Jamboree on The Trail 2014

For a change, we thought we’d take the Scouts to the annual Jamboree on The Trail this week. This meant we’d meet on Saturday rather than their usual evening meeting.

Jamboree on the Trail is an annual day for the World Scout Movement to hike together. All Scouts, whatever their age and wherever they may be in the world, are invited to participate. Teifi District Scouts were walking along the Teifi Valley as a sponsored event for JOTT and all groups from the district were invited so we thought we would join them. Plans were hatched and arrangements made. Things kept changing as we had lots of other things on over the weekend and discovered in the run up to it that Morgan had been invited to run in the National Urdd Cross Country. This was being held in Abreryswyth on Saturday afternoon so plans were changed allowing us to get back for that as well.

The JOTT walk we were doing was in  Cilgerran which is a lovely little village just inland from Cardigan. It just so happens to be where friends of ours live too. We planned to visit them on Friday evening, stay with them overnight and then meet the Scouts on Saturday morning. We had encouraged the Scouts to bring their families along and thankfully all of those that were coming were indeed coming with parents so we were going to be able to leave early if necessary. As it turned out, the stormy weather forecast for the weekend meant that the Cross Country was cancelled at the last minute so there was no need to rush back after all.

We turned up at Dennis and Sophie’s in the late afternoon having driven down straight after school. We had a nice evening with them, eating, drinking and chatting in front of the fire. They put us up for the night and provided us with breakfast before we headed off to meet the Scouts.

The Saturday morning meeting meant that we didn’t have many of the Group turning up. They all seemed to have other things to do or some sort of an excuse. At least those that made excuses did, most of them we simply hadn’t heard from so we did wonder if anyone else would just turn up, but in the end it was just the people we knew about. That meant was only had 6 Scouts (including Morgan) and 6 adults (including ourselves). It’s a shame there weren’t more as this really is the sort of event we should be participating in. The Scouts can earn a badge for doing the Jamboree on The Trail, it takes us to knew places and integrates us with the rest of the groups from the district. At least there was a contingent from Borth, even if it was small and the others there appreciated the fact that we had travelled down from the ‘far north’ of the county.

We met at Cilgerran Wildlife Centre and headed off for a walk along the Teifi Valley. There were a couple of points along the walk with activities for the Scouts to do, such as tower building in the woods and fire-lighting.

We made our way as a group through the wooded valley chatting and taking in the scenery as we went. We were wrapped up warm from the elements complete with full waterproofs as the weather forecast had been terrible. Torrential rain all day, strong winds and not too warm either. As it turned out we were sheltered from any winds in the valley and other than the odd bit of drizzle as we got ready and the occasional threat of rain on the walk it stayed dry. The sun even came out briefly now and then.

We stopped at the castle in Cilgerran for lunch. Everyone else was well prepared with a picnic, but as we had stayed over at friends the night before we didn’t have any with us so quickly popped to the shops and bought some before meeting back up with the group.

Cilgerran Castle

Cilgerran Castle

We then wandered back along a different path the wildlife centre. The walk itself wasn’t long, nor particularly strenuous. It was just short of 4 miles but it had taken the a while to do at quite a slow, leisurely pace. The Scouts and Cubs that were there seemed to have enjoyed it though, the weather had been kind and it was good to get families involved too. It was nice for us as there wasn’t much for us to organise, we just turned up and did the walk, but it was good to meet people from other groups as well. We didn’t have much to do with them while we were there but at least 2nd Borth Scouts and showed willing and our faces had been seen.

Back at the Wildlife Centre we said and our goodbyes and headed off in our own directions. We popped into the visitor centre for a well-earned cup of tea. The Cilgerran Wildlife Centre is part of the Teifi Marshes Nature Reserve. The main visitor building has a striking wood and glass exterior which was constructed in 1993. It contains a permanent and bi-lingual exhibition on the geology and history of the Teifi river and also houses the Glasshouse Café (serving meals made from local and organic produce) and a gift shop.

Outside there were lots of willow structures and a bug hotel that put ours to shame. There was also a very impressive badger sculpture overlooking the reserve.

2 Responses

  1. Avatar forComment Author john barrett says:

    It was fantastic to see you at the JOTT yesterday. We appreciate and welcomed you making the efforts to travel to the deep South. I am glad you enjoyed it and you are very welcome to join in future events as well.
    John

  2. Avatar forComment Author mum says:

    Yet another successful day 🙂 check spellings hehehe

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Alan Cole

Alan is a Freelance Website Designer, Sports & Exercise Science Lab Technician and full time Dad & husband with far too many hobbies: Triathlete, Swimming, Cycling, Running, MTBing, Surfing, Windsurfing, SUPing, Gardening, Photography.... The list goes on.

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