The Wilderness Festival 2017

Well, we did it again...

60 children, 8 adults, 2 nights, 1 festival - The Wilderness Festival, Cornbury Park, Charlbury, nr Oxford, Oxfordshire.

The weather was once again pretty kind to us, although setting up in the rain on Wednesday for some of us, questioned why we are mad enough to continue doing this. Thunderstorms and winds threatened us throughout the weekend, but thankfully someone was looking over us and they abated, moving on to some other poor, unsuspecting souls...

Friday morning arrived all too soon and it was all hands on deck, or rather forest floor, to create shelters and set up activities for the arrival of the green team; 30 excited, intrepid explorers, keen to camp out for the night. Some old faces amongst the group confirmed to us that we must be doing a good job, else why would they return for a second year running? Whilst walking back to our base camp, new friendships were sparked and old memories re-kindled...

Introductions around the fire with juice and biscuits, followed by an ice-breaker game of 'Rhythm Master' to break down a few more inhibitions, it was out into the field to play some more team-building games, breaking down those barriers a little more to enable new friendships to be made. After some fun with a water pistol and running off a little steam with some games, it was back to the woods to gather into our shelter groups ready for pimping their shelters and sort out their accommodation for the night.

Our activities of fire-lighting, Viking knitting (rope making), Nordic slinging (friendship bracelets), mammal trapping, pewter casting and bug hunting filled our time unto supper of cowboy beans, potatoes and sausage was served around the fire.