up in the morning and set out with the intention of completing a wilderness journey across some five kilometres of arduous terrain, often bereft of easily-discernible features.
"Much discussion was required in order to navigate with any degree of confidence, but I am pleased to report that everyone did extremely well, holding steady to the course that they had set themselves and completing a very challenging loop. There were numerous bogs to traverse, steep and slippery slopes to contend with, streams to cross (including one rather memorable one!), as well as expedition rucksacks.
"A huge amount of learning has clearly taken place over this brief period, aided by the extreme nature of the weather, both in terms of technical ability and appropriateness of kit, as well as in less concrete terms such as awareness of one’s own physical capabilities and mental fortitude. There is, after all, only one way to understand how you might cope in such challenging circumstances. Get out there and live them! Well done, folks. I can’t wait for the Practice Expedition (April 19 - 22).
“Four days and three nights of the same, anyone? Let’s hope for less inclement weather, eh?”
