JamboRi18 Ireland

7:36 am GMT and our flight from Doha finally touches down. As we approached the airport, the city hid it’s delights from us under a thick cover of cloud. At the last minute, we broke through the cloud and landed smoothly. On this leg of the journey I was sat next to a Scottish fellow, Michael, who was an outdoor education instructor.  He also taught UK Scouts and leaders how to navigate with a map and compass – a skill, he says, is getting rarer and rarer!  He was on his way home after six weeks in Nepal with a group of students and teachers. They were attempting something called the World Challenge. From what I could understand, this was similar to the Gold Duke of Edinburgh or Queen Scout award except for the fact that most of it had to be completed in stages overseas. I think I managed two hours sleep on this flight but I was glad to hear that most of our group heeded my warnings and slept four to six hours.  Most, didn’t include one young Scout who thought sleep was overrated and

Warning!!! For those of you who get bored easily, I’d skip this post.  There’s only so many moves you can watch on a plane. This post filed in some of that other time! Well, here we are onboard QR 907 safe and sound, just five minutes from take off. Most of us arrived at Kingsford Smith airport, at the designated time, checked in our luggage without problems and bid our parents and loved ones a fond farewell. I think for some parents it was a sadder occasion than for their kids. We cleared customs with only one hitch, one Venturer had a 200ml bottle of hand sanitiser instead of the regulation 100ml and a full bottle of water. This was despite our advertising all the restrictions in the newsletter. They do say Scouts learn by doing! This works for most things, other than hanging of the end of a cliff on a knot you haven’t practiced. Once through customs, it was time for some lunch. Interestingly enough, the Venturers wanted to go to Maccas (obviously getting ready to fully embrace

I always seem to start my travel blogs around five days out from a trip. The reality is, there have been more than five months of hard work, planning and organising to get us to this point. What is "this trip" you ask? In five days 22 Scouts and I will be embarking on an amazing adventure through the highlands of bonny Scotland across the Irish Sea to the green hills of Ireland. From the top of Northern Ireland to bottom of South Ireland and in between we'll be spending nine days at the first national Irish Jamboree in 10 years. For those of you who don't know me, Noel's my name and I'm the Australian Contingent leader of this group. We have 10 Scouts, seven Venturers and five other leaders all leaving different parts of Australia on or before the 15th of July, to meet up in Edinburgh for the first leg out our journey. With just five days to go, I've got lots of last minute things running through my head that are keeping me awake at night. It's 12: