Day 7 Romney Marsh to home via WS2013

Not such a nice day and the tent was saturated with dew - no sun and very little wind, typical! We wanted to get away at 9.30am so I had to reconcile myself to the fact that the tent would be very wet and would require drying at some stage rather than being rolled up and stuffed into its bag for 2 days.

Molly was very helpful with all the packing up and we were soon ready for the off. We've enjoyed our 6 nights together but Molly was looking forward to seeing her mum again. Our rendez-vous point was the Gardener's Arms opposite the Sussex County Show Ground at Ardingly - a great pub if you're ever in the area, a good menu and superb service - a popular choice for Guide and Scout visitors to the camp in the afternoon. After Molly and my sister had left I grabbed an hour or so to catch up on some emails and to change into Guide Wear for my afternoon's visit.

WS 2013 International camp is a joint venture for Girlguiding and Scouts in West Sussex (including Girlguiding Sussex Central). This is the 9th camp that they've run over the past 30 years bringing together almost 2,000 young people, supported by 570 leaders and a further 450 volunteer staff running the central camp and activities.  Guides and Scouts from Argentina, Austria, Australia, British Guides In Foreign Countries, Canada, Denmark, Georgia, Germany,  Guernsey, Ireland, Jersey, Mexico, Norway, Portugal, St Lucia, Sweden, Spain and the USA have joined the week long camp of adventure and friendship.

After a welcome from the camp organisers, the VIP's were shown around the Ancient Civilisations themed camp and encouraged to join in the fun and fundraising in the bazaar. I had the great pleasure of presenting some of Girlguiding's top awards to members on the central stage in 'Camelot': BP Awards to Guides, a Leadership Qualification and our very top award for members under 26 - the Queen's Guide Award. Very many congratulations to you all and well done for all the hard work that you've put into achieving your award.

Whilst speaking to Eileen Burbidge, one of my predecessors in my role as Chief Commissioner for Girlguiding London and South East England, we spotted a parascender flying over the campsite. What a great opportunity for a new adventure, Eileen was full of support and enthusiasm for the challenge, everyone rallied round to make it possible and before I left at 7.30pm I'd flown over the camp strapped to a parachute. What an afternoon! Very many thanks to all of you involved in making the camp such a success for so many young people and their leaders and for your warm welcome to all the visitors.

       with Eileen and the two wonderful Guides who showed us around camp


If you're wondering what happened to the soggy tent .... I spread it out over the back of the car in an attempt to dry it off but later decided to pitch it in the car parking field. Just got it down and packed away as the dew started to fall. Phew!

Off home to repack and reprovision and to pick up Nick, my son and 2nd camping companion, for the Sussex leg of the trip.

Day 6 Romney Marsh

Another 'good to be alive' morning - we really are blessed with them on this trip. I spent the first hour or so of daylight lying in bed uploading photos and working through my emails. Remember, I've reset my body clock so we were in bed by 9.30 last night - can you believe it of me?? - which meant that by 6.00 am I'd had a long lie-in! 

We'd had an unsettling early evening at our new campsite when the wind had got up to such serious levels that the tent pegs were lifting out of the ground. We're using my trusty Outwell Arizona full height 2/3 person dome - the one that we completed 'a summer to remember' in last year. It's brilliant and 100% trustworthy, the challenge was the ground. We bashed pegs into soft ground with no 'hold' which was slightly alarming, so out came the backup even heavier duty pegs which then held the ground well. The tent bucked and rose with the wind but held fast. No chance of cooking without some serious shelter and 'U seless' wasn't about to get a 2nd chance so we retreated to a pub in Dymchurch. On our return to the campsite the wind had dropped considerably but my veteran camping companion, Molly, was understandably concerned about the possibility of the tent blowing away with us in it. Luckily, the wind soon abated and by morning we were becalmed (can you be becalmed on land?)       

We've hit lucky again with our campsite - I'll write a separate post at the end of the trip with details and reviews of all the sites that we've stayed in - this one is totally flat (can Guiding/Scouting boast any flat sites??), has a field of sheep and a resident donkey next to it, not to mention numerous bunnies and excellent loos, showers, washing up, fridge/freezers and even a washing machine. The pitches are well laid out around a central grassy area which fills with children of all ages playing all sorts of fun games together until dark - when we all go to bed! It's idyllic.

We met up with Carole, another local Guiding friend, today and headed straight off to her beach hut on Littlestone beach. I've always wanted to peep inside a beach hut and hear tales of how their owners use them and Carole certainly didn't disappoint me. What a delightful hut with all sorts of clever features including a loft space! Molly was excited by the inflatable 'biscuit',  we soon launched her off into the sea in but she had a heck of a shock when a wave propelled her back onto the shore with great force a couple of minutes later.

 Littlestone beach with Carole

























Dungeness beach

Carole is a committed Geocacher and keen to share her passion with Molly who was new to the activity, with an ever thoughtful mind to the concentration of a 9year old, Carole had us picking up caches within a very short space of time around Dungeness. I would have liked to have lingered a little longer and hear more about the history of the area but we needed to press on. Being a local, Carole knows where to park avoiding the necessary charges on beach car parks. Heading back towards Greatstone Guide HQ we crossed the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch Railway line and were treated to a couple of steam trains passing us and also bumped into Carole's mum!

 



Goddington Brownies (the Ashford Goddington not Orpington one!) have been staying at Greatstone all week and met us on the beach for a picnic. What a great group of girls and leaders who were firmly ensconced in their pirate themed adventures, complete with digging for Captain Hook's buried treasure on the beach. We certainly struck our own gold with them and easily broke our sandcastle building record with their help - in no time at all we'd built 118 of them and stuck Rainbow, Brownie, Guide, The Senior Section, LaSER and Girlguiding London and South East England sandcastle flags in most of them. I wonder if Girlguiding Sussex East or Sussex West will be able to beat Kent East's record?

Eva Jones aged 10 from 1st Goddington Brownies has written a poem entitled Sandcastles and has given me permission to publish it here on my Coastal Camping blog:

Sandcastles big, tall and wide

get trampled on with one big stride.

Your heart is pounding will your masterpiece survive?

A tear rolls down your frosty cheek

and splashes the remains of

your long lost dreams away in the sky.

Don't fret, your mother says, sitting by your side

it's just another day at the seaside.

Well done Eva - what a masterpiece! Thank you.

Farewell to Goddington Brownies and a big thank you to Carole and we were off to visit a place from my childhood. At the end of the 50's early 60's, 'Pirate's Spring' in St Mary's Bay, was a Sunshine Home for Blind Babies. I have fond memories, from a very tender age, of visiting my aunt who was the head there before she moved to the Sunshine Home in Leamington Spa. Now part of The Springs Community for young adults with Aspergers and Autism I was fascinated to see how much I would remember from my childhood visits. Sadly not a lot. The building has been extended way beyond the original 30's but the blue sky and beach at the bottom of the garden were the same!

Back to the fairground in Dymchurch for Molly to indulge in a couple of rides and to spend some of her pocket money in a gift shop on another addition to her soft toy menagerie. 'Biscuit' the puppy will have a very good home I'm sure and I hope will remind Molly of our trip.

Last night's wind blew away the thunder bugs but they appear to have been replaced by a plague of earwigs. They don't bother Molly but I'll need to check that we leave them all behind before I continue the camping trip with Nick on Friday - he'll freak out at the sight of earwigs!

So, the final night of our Coastal Camping trip around Kent. We've met lots of Guiding friends on our travels - Rosemary and Carole kindly helped with the planning and joined us for part of the trip. Along the way we saw many familiar, and plenty of new, faces at Campdowne 2013, met Penny in the Coastguard pub in St Margaret's at Cliffe and loved our lunchtime meeting on Greatstone beach with Goddington Brownies. Molly has made innumerable friends at every campsite along the way and I've enjoyed the company of their parents and grandparents! I've definitely achieved the aim of the first part of this trip - to get to know the Kent coastline, such a large part of the our boundary of our Guiding region.

     

a seashell message - turn your head sideways to read it!!

118 sandcastles - well done Brownies!

our last evening meal together

Day 5 Deal to Romney Marsh

 

Having just completed her circular pebble design, Molly discovered a pebble 'hedgehog'

 

Flags in a row on the beach at Deal

Interested in the history of Romney Marsh? http://www.theromneymarsh.net/

Molly's Blog:

On Day 5 I helped Pip pack and went down the hill to play with my new friends Hannah and Lisa. We played Mr Funny Face the board game while Pip took down the tent and packed everything in the car. We went to Rosemary's and had lunch and I played in the garden, climbed a tree and played with toys on the shelf. 

On the way to Rosemary's we went to the beach in Deal and put our flags in the pebbles.

Then we went to the new campsite, the sign said 'Mrs Pip' where we had to put our tent. We met a lady and her grandson Linda and Bill. I made a zoo using tent pegs and string and animals that are stones in the shape of animals. Thunder bugs covered everything. After we put up the tent the wind nearly blew it away so we put extra pegs in. The thunder bugs had disappeared with the wind. We had to go out for our evening meal because the wind was too strong to light the gas and it was too dangerous.


Molly got to be a dab hand at assembling the table

When we got back I met some children and we played Cops and Robbers.


Molly's 'zoo' - constructing sheltered enclosures for her pebble animals

Day 4 Kingsdown and Campdowne 2013

Woke up to a beautiful sunny morning, what is it about blue skies, sun shine and the gentle sounds of waves breaking on the shingle and seagulls screeching at 6.00am? It can't fail to instil a sense of 'good to be alive-ness'. What a dew though! I can't say that I've been aware of heavy dews this year either at home in London or on earlier camping trips - we went to bed with a hefty layer and woke up to puddles of it!

Rosemary and I were up with the larks - well wood pigeons in the woods behind our tents. The campsite is great, basic but with flush loos and showers that were probably plentiful enough for Scouts a few years ago but are now stretched almost beyond limit by it's current users, many of whom also decided to go for an early morning ablution resulting in queues for showers at 7.00am on a Sunday! I read an article in The Guardian the other day about how camping helps us to reset our body clocks in accordance with day

Iight- it's certainly resetting ours -  no attempts to clear my emails at 1.00am, we're sound asleep by 11.00pm. Seems that we're not the only ones with many campers on this site getting up with the sun.

The 19 Counties in Girlguiding London and South East England are very varied in terms of geographical size, we managed to clock up 160mile round trip to Campdowne 2013 (near Orpington) and we were still within Kent, albeit having travelled through 3 guiding Counties.  In sharp contrast my home County of London South West stretches approximately 10 miles along is length from Putney to Waterloo.

Campdowne 2013 is a 10 day international Scout camp, held every 4 years at Downe, one of their national campsites. 1,200 Scouting and Guiding participants from 21 different countries are taking part this year and I was privileged to be invited to join them for Carnival Day. This was Molly's first experience of an event on this scale but I'm fairly confident that it won't be her last! We were delighted to be hosted by Abi and Philippa from Orpington Guides and Rangers who were complete stars and took us on a tour of the sub camps pointing out lots of different activities on the way. I met many members from our Region as well as Guides from across the UK and was especially pleased to chat to the New Zealand Guide contingent who all camped at Tui 12 the NZ jamboree that I visited last year.

What a great opportunity Guiding and Scouting offers to our young people in terms of adventure, cooperation and friendship. National and international camps and jamborees abound not only across the UK but across the world and only due to the generosity of our volunteers who give so much of their time and expertise to ensuring the very best experiences for everyone. If you are a member of Guiding or Scouting and haven't experienced a large scale event like this yet then look around and book yourself on one for next year, either as part of the volunteer service crew or as a leader taking some of your young people.

Our final stop before we left Campdowne was to a warm welcome from the London Over the Border contingent for tea and scones  - thank you Janice et al, delicious! Molly and her new found friend, Amy, become avid badge collectors by the end of the day. Molly has requested a camp blanket for her teddy for her birthday having seen baby Erin's camp blanket! Something for me to do on my Sussex leg of the Coastal Camping trip then!

Very many thanks to Ben, Emma and your wonderful crew for hosting all the visitors - what a great day!

We headed back east to Deal wondering when we'd pick up a 3G signal and decent enough phone reception to ring Lee, Molly's dad , to wish him a happy birthday - imagine my consternation when we ultimately picked one up at St Margaret's-at-Cliffe ...... welcoming us to France! Apologies Lee that you had to wait for your birthday call until we were safely back in England!

We stopped off for a pub meal at the 'Coastguard' in St Margaret's - right on the beach, under the famous white cliffs, what a delightful spot to be at sunset with very few people around. Tipping up in our Brownie/Leader wear was a bit of a giveaway I guess, staff member Penny was keen to find out what we'd been up to and we swiftly established that she's a Brownie Leader in Ramsgate. I'm sure that all customers at the Coastguard get excellent service but Penny and her team were exceptional. I can highly recommend the menu too, my plaice and new potatoes were cooked to perfection and the ubiquitous mixed leaf salad was nicely jazzed up by the addition of a couple of slices of perfectly ripe nectarine and a drizzle of decent dressing. Molly plumped for a child sized portion of cod and chips, also perfectly cooked and presented. We certainly didn't need to indulge in the ice cream sundae menu ..... but we did! No sign of the usual pub fayre desserts, my indulgence was Kentish apples with salted caramel, crumbled flapjack and vanilla ice cream whilst Molly 'smelled heaven' when she was give full rein with the bubblegum, strawberry and raspberry sauces over her ice cream with sprinkles.

I reckoned that a dip in the sea after that lot was off the cards so we settled for unsuccessful pebble skimming but a rather more successful pebble hurling competition!

Back to camp at Kingsdown - where has everyone gone? Very few tents remaining and all quiet at 10.00 pm! 

 

Molly trying her hand at Morris Dancing!

Molly and Penny at the Coastguard pub in St Margaret's-at-Cliffe

The famous ice-cream sundae!

More sandcastle flags in the pebbles, this time at St Margaret's-at-Cliffe as the light fades

Day 3 Herne to Deal

Rude awakening at 2.05am as the rain lashed down,  the sky lit up with lightening and thunder rolled around us. The first gust of wind swiftly demolished a structure sold to us as a 'wind break' but was quickly renamed as 'useless'. Unfortunately as rain was not forecast, I'd left our wet weather gear in the car, but fortunately rain in reality is never quite as bad is sounds from inside the tent. 'Useless' had taken the aluminium table, gas burner and kettle with it and thrown them against the tent creating an almighty racket that would have been enough to wake the whole campsite if they hadn't already been woken by the storm. The guy lines remained firmly tethered and held well down by the tent pegs so it was a question of hastily removing the poles, taking the table apart and shoving them all -lock, stock and barrel - under the car before disappearing at great speed back into the tent. The storm probably only lasted about 20 minutes but it was quite an adventure and apparently Molly's first experience of rain from inside a tent!

A fond farewell to friends for Molly and we were off by mid morning. A perfect campsite for our purposes and one that was popular with many of the other campers, some of whom were in for the long haul. One couple camp there in their tent for 2 or 3 months each year, only setting back off home to Whitby at the beginning of October - a good solution for those wishing to visit their offspring without imposing on their homes.

Our tent was still wet when we started pitching it at lunchtime at Kingsdown near Deal but soon dried off in the wind and hot sunshine. Molly quickly made friends with our new neighbours - Ruby and Tilly - whilst I set up camp and thought that I might get to read the paper. What a view! We camped in a massive field, part of a former Scout campsite now privately owned and open to members of the public as well as Scout, Guide and other groups with a stunning view of the English Channel - who could ask for more!

We were soon joined by Rosemary, a guiding friend of mine, who arrived with a BBQ and the wherewithall for  a delicious BBQ supper and 'camp doughnuts' to share with our neighbours.

The campsite boasts a direct pathway to the beach, a very popular draw for many campers - and us! Rosemary led the way and we were soon budond sandcastle s and racing tohd the rapidly advancing tide back in a predictably impossible battle! 

Molly and Rosemary at Kingsdown

..... and the race against the tide

......go back!!!

Going, going ......

Day 2 Whitstable to the Isle of Thanet

Interested in the history of the Isle of Thanet? http://www.bbc.co.uk/kent/content/articles/2006/05/15/thanet_history_feature.shtml

Molly's Blog:

On the 2nd of August we got up and had breakfast. Pip had Dorset muesli and I had Coco-Pop Paws. After breakfast we washed up and went down to the shower block to wash our hair clean from the seawater from the beach the day before. The toilets were full of moths and daddy long legs that kept flying around when you did your teeth. Back at our tent a cat called Biscuit was running around scratching the walls of the tent and jumping on boxes. I met a girl called Esa and we played with Biscuit around the campsite. Biscuit got into a fight with a cat owned by some campers and me and Esa had to try and chase Biscuit away. After that we placed with Bubbles by the caravan but Esa had to have a late breakfast so I had to go back to our tent. We then decided to go out to Tesco to look for a new air bed 'cos mine had a puncture and I could feel the ground when lying in it. As we looked around the shop we realised that they only had double camping beds so we went to buy lunch and headed to the beach. The beach was called Whitstable and we made sand castles and played in the sea.

The sea was cold so we didn't stay in for long. We went back to the car to eat lunch then drove off to the next beach. 

The next beach was called Birchington, there were rock pools and loads and loads and loads and loads and loads of winkles, barnacles, mussels and oyster shells. The seagulls feet made funny sort of flapping noises as they ran across the muddy sand

The next beach was called Westgate and we saw a fashion model photo shoot. We made 6 sand castles. 

We drove through Margate and saw loads of fairs.

The next beach was called Joss Bay, we stayed there for an our and made a sand boat which we decorated with seaweed, chalk pebbles and flags. I swam in the sea and caught my foot in the hole between two rocks.

The next beach was called Broadstairs and we bought fish and chips and chicken nuggets and chips. We saw a seagull feeding it's baby. 

We went back to camp and met some children called Lily, Chloe and James. We did an egg and spoon race, we did a running race, we played catch, who could throw the egg the furthest, we watched the ponies and we played on the scooters. 

Whitstable

Birchington

a budding jewellry maker

Westgate

Joss Bay

Day 1 Isle of Sheppey and Herne Bay

It's a long time since I last stayed on a 'commercial' campsite rather than a Guide one but thankfully we made the right choice with a quiet caravan and camping club site down a very long track set well away from the road. I'm sitting in the dark with only my phone and a citronella candle for light, enjoying the proper dark as opposed to the orange glow of nighttime in London.

We headed off to the Isle of Sheppey for our first beaches this morning and hit Sheerness as the temperatures soared to 30 degrees. Luckily there was a good sea breeze so it wasn't unbearable. We decided that we didn't have time to linger so hurriedly built our first two sand castles, forced ourselves to eat ice creams and pressed on down the coast.

 The tide was out so the next beach (just east of Sheerness??) had better sand but  also a flat beach and a lot of very soft mud. Pretty yuck but despite low tide we managed to get our feet wet in the sea.

It was scorchingly hot by this stage - 34deg - so a quick drive through Leysdown-on-Sea was enough to say that we'd been there and had ticked off the Isle of Sheppey. Interesting discussions with Molly about the difference between river mouths, deltas and estuaries and the history of import/export shipping from London. 

Pitching camp in the searing heat of late afternoon was a heck of a lot easier than with a whole heap of newbie Guides and we were grateful for a pitch under the trees affording us a degree of shade in the evening sunlight.

The highlight of our day had to be swimming at high tide at Herne Bay at sunset, thank you Molly for your eagerness to get in there, perfect way to cool off at the end of the day!

Herne Bay at sunset. Planting our LaSER sandcastle flags in pebble piles

Bubblegum ice cream at Sheerness