Despite the additional and unwelcome presence of Storm Francis, 24 Year 13 girls successfully took on the challenge of a four-day and three-night expedition to the Lake District at the end of the summer holiday.

Due to the DofE changed expedition requirements, the girls camped in individual tents and stayed at the same campsite for the full expedition. On day one the girls walked in non-stop rain from the drop off point at Threlkeld to the campsite at Borrowdale, arriving late in the day, and then having to erect tents and cook a hot evening meal using trangias.

The girls awoke to a fabulous second day, clear skies and hot sunshine. Walking from camp, they walked over the fells, via the Honister pass and into Buttermere witnessing the Lake District at its very best. Unfortunately, the rain on the third day was again torrential and a shorter walk to take into account the conditions was planned and successfully executed by each team, There was an added incentive of a hot drink rustled up for each team member by Tim Deighton and Mr Parry in their ‘pop up café’ at Watendlath, before the return leg back to camp.

The final day was a little overcast but dry, and the girls had all packed up camp and were on the final leg of the expedition before 9am. Walking back to Keswick, the views over the lake were inspiring and all teams safely arrived at the final collection point, tired but delighted to have successfully completed this challenging expedition.

As always, I would like to thank the DofE assessors Tim Deighton and Alyn Griffiths and their staff for all their support and encouragement to enable the girls to complete this expedition. The girls remained positive and cheerful throughout, despite the conditions and Mr Parry and I very much enjoyed sharing this experience with them. Finally many thanks to Mr Parry for giving up the final part of his holiday to accompany this expedition and for driving the minibus.

Dr Sue Madden, Assistant Head

Tents drying in the HUB. The HUB has underfloor heating so this is one of the many things for which the HUB is useful that we didn’t anticipate when it was designed and built!