DC`s Report

Congratulations to all those who have received awards in the St Georges Day Honours,

Laurie Badcock, Stephen Duck, Ian Fair, Richard Gee, Jim Roebuck and Alan Scott all The Silver Acorn.

Two former DCs have been awarded the Silver Wolf, David McKenzie and Bob Tyson.

Our new County Commissioner Gwyn MacKenzie, will be in role from May 1st, as a District we send Gwyn best wishes for her time in this role. We would also like to say Thank you to Dave Bennett for his kindness, support and friendship, I am sure we will continue to see you in and around the County.

St Georges Day, 23rd April at St James and St Basils, please encourage everyone to come and renew their promise and make this a memorable event. If you are not sure of details please contact Vince Mackell.

Lookwide Open Day, please look in County News and encourage activities to happen in your meeting place, please let ME know what you are doing and what time you are doing it, then hopefully I will be able to visit all the activities and buildings.

Lookwide Marra is not that far away, please ensure that your Nights Away Notification Form is with me at least two weeks before the event. Sections MUST have the agreement of the GSL before it is sent to me. Even if you are camping with another Troop, Pack, your GSL and I must have your Sections Home Contact detail, I am sure you will have a good weekend.

Kath Tyson DC

Look Wide 1957

Celebrating the 50 th Anniversary of Scouting, (Lord Rowallen,who was then Chief Scout) visited Northumberland, and officially uncovered the cairn at the spot. He stands, in the photograph at the cairn, with Ken Angus who was the County Commissioner at the time. Somewhere in the photograph, I can be found as well. I wonder how many of you will have a print of this of this years celebrations in 50 years time. ---Ed

News from ‘Chil’

Firstly congratulations to Brunton Park for coming runners up at the county football competition; also well done to 82 nd who played well too.

I was invited to attend the 1st Westerhope Cub and Scout indoor camp 29 Feb. – 2 nd March held at the HQ of Ist Hexham. A lovely new venue with an indoor climbing wall. It was an active time with a theme of Boot Camp. Thanks you 1 st Westerhope – again you made me feel very welcome and I learnt some new games too.

I attended the NE Regional meeting for ADC (Cubs) and DCSLs on 16 th March. A day conference to inform us of what is going on nationally to find out from us how the programme is working and the challenges facing Cub Scouting in our districts and counties. (By the time you read this I will have given a presentation of this event to cub leaders in Great North at our meeting on 27 th March (1 st Dinnington HQ 8.15pm), but if would like more info just ask me for a written copy

Sarah Haswell

Gosforth Sea Scouts

This term's camp to Hawkhirst was a great success. It was a clear dry night when we arrived and set up camp, which as usual was in the dark!

Saturday started wet but gradually dried out.We spent most of the day out riding our bikes. We all Managed to get to the Dam and back by one means or another, though the recent storms did their best to put obstacle in our way.

On Saturday evening, we entertained the All Saints and Brunton Park Cubs at a campfire that Ragey did his best to make sure none of them will ever forget.

Sunday saw us setting off for a hike along the Bloody Bush Road . This took slightly longer that planned. Some would say that we got lost; my take would be that we weren`t lost, we just didn`t know exactly where we were. Anyway we got back safely.

A huge thank-you to those parents who came along to help ;-Louise the “catering manager”,-Ian the “White Van Man”,and “Alex the VTT extraudinaire”

Seems like there was a lot of fun, but that's what scouting is all about - Ed

Report by Brian Smith

All Saints’ Cubs

Chief Scout Silver Award - Edward Langley

First night away – Harry Moorin

Bring a friend – Sophie Smith, Alison Briggs, Jonathan MacKenzie,Thomas Proudfoot,

Outdoors Challenge - Thomas Proudfoot, Harry Moorin, Harry Guthrie, Emile Siou, Abhishek Kamath

Promise Badge - Jack Johnstone, Harry Moorin

5 Nights Away - Charlie Moorin, Fraser Moore, Jamie Butcher, Paul Thompson, Alison Briggs, Jonathan MacKenzie

Water Activities - Sophie Smith, Alison Briggs, Charlie Moorin, Jamie Butcher, Paul Thompson, Jonathan MacKenzie, Fraser Moore, Stephen Parkin

Outdoors Plus challenge - Edward Langley

Athletes Plus - Abhishek Kamath

Kingston Park Group

Invested Cub Scouts - Anthony Shanley

Creativity Challenge - Findlay Green

My Faith Badge - Findlay Green

Chef Badge - Mark Burns

New Sixers - Todd Rye, Mark Burns

New Seconders - Jamie Brown, Sam Foxen, Lewis Holmes, Connor Farndale

Keilder Fun

All Saints’ Cubs have been trainee weather forecasters for the last term – we’ve read the clouds, constructed barometers, learnt about which weather sayings actually mean anything sensible and followed the weather fronts as they moved across the North Atlantic Ocean . We’ve even learnt about Buys Ballots law which may date back to the 1800’s but which is one of the few pieces of weather knowledge which is consistently reliable. So when the weather forecast for our trip to Hawkhirst looked wet and windy we were all willing the weather systems to move across quickly. And we were lucky enough to get a window between two lots of storms.

So on the Friday night 28 cubs from the Brunton Park and All Saints packs travelled in convoy up to Kielder. The gales earlier during the week had brought lots of trees down which made the path to the Bird of Prey Centre impassable but otherwise we didn’t have to amend our programme at all. The Saturday saw us on the water practicing rowing orienteering, which for some cubs was a double challenge –the rowing and the orienteering. We also went double boat kayaking and had loads of fun challenging the other teams to American Football on the water. But we glad that the showers were piping hot for afterwards.

Sunday morning and the cubs had the difficult choice to make between archery and crate stacking– luckily they split 50:50 which made the logistics much simpler! The archery group also tried some problem solving –not the maths sort. Both teams managed to defuse their mock bombs within the time limit though one lot nearly resorted to a fist fight in the process!

We managed to visit the Bird of Prey centre which made for a great finale to our weekend. And in the few moments remaining we squeezed in an Easter egg hunt – it was Palm Sunday and strictly speaking the eggs should have been saved for a week. But I think that they had all been consumed in the time that it took to mention the fact to the children!