Duke of Edinburgh Gold Expedition. In Photo Diary Form.
I'm back!! And I'm alive. So far. Not dead from drinking under-boiled stream water or crawling with ticks at any rate, which is a plus.
This is probably better told in photo form:
We left on Monday. 3 hour train journey to Exeter St David's, then 1 hour train journey to Ivesbury. On the up side, Ben (Pond Guy!) got us a Balloon Animal with the mission of looking after it until the end of DofE on Friday.
Amy, Tash & Steph on the train
Amy, Steph, Tash & me at the train station with Balloon Animal (whose name I can't remember)
We then proceeded to dismantle Balloon Animal in the train. Witness Ben in the background looking exasperated with us. Already.
We arrived and then had to hike 5 or 6 km to the wild camp where we stayed the night. I was freezing every night and hardly slept. Despite wearing about 34237 layers.
Next day we walked 18km over ruddy great hills. Behold the beauty of Dartmoor.
It was also very windy. As you can see:
By this point Balloon Animal had pretty much died a death:
Loads of Ancient Rocks on the tops of the hills and remains of 11th century dwellings etc. 'Twas the proverbial shit.
At lunchtime we buried Ben in rocks (well, not really). It was punishment for stealing Amy's spoon in Iceland. And eating all our food. Hungry Ben comes out on the Full Moon.
Tuesday night was our only night not wild camping, ie there were nice toilet facilities ^^ so when I woke up at 6 in the morning, an hour and a half before everyone else as usual, I got to go and sit in the warm loos and dry my shoes off instead of having to go sit on a rock somewhere.
Wednesday we walked 16km and got to eat two ice creams because it was boiling hot. Devon clotted cream banoffee ice cream. Mmm.
Thursday we walked 18km again. Last leg was pretty easy though, just following this abandoned tramway. On getting in to camp there was Pot Racing down the stream, which was immense. Big Pot beat Little Pot. He's a crafty bugger, that Big Pot.
Amy's mating call: "Hattie! Flo! / Ratty! Mole! (badgerbadgerbadger) A Toad! A Toad!"
And then night nav, where we went through this bog in the pitch black and I finally cried out "This is when I love London!"
Steph and Amy (the Weasley twins) set their phone alarms for 4 and 4.20 and hid them in Ben's tent. So one woke him up, he switched it off, dozed off, then the other woke him. Class.
He then reset them so that Steph's was in Arabic, Amy's in German, their dates and clocks were messed up, their backgrounds and ringtones changed, they had welcome messages like "Steph smells" and false numbers entered into their phonebook. He is truly a worthy opponent. Despite only finding some of the rocks we put in his backpack.
Then today a 2km hike back to the train station, all of us unwashed, hadn't showered for a week, tired, cold, exhausted, aching, sore and ultimately hyper.
Steph, me, Amy & Tash. Behold the redness - that's windburn for ya. Bloody painful it is too. And the white thing Tash is holding is a sheep skull which she took home with her, and frightened small children with on the train. She kept picking up bones and sheep legs and shit. Because she's that kind of person.
Steph. Just because she's the only person who could look that cute even when she's that unkempt.
And of course, Flo (or should that be Fol? XDXD) and Steph mourning the final demise of Balloon Animal
xxx
This is probably better told in photo form:
We left on Monday. 3 hour train journey to Exeter St David's, then 1 hour train journey to Ivesbury. On the up side, Ben (Pond Guy!) got us a Balloon Animal with the mission of looking after it until the end of DofE on Friday.
Amy, Tash & Steph on the train
Amy, Steph, Tash & me at the train station with Balloon Animal (whose name I can't remember)
We then proceeded to dismantle Balloon Animal in the train. Witness Ben in the background looking exasperated with us. Already.
We arrived and then had to hike 5 or 6 km to the wild camp where we stayed the night. I was freezing every night and hardly slept. Despite wearing about 34237 layers.
Next day we walked 18km over ruddy great hills. Behold the beauty of Dartmoor.
It was also very windy. As you can see:
By this point Balloon Animal had pretty much died a death:
Loads of Ancient Rocks on the tops of the hills and remains of 11th century dwellings etc. 'Twas the proverbial shit.
At lunchtime we buried Ben in rocks (well, not really). It was punishment for stealing Amy's spoon in Iceland. And eating all our food. Hungry Ben comes out on the Full Moon.
Tuesday night was our only night not wild camping, ie there were nice toilet facilities ^^ so when I woke up at 6 in the morning, an hour and a half before everyone else as usual, I got to go and sit in the warm loos and dry my shoes off instead of having to go sit on a rock somewhere.
Wednesday we walked 16km and got to eat two ice creams because it was boiling hot. Devon clotted cream banoffee ice cream. Mmm.
Thursday we walked 18km again. Last leg was pretty easy though, just following this abandoned tramway. On getting in to camp there was Pot Racing down the stream, which was immense. Big Pot beat Little Pot. He's a crafty bugger, that Big Pot.
Amy's mating call: "Hattie! Flo! / Ratty! Mole! (badgerbadgerbadger) A Toad! A Toad!"
And then night nav, where we went through this bog in the pitch black and I finally cried out "This is when I love London!"
Steph and Amy (the Weasley twins) set their phone alarms for 4 and 4.20 and hid them in Ben's tent. So one woke him up, he switched it off, dozed off, then the other woke him. Class.
He then reset them so that Steph's was in Arabic, Amy's in German, their dates and clocks were messed up, their backgrounds and ringtones changed, they had welcome messages like "Steph smells" and false numbers entered into their phonebook. He is truly a worthy opponent. Despite only finding some of the rocks we put in his backpack.
Then today a 2km hike back to the train station, all of us unwashed, hadn't showered for a week, tired, cold, exhausted, aching, sore and ultimately hyper.
Steph, me, Amy & Tash. Behold the redness - that's windburn for ya. Bloody painful it is too. And the white thing Tash is holding is a sheep skull which she took home with her, and frightened small children with on the train. She kept picking up bones and sheep legs and shit. Because she's that kind of person.
Steph. Just because she's the only person who could look that cute even when she's that unkempt.
And of course, Flo (or should that be Fol? XDXD) and Steph mourning the final demise of Balloon Animal
xxx