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This is like the greatest ting ever. It's really tough but it shows you who your real friends and how much pressure you can handle.
It will either make you and your friendships stronger, or leave you weak and alone...
To get the award you have to some Physical activity, some community service and something to do with skill like sommit creative.
You also have to do 2 Expeditions to the countryside!! this is why the award is worthwhile. on Bronze its jst 1 nite and 2 days. On silver its 2 nites and 3 days and gold its like 1 week!!
From what i remember from a year ago, Bronze d of e was great!
Apart from on both the Practise and the final expeditions, we fell out with becci. This is what i mean about making or breaking friendships.
Anyways, My group that year was Me, obviously, Aleisha, Becci and Steph. We had a bigger group but they all quit. They weren't deternmind!!
I got a few pics from the expeditions but we look awful so don't judge us by them. We were roughin it in the country!
This was our practise expedition. We got soo lost!! (mainly down to me) but when we tried to find our way back it became everybodys fault so it was ok... but it was mainly me again...:-(...
Then camping we fell out with bex, Big Time and we were mega late gettin up and we spent to much time frying spam.
But we did learn somethings.
1. never trust men on horses with directions
2. never trust boys fishing with directions
3. Don't try frying spam when your already late whlist camping.
Aleisha stresses, as the team stands and listens
Me and Becci
To say we got lost, we were only in sherwood forest. We just decided to take the scenic route through the forest instead of round the edge!
And later when we were lost, We were only like 100m off cause we chose the wrong path due to the fishing boys showin us the wrong way!
At Start, before we got totally lost!
This was our final bronze and the weather was really, really hot! It was so hot Steph had to change her clothes on the side of a hill, not a pretty site lol! We didn't get lost once! we did super, super well! We even arrived at camp 5 minutes early (which was a big achevment considering we were 2 hours late on the practise!)
We had a great time on the camp cause the peole next to us were a right laugh and we became really good friends. This goes back to the making and breaking frineds thing cause guess wat we all fell out wiht bex agen!
mmmm Food!
The two groups!!
This was a great expedition! We had a really great time. If you can be bothered to read it, i've put my expedition diary on below here. It's actully really quite funny to say it was school work but i did mainly so i could remember when we have the D of E reunion in June 2015!
We left the house at nine, and went to pick up Becky. At her house we loaded in her luggage and went off to Derbyshire. The luggage had been set out, as it had been in the practice, Becky & Steph shared the tent, and Jenny & Aleisha the food and cooking equipment. When we were in the car Becky fell to sleep but work up after about twenty minutes. When we got to Rowsley, we were 5 minutes late but we had left half an hour to make up for traffic. It was 10:05 and we were due to leave at 10:30. Aleisha and Steph were already there, so we made our way to the loo.
At 10:30, we left the car park and set off for our first checkpoint. We came to the farm, just like on the map, and entered a gate. On the other side, was a herd of cows. Mr Perry said “Cows won’t harm you,” But he was wrong. One cow (Known as ‘The Killer Cow’) Began ‘mooing’ in a menacing manner when we tried to walk past. We didn’t under stand why as it didn’t have any caves with it. We continued on but the ‘mooing’ became more threatening. We all decided to go back to the farm. We decided this when the cow started walking up to us, ready to charge, so we quietly walked back to the farm at the start. We asked the farmer for help, he said, “Them cows won’t harm you.” Just like Mr Perry he was wrong. We decided to give it another go and hoped the cows had gone into another field.
The cows were gone but we later discovered them in another a field. We bravely wove in and out of the undetected by ‘the killer cow’ and made it to the stile safely. By now we were running late on time so we speeded up. We got to the top of a hill and the map became a bit confusing. We did not no if to go up or down. We chose down and a farmer pointed us in the right direction, which turned out to be up. We hit another problem. Both gates through to the check point said ‘PRIVATE’ so we had to go all the way back and we discovered another way round. We met my Mum and Dad at the first check point 10 minutes late. (This isn’t bad what with all the problems)
We set off from the first check point and made our way up to Calton Houses, It was only a half-hour leg. It was up a long slight slopping hill. We Saw lots of sheep and a few walkers but nothing much else. There was a stream but the water wasn’t clean enough to splash in. At the end of this leg, the heat had started to set in. we were all very hot. The four of us collapsed of 15mins on top of the bank but we had to continue on…
My Dad had warned me about this part of the route. He said it was tricky and we would probably get it wrong. We showed him! We did our ‘S’ bend perfectly. We also found a long trail of ‘Weathers original’ wrappers. This was the third leg, it was the leg we caught up time on. We over took loads of other D of E groups and other walkers. We also passed a group from our school who had got lost and were still on leg one. Also on this leg we had to go through a wood. My group isn’t good with woods, we get lost in them. This wood was a dangerous road full of steep and slippery paths, but we made it down. At one point we came to a junction and didn’t no which path to take, but we used our initiative. We used a compass! We found the right way thanks to Becky and the compass. On the golf course Aleisha rang the bell to let the golfers know we were here. And at the checkpoint we saw my Mum, Dad, Mrs Durance and an Assessor!
The Assessor turned out not to be assessing us, so that was good. We had caught up on time by cutting down our half-hour lunch break to 15 minutes and left at our ETD. Aleisha, Becky, Steph and myself set off along the long, hot (but flat) cycle path. On the path we saw people walking, people biking, people horse riding and people sitting. It was a long leg, and kind of boring, but we made it to check point four. However, just before we reached the safety of the checkpoint, Steph fell over. Luckily she didn’t hurt her self at all.
The fifth leg saw the four of us face our fears. We had to walk through a cow field. We quietly walked passed them and they didn’t seem as threatening as ‘The Killer Cow’. After that terrifying ordeal, we sang some songs to keep up the morale. Classics like ‘Hakuna Matata’ and ‘The Ants Went Marching’. When we had walked passed the shady trees, we emerged on to a hot road. The checkpoint was nice and shady luckily. We had a 20-minute rest, as we were 5 minutes early! Aleisha took off her boots and we all relaxed.
We had to leave the lovely, shady checkpoint and go into another cow field. We bravely kept calm and reached the stile on the other side. This leg seemed to contain lots of fields and stiles. Sometimes the gaps were too small to fit the bags through, so we had a bit of bother. In one field were some harmless horses. We knew that they wouldn’t hurt us if we stayed away, so we entered the field. Halfway in (or halfway out) the horses suddenly surrounded us. They were running in circles around us! Becky stupidly screamed and made Aleisha run for the stile, the worst possible thing but luckily, again, the horses didn’t notice. We made it to the stile. One bit of path to go until the checkpoint. It was over grown with nettles. Somehow, we made it through with only two stings between the four of us. In Great Longstone we found the church, my Mum and Dad and the checkpoint.
After a fifteen-minute rest, we set off on our last leg for the day. We passed some houses, a school and a park. As a last challenge of the day, we had to pass through a cow field. The sign on the stile said: Cows running with Bulls. Could it get any worse? Never the less, we made it to the other side. Some walkers nearer the cows and bulls mushave distracted them. We were nearing the camp, we only had to walk up a road and we would be there! We were still on time. On the way we met a family who started talking to us, asking if we were on D of E and about the campsite. They lived up at Monsal Head. That’s where we camped. We were there! We had made it to camp 2 minutes early! (on the practise we were 2 hours late. We were so happy!
Camp
We chose our pitch on the campsite. We were the second team to arrive. First of all we put up our tent.
We unpacked our bags and set up the trangia and the food. It was only 4:50pm so we sat around for a bit and listened to the music that Aleisha had brought. Eventually, the other two teams arrived. About 7:00pm we started cooking. Firstly we cooked a tin of hot dogs. They were really nice. Next we cooked some Smash potatoes (dehydrated). On the practise this was a disaster and again, it didn’t turn out to well. We decided next to cook some beans and hot-dogs together in one pan and this was successful! We left the food for a bit then and sat around some more. Later on we cooked the last tin of Hot-dogs. Everything went well. We eventually got to sleep when the tent next door had stopped playing party music. We slept well, although we had 4 people in a 3-man tent, and had set the alarm clock for 7:30am (we weren’t going to be late like last time).
When we woke up it was about 7:00, so we decided to get up anyway. Firstly, we rolled up our sleeping bags. We started to pack our bags but we stopped for breakfast. (We didn’t plan on having it because it was what made us late last time but because we were early it seemed OK). We had our last tin of baked beans and some French Toast. After that we packed away the trangia, we finished the bags. I had done first so I began taking the tent down. Stephelped me fold it up later. We were all packed and ready to go at about 8:45am, we weren’t due to leave until 9:30am! We sat around a bit and re-filled our water bottles. At precisely 9:30am we departed from camp.
June 19th 2005
Day 2
We headed down the road towards Monsal Dale. We stood at the top of the valley and looked at the view. (Also we had a few hurting legs so we had to stop). Aleisha, Steph, Becky and me headed into Monsal Dale. We went down to the bottom of the valley and passed the weir. It was lovely and cool. We followed the river and went through the shady trees. We reached checkpoint eight on time. Things were looking good.
We left this checkpoint accompanied by my dad (the supervisor), as this leg was where Linda had nearly fallen to her death yesterday. There was a stream, which had taken over the path and made it very slippery. We made it safely to the top of the hill and my dad left us. It was on this leg that we over took the group that had left camp half an hour before us! They eventually forced themselves back in front. So, we walked through the deep dale valley and passed some more cows that were in a separate field luckily. We reached the second checkpoint of the day on time and with no injuries.
At the checkpoint we heard the group who we had caught up with, again, discussing ice cream at the next checkpoint so we headed off with high hopes as it was very hot. It was a simple leg of straight lines. We arrived ten minutes early for this checkpoint in Monyash. We were excited about the ice cream but then Mr Perry was there and later Mr Coghill too! There was no chance for ice cream. This checkpoint was our half-hour lunch break so we had our lunch. We used the left oveFrench Toast. I had brought some mini jam pots. We had toast and jam and it was very nice. It was a reasonable lunch. As we were setting off Mr Perry spoke of a river in the bottom of the Lathkill Dale valley and said we would be able to paddle so we set off with high hopes once more.
This leg of the walk was the most demanding. We passed through a graveyard and then over an endless string of stiles. We eventually made it on to the lime stone way and thought ‘there can’t be many more stiles now.’ How wrong we were. The amount of stiles was ridiculous. We lost out on ten minutes of time as it took us so long to get through them each time. Steph kept getting her bag stuck. We reached the top of the Lathkill dale valley and descended down into it looking forward to paddling. There was major disappointment.
There was no water in the bottom of the Lathkill Dale valley. There was just another stile! We had a fifteen-minute rest and then attempted the steep steps up the valley side. It was very tiring, we had to rest at the top of the hill. We continued on. It was our final leg. We hadn’t seen many cows today but we saw loads on this leg. We passed through lots of fields and most of them contained the killing machine that is the cow. We soon could see the finish point though! As we got closer we saw my mum waiting for us with someone else…
At the finish (woohoo!) we found my Mum, Dad, and Aleisha’s Nan with the camper van and her little dog Kimmy! We dumped our bags and had a lemon mousse out of the fridge in the camper van. That was it. The complete story of our bronze duke of Edinburgh award expedition. We all had a good time and a memorable experience.
This D of E year had a change in the groups. Our friends from the bronze final quit, So we didn't really know who to go with. Even Steph quit!
So I teamed up with Aleisha and Becci (like last time) and our new members were Ally and Gemma!
How wet do we look?
OMG no one will ever understand the hell we went through!
Our Practise turned out to be a total wash out. I have never been so wet!! honestly, not even when i've been swimming! It was still a great laugh, just read below!!
On these photo's we really do look awful, but as i say we were like drowned rats!!
1. wet
2. cold
3. wet
4.smelly (the cows and becci's ass)
5. wet
6. scary (would we make it throught he night?)
7. wet
8. funny
9. unforgetable (FARMER TED!)
10. Wet
This wasnt a good time exactly but it was memorable. it was our Silver practise Duke of Edinburgh Award!!
Me, aleisha, ally, becci and gemma stuck together through the TERRIBLE weather and made it through the weekend! we were all very proud cause most peeps dropped out but not us!
the saturday was wet, and the sunday was even wetter!! but on the monday because we stuck it out through the night when the others didn't, we got a treat! Our good friend Heather (or Miss Mcfall or summit to you lot) Put all our packs in her car so we didnt have to carry them! We all Luved Heather lol!!
The barn song was made up when we spent sunday night in the cow barn and we slept where the cows do usually because it was so wet we couldn't go in the tent. Mr hurrel told us to sleep in the smelly cow barn but it was pretty good (mainly because you couldnt smell becci's farts as much!! lol)
well anyways despite all this SILVER DUKE OF EDINBURGH RULES! and wouldn't have missed it for the world. I think ally and aleisha and becs would agrees. (gemma mite not - she got trench foot.)
the barn song:
we lived in a barn
a very small barn in the country
smelt like ****
but we got over it
in the country
we lived in a barn
a very small barn in the country
Wanted to cry
knew dam well why
in the country.
1. killer lamb (BAAA!!)
2. Farmer ted
3.Farmer tod
4.Farmer bakewell
5. Miss atkinsons freaky daughter!
6. The weather
7. How we take light bulbs for granted
8. The barn
9. The valley (london lads!) WILL and WILL!
10. The barn song
Our final Silver D of E was like the best thing ever!! the weather was gorgeous!! Here below is like our mini diary of what happened...
WOW sums up our silver D of E final!!!
It was sooo Fantastic!!!!
It was the hottest weekend ever!! and supose a bit cooler weather would have been nice but we all got a great tan!
Day 1 Friday June 9
It started great, didnt get lost once did we ally? (i always ask u cause i no you'll leave a comment!)We went on route past the killer cows house. Then we went up hill and kinda got lost adn then Aleisha shouts "i've been here before" adn she says, "Bakewells that way, so we go this way" so we walked and then relised we were slightly miss placed adn then we decided "Bakewell mite have been the other way". So we wnet back on course then. Stopped and had a snack and went onwards! The next leg was nice and easy and straight. We got to the check point early which gave bex time to climb a hill to use the Bush Bog. We ate a snack again, (its very important to keep your energie levels up you know). Then we went on and we found our selves ventureing somewhere we never wanted to go again. The many steps of LathKILL Dale (note the ending KILL) So we wnt down the many steps and up the other side adn then we went through this farm yard and met Allys dad who was the saftey officer.He said to becci and Aleisha "whats all that brown stuff up your legs?" they said "mud" Course we knew different. They'd been jumpin in cow pats for about the last half an hour. We found a bright yellow budgie on a farm. "Aww bless" we all said. We wnt to tell somebody but they said it was always flying around.we then went further on our route from Bronze and then went in to Monyash to what we didn't relise would be a very eventful night of camping!!
When we got to camp, it was great! we set up our tents, we even had a washing line! we put up our england flag and then Jenny and Aleisha and Becci went in the Shower all together! (we had our clothes on peeps!) i think ally went with gemma. so then we went back to camp and rocked to Allys super Ipod Classics such as 'Barbie girl' and 'Sclub7'. there was everthing from My chemical Romance to Bwitched!! After that we ate then went to the loo and that was when the lads (Felix,Tom A,Tom C,Lewis,Fenton,Joe S ) Nicked all our stuff!! our sleepin bags, food, becci clothes and our wicked hats! (see pics) but they left the Ipod (i dont get how there minds work!) so hten we had a mini war with them but we had a secret weapon, BECCI THE TURD SLEEPIN BAG!! so any way that all calmed down sept wen it got late and they wnated to pull there trousers down in front of us, which they did OMG SICKOS!!! and that was day 1 o yeah we spent most of the nite prankin people and askin David out for Gemma Bell, Aww such a sweet couple! lol o yeah and there was THE INCIDENT that we wont tlk about involving Aleisha's Future Career!!
Not such a good day. Very hot and very long. It started ok I supose we set off through a farm, got attacted by a doggy, you know they usual. We went over some more fields, and into this liitle village. When we were havin our check point rest there, these Quad bikes and cows went zoomin down the road. It was quite funny. we found the quad bikes further on and guess what? The keys were in the Ignition still! we were seriously tempted but we didnt nick them in the end. We then went through the Chicken field. We found two chickens and chased them. One ran off but the other one, well becci chased it for ages. we called it Tom. We then went through this wood and found this grave thing. Just a bit wierd but you know. Then the wood stank of garlic but then at he bottom of the hill wood, we found a nice river. Aleisha swam in the river and left summit behind but we wont mention that lol. lets jst say me and Alice are glad we didnt go in and Gemma and becci got there feet out pretty sharpish! next we walked across a load of fields didnt we guys? Made up loads of time cause we was walkin so fast!! so we got to monsil head like half an hour early!! so then we went down in to Monsil dale in a slightly differnt derection than planned but we all knew where we were all the time. we swear later on we didnt stop for ice creams lol.After Monsil dale we were walkin past fiddlers cottage. Course that made us laugh but then summit happend to aleisha and Alice saw it all! Course aleisha being aliesha took a photo. The we found out that england had won there first match of the world cup yay! And then wen we started walin down this vally, Me and Gemma were tlkin bout Pirates of the Caribbean and stuff, Ally and Aleisha were still going on bout fiddlers HEEHEE init girls!! so then i made up the rhyme, Becci thort it was good. then we took a short cut out of the valley and climbed the wall adn then we ended up on the road to camp. YAY! it was then that a HIPPY VAN drove past and me and Aleisha went mad! it was really nice on too. it was going the opposite direction to us tho. so then we arrived at camp.
The camp was awful. We had been spoilt on our first nite lol. It was just a grassy hill side! Yeah a HILL!! part frm playin happy familys and climbin a tree and watchin becci get stuck, nothin great happend. the food was really gd tho. Spicy rice wiht pitta breads. mmmmm. We all went in the shower together again lol. Josh Polack Ripped our TENT! o yeah and we had our England flag out to celebrate a win!! adn we spent the no=ight Prankin people again. IT was soo funny. actully spoke to martin but David hung up on us!! No manners honestly!!!
It was even hotter than the other days! i swear we were all going to melt! but we were looking faward to going in the lake that was on our map. It was big and blue. We couldn't wait to get there and swim! but first off we had to get there.
So it was back into yesterdays valley. Yes we had to walk back into it!! and more awfully, up the other side!! so we reached our first check point and were already shatted! it was soooo hot! but some how, we got there early so we had extra rest. Gemma's mum had been quite clever and had a mini fridge in the back of the car. so our water was ice cold! more went on us than in our mouths lol!
So then we set off again and went through a field of sheep. We thort we'd better take a picture for our project onn wild life. So to prove we took it, we put one of our fantastic hats in the picture. It would have been better to put it on a sheep, but we couldn't be bothered to catch one!
So then we got to top of a hill (after some more sheep fields) and we met Miss Cobam. She gave ally and hand with her ankle, cause it was killing her. I didcovered i had a wistle attached to my bag that i never new was there. (im not stupid, it was digusied as a clasp.)We set off after sorting Ally out and then we all got excited. we knew the lake was coming up! We found it. We were very disapointed. It wasnt as the map said it would be. It was like a desert in one half, then a muddy, dirty lake in the other. They were divided by a wall. We were soo sad. Even if the lake side had been clean there was a big fence round that said 'danger deep water'. well, I mean DUR! water is deep if its for swimming in!
So we moved along and met Gemma's mum at the check point. Gemmas little bro (in his VW camper T-shirt!) was hiding in a tree and Aleisha and Ally didn't relise he was there. It was quite funny. So after some more cold water we set off in to a valley. Now I thort valleys always had water in them. But according to the map, this valley was differnet. Dry as a bone. So we set off some what depressed. We started talkin about Familys. Thats how depressed and bord we were.
It was then, Through a gap in the road, I SAW IT!! There was WATER!! I sceamed it at the top of my voice, i thort it was a merarge. (can't spell lol) I heard shouts from behind me and then Aleisha went charging past nearly knocking me over! But the water was real, and cold and it was just for us!
Ok so really it was a trickle of a stream but it was good enough to put your feet in. It was so nice. Aleisha took this time to empty herself of water too. Becci layed down in it, got up and said "i cold now" so she didn't get back in.
After a while we got up. We kept on walking and we eventully came to the check point. We saw there was a park! wow we thort! lets act like little kids and have some fun! but it was then Aleisha fell over into a patch of nettles. Bless her. Cut her knees and everything! She did look like a little kid with grazed knees. Anyways, it didnt stop us going on the park lol. the we had lunch. MINI CHEDDERS and BIG CHEDDERS and SALAD CREAM stacked together are the tasty things ever. A bit of lettuce on top and its great!!
So then we were in Claver. This made aleisha think of her little Tom. Bless her again. we went on and met Good old Miss FATkinson and her creepy looking kid. At laest she couldnt stare at us getting changeed this time. It was at this point that Miss FATkinson took us the wrong direction completely and sent us a up a hill only to say: "girls you are silly, this is the wrong way! come on back down we go" Honestly we hate her soooo much. so then we were on the last leg. Gemmas Mum walked with Gemma and Alice. Me and Becci and Aleisha walked on ahead with great speed. We had Gemmas little brother with us. he had told us that there was a river for paddleing in at the end of the walk. You can imagine the efect it had on us. We sped along! and we got there super quick! Horray! we went for a paddle! it was great. the other two eventully got there and then we all went home. Ally went with her family, Gemma with hers and My Mum and Dad took me and Becci and Aleisha home. But before we set off my Dad brought us three ice-creams!! Soooo tasty!!
And thats it really. No D of E for like two years now. What a shame. I'm really gonna miss it, even tho we moan. O well we'll being doing Gold before you know it!
