TOTEM CAMP/TOTEM TRAINING CAMP 2009 

The annual Competition Camp was held on 2nd/3rd May at Stoke Poges. All Troops in the District took part, with entries in the Main Camp up from 17 to 19 Patrols, and the Training Camp up from 5 to 6 Patrols. Once again this event was very successful, with standards being maintained at a high level. The Training Camp was again run by Dave Folkerd and his team, and they must be praised for their great patience and hard work in showing the younger scouts and guides what will be expected from them next year when we expect them to take part in the main competition.
I would like to thank personally all the scouts and guides who were present, in particular those in the main competition for all their hard work, from preparing and submitting programmes, equipment lists, menus, food quantities and costings etc. back in March, and their great efforts in the field in what is probably the most challenging camp they are going to experience in their time in their Troop. I would like to congratulate every scout and guide who participated for making this the top event of the year’s programme. We were pleased to have a visit from the Deputy Lieutenant, Robert Leader, and our President, John Matthews, on Saturday afternoon and, once again, they spent time showing great interest in all that was taking place in both the main and training camps, as well as finding time to speak to all the Leaders present. The winning Patrols this year, after a very close finish, were:-

1st 1st Ealing North Hawks 655 points
2nd 1st Ealing North Kestrels 646 points
3rd 25th Ealing Kestrels 588 points

I must end by thanking all those assisted over the weekend, especially Dave Folkerd and his training team, Bev Tremayne, Malcolm Turner, Pete Balls, John Foxwell and Helen Mitchell - not forgetting Jim Vaux, Dave Bussell, Paul Phillips and the 1st Hanwell team along with Mary Power and Di Ljubisic for all their catering. Dominic Figon and Bohdan Kostlea for organising the night activity and Ben Douglas and Josh Aqui for producing printouts of the mark sheet on the day.
Next year I am expecting even more entries with 6th Ealing moving up from the training to the main camp, and the newly formed 2nd Troop of 1st Ealing North taking part.

JOHN SEAR
ADC SCOUTS
(scroll down to see photos and the training camp report)

Totem Training Camp Report May 09

A total of 32 Scouts and Guides took part in the Totem Training camp over the weekend of 2nd/3rd May. They were formed up into 6 “Crews” and under the guidance of a quickly elected “Crew Boss” they selected their new Crew names. Well, they only had a choice of 2, the Phonetic Alphabet or Greek Alphabet…so we ended up with Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo and Foxtrot. All of the Scouts and Guides were then given the ADC Challenge, which was to estimate as accurately as possible the height of the Stoke Poges flag pole. This year’s rather “tame” challenge was an effort to reduce the amount of blood and blisters resulting from last year’s challenge that seemed to involve a lot of cutting and branding. With a “little” bit of help from the Training camp leaders the Crews got their sites set up and then had their last real meal at "Jims Cafe" before venturing into the unknown of collecting wood & water, storing food, cooking their meals and finally the delights of washing up the dirty billies and other kitchen utensils. “Where did mum say she packed the dishwasher in my rucksack”! With the excellent assistance provided by the training team they were all given guidance in storing food, chopping wood and lighting fires. Soon after the session, each Crew seemed to give birth to a mad axe-man as well as a pyromaniac who between them will chop wood and feed it, and anything else that will burn into an altar fire all day and all night if given the chance … as all Leaders know, this is an essential ingredient of every successful patrol at camp. Each Crew were also given a “Workshop Manual” of useful camping information that as a last resort they could read to get themselves out of a jam. I suspect this went unread. Maybe the manual was opened, but only with the thought of extracting a few pages to act as fire lighters. (minus 10 points for judges discretion) The same marking regime operated at the Training camp as at the Totem camp and in general, the marks were pleasingly high, which I am sure had a little to do in part with their Trainers naturally wanting their team to do well. All of the teams produced very good meals at dinner and breakfast but as anticipated their washing up skills needed a bit more “fine tuning”. Aroundthe flag pole on Sunday morning there was the “Big Sell” for the Docklands Water Activity day on 14th June (spaces still available!!) and then it was off to Scouts Own giving the Leaders the opportunity to check out the Training Crew’s sites to see if all of the hard work by the Trainers had paid off. Unfortunately we still found a few “Jumble Sale” tents, wood piles ranging from a couple of twigs to a whole forest and waste disposal arrangements ranging from full card carrying members of Greenpeace to the “burn everything regardless” brigade. They will get on well in next years Totem camp then! The weather was excellent throughout the weekend, with only a brief shower at 04:00 so it was a great relief that all tents were able to be taken down dry and the kit and clean(ish) Scouts and Guides had their final Inspection before clearing the site for the arrival of the weary Totem Campers, and then to eagerly await the results of the Training Camp competition. Congratulations went to Delta Crew from 5th Hanwell won the Training camp competition with a score of 458 points out of a maximum of 585 points. It seems like everyone had a good time and hopefully at least some of the many combined years of wisdom from the Training team will rub off on the young campers. Once again, many thanks to the Training team and Jims Café, without whom the event would not have been possible.

 

Dave Folkerd
G.S.L. 25th Ealing

Totem Camp 2008

The competition camp was held over the week of 5th/6th May at Stoke Poges Camp Site. I am very pleased to be able to say that this year saw the largest entry since 2002, with 15 Scout and 2 Guide Patrols participating.  It turned out to be a highly successful camp with last year’s standards being maintained. All the Scouts and Guides must be praised for their very determined efforts and for showing a willingness to take note of the advice from the examiners.  The new Deputy Lieutenant Mr. Robert Leader, with his wife Sue, attended the event on Saturday afternoon, and all the Scouts and Guides were a credit to their Troops/Units in the way they responded to questions posed by our visitors. We were also pleased to welcome Leslie Clarke and John Matthews, making their traditional visit at the same time.
I would like to express my thanks to all those who took part for all their hard work from submitting programmes,
equipment lists and menus back in March, to all their outstanding efforts in what is a hard and testing competition camp. I congratulate each and every one of them for making this the number one event of the year. A Thanks badge was presented to Sheila Grant as this was sadly her last Totem Camp, after 30 years as a Guide and Leader, as she has moved out of the area. Pete Balls was also presented with a well deserved 25 year Long Service award by Alan Rayner.

The winning Patrols for this year were:-
1st - 1st Hanwell - Stag Patrol 625 points
2nd - 7th Hanwell - Cobra Patrol 617 points
3rd 1st Ealing North - Raven Patrol 597 points.

My thanks as always goes to the team that assisted during the weekend, especially Sheila Grant, Malcolm Turner, John Barber, Jane and Graham Stanton. I must not forget Big Jim and his 1st Hanwell team for feeding us, and Ben Douglas who produced printouts of the mark sheets on the day.
Let’s hope for an even larger entry in next year’s competition.

John Sear
ADC SCOUTS