It was very exciting to welcome back our Second Form adventurers yesterday, who were returning ater nine days on an adventure camp in the French Alps
Many thanks to one of our Second Form Alps adventurers, Ivo McLusky, for his account of their trip to France:
We have just returned home from nine nights away in France, eight of those were in a tent and one in a hotel due to the French strike (because of a ferry company closing).
We left Bloxham School at 7.00am in two buses, one big one for the boys and the small one for the girls. It was a long journey with lots of stops, my favourite bit in was when we finally got off the Eurotunnel – the adventure was beginning at long last!
After two hours of driving night approached so we pulled over to an emergency hotel and Josh and I watched a film in French. We were up the next morning at 8.30am and back on the road to camp. We finally arrived at the camp at 9.00pm, when we set up tents and had a great dinner of chicken, spicy sausages and cous cous.
On the first day we went to the market and different groups were in charge of buying different food for starters, mains and pudding for our evening meal that we cooked on a fire by a glacial lake. We then went to climb part of Via Ferrata, which was very tiring and hot but it was very fun. What we did was put two carabiners on a metal line and climbed and walked across some steep cliffs and rope ladders. Ben’s favourite bit was when he crossed a gorge with just a bit of wire to support us.
The next day we split again and half went mounting biking and then went to a lake. My group went water rafting, which was great! We started in single or double air boats, I was in a double with Josh but then he ditched me and I got stuck with Mr Tuthill. He fell out so I paddled as fast as possible down some rapids, leaving Sir in the water! After lunch we went into big rafts, one for the girls and one for the boys. It was fun and in the shallow water we would attack each other by jumping on to enemy boats then pulling people off ! At the end Mia, Amy and I surfed a wave for 15 seconds in the raft. George’s favourite bit was when we jumped though a big rapid wave and we were under for five seconds.
On the third day we swapped activities so my group did mountain biking, which was tiring and fun even though me and Josh wiped out and got lots of cuts. Then we to a big lake which had pedalos and big jumps and we spent a long time there messing around. My favourite jump was six meters high up a tree and I did a flip off it!
The fourth and fifth days were a long hike and I nearly threw up on the first day because it was so hot and the slopes were not at all easy (about 65 degrees). Finally we made it to a lake where Richard jumped in and swam to the middle but we had to leave to get to the hostel and have food. We stayed in this amazing place with an 18-man bunk bed!
On the last day we went canyoning and fishing to catch supper. Canyoning was jumping off rocks into waterfalls in a narrow river gorge, which was great fun. We caught 27 fresh trout for supper and Giles Cornah (an Old Bloxhamist who helps organise the trip every year) cooked it all for us – I ate a fish eye!
Luckily, the trip home was nice and easy and we got pizza on the last night.
To see a full album of photos, please click here.