Baden-Powell's Birthday Hike

In honour of our founder, Lord Robert Baden-Powell, 1st Whittingham BP Scout Group set themselves a huge challenge – a 20km hike across 12 summits in the Cheviot Hills, with an overall climb of nearly 1000m in the week of his birthday!

We had wonderful conditions for the walk, starting off in beautiful sunshine, but it was very blustery on the tops, and we were in cloud on Wester Tor, the highest peak, and furthest away, which the scouts found very exciting! We were helped on our way by treasure bags left at each summit by one of the Rover Scouts who ran the route ahead of us with a friend! The group were lead by Ninette and Clive, both Mountain Leaders, so all were in safe hands! We completed the hike in 8 hours, finishing just as it was beginning to get dark. Everyone completed the hike in great B-P spirits, showing huge determination and strength of character. We are really proud of each and every one of the group – this was a huge challenge to them all, and they all completed it with a smile on their face and a huge sense of achievement. Scout Law number 8 – A scout smiles and whistles under all difficulties!

3 cubs, 7 scouts, 1 senior scout, 5 rovers, and 3 leaders undertook the challenge. Nobody showed signs of tiredness until they reached the cars at the end (at which point one of the scouts was found curled in a heap asleep by his car!)

The scouts were raising money to travel to Lesotho in the summer to plant trees in the deforested mountains of the Kingdom of Lesotho.