Cookham Scouts Troop Bivouac Camp June '98

We had to get moving quickly and get the shelters down and everything back to normal very fast - the woods get busy over the weekend and we had the parents turning up early for collections.
To the credit of all, the bivvi site was returned to all its original splendor in good time for everyone to wander back to their parents - a little tired and a little grubby.
A good time was had by all - thanks again to the Summit for helping us out.

The cooking and chatting round the fire lasted until the early hours. The Scouts were certainly in no hurry to go off to sleep.
Eventually all were convinced and they shuffled off into the darkness. Now, where was our shelter again? The Leaders did a quick sweep round to make sure all were 'home' by which time most were in their bags asleep.
Dawn broke. It hadn't rained during the night and it was a bright, sunny morning. Only one group had bottled it and grabbed for the tarpaulin, whimps.. the rest were laying under piles of twigs and leaves where they had fallen the previous night..

The Scout Bivouac night ran into trouble as soon as it was on the programme.
We wanted a remote location for 30(ish) boys to spend the night. The intention was to build shelters from the local woodland and then sleep under them. Those leaders hardy enough to withstand the elements also had a few activities under their hats. We tried to raise the usual landowners, but to no avail.
We were all signed up with nowhere to go!
That is, until we approached Wycombe Summit. The manager of The Summit didn't seem too put off by the thought of the Scouts running amok in his woodland, so long as we didn't burn it down - so we were all set. Well, almost. The woods, great though they were, did not provide the raw materials we really needed to build decent shelters. The PLC was convened and decided that they should have a night under the stars - we would attempt to build shelters but would carry tarpaulins, just in case! (Ed. Sounds like a cop-out to me).

With the promise of bad weather ahead, the turn-out was smaller than expected, but that didn't matter. We were joined by a few linking Cubs for the Friday evening, they chose, perhaps wisely, not to stop the night.

As dusk fell the intrepid Scouts (and Cubs) were walked off into the woods to establish their homes for the night, interrupted only by a stuck 4x4 down the track. (Not Rob's)

We formed four groups and they all set too looking for their spot and then building their home. The Leaders gave them their space by retiring to the shelter of the Summit bar whilst on a mission to collect water for the troops.

The Leaders returned to walk those not stopping for the night out of the woods, and back to safety.
The rest kept going with their shelters.
When everyone was satisfied with their shelters, or had got bored and decided it might not rain (yeah right) Rob and Neil led them off on their first activity - Follow The Leader, literally.
Now, even the Scouts ought to be able to follow a couple of Leaders.. through the wet woods in the darkness without torches.. nope!
When set tasks of lighting signal fires and working as a group - well, they sort of got it together - only they lost track of the Leaders, and they were a long way from their camp, and it was dark and no-one knew where they were...
The Leaders (eventually) appeared and began to walk the group out - oh no they didn't... The Leaders disappeared again and this time the group had to figure out how to get back. Eventually Nick got bored with waiting and started leading the group off - but were they going the right way? Maybe they knew the Leaders were stalking them.. maybe not - but either way, after a little while Rob and Neil popped out the bushes and walked with the group back to camp.
By this time a large fire had been established by Andrew and Simon and the group set about the task of cooking supper - err.. what do you do with the flour again??.. Twists appeared, some with interesting ingredients, and some disappeared into the depths of the fire - a blessing some might say. Next came sausages.. now small twigs to cook on should not have been hard to find in several hectares of woodland, but they were proving a tad elusive to the Scouts. Their 'small' twigs were bigger than the sausages - so when you stabbed them and got them hot they just kinda drooped and fell off into the fire. Lucky we had lots of them..