Duke of Edinburgh Award

Last weekend seven silver Duke of Edinburgh participants revised their map reading and first aid skills at the Simonside Outdoor Adventure (SOA) Centre in South Shields.  They studied the walking route of their practice expedition in Wark Forest and made route cards. Each leg has four ‘D’s – direction, distance, duration and description. You get lost if you do not know them all. All seven did a Bronze expedition on Hadrian’s Wall last Summer so, having completed their practice expedition this week, they should be able to cope with the final three day expedition in the Yorkshire Dales in June.

29 Bronze participants spent two days training at the centre the previous weekend. Many of them had never used a cooker or a compass and had no idea what to pack in a backpack when camping overnight. After a day in class they split into three groups on the second day and headed out to Rothbury and the Simonside Hills. Three SOA mountain leaders and two NSB staff watched the boys orientate their maps, spot features to indicate their location, learn how many paces they took to cover 100m, work out bearings, estimate the distance to be covered walking 3 or 4kph, set up an emergency shelter and discuss what to do in an emergency.

Many thanks to Simonside leaders Moore, Rowe, Smith and Macmillan and to Mr Smith, Mrs Innes, Mr Drax and Mrs Sanderson for their enthusiastic support to all Bronze and Silver participants.