The school does the Duke of Edinburgh scheme but those overseas will know it as the International Award. The DofE as it can be known as, is formative for many young people. Established by The Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Phillip, its strap-line is now YOUTH WITHOUT LIMITS. Its aim is simple, empowering young people to build confidence and resilience. The International Award is the same but different!

The Duke of Edinburgh scheme is part of The Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award Foundation found in over 120 countries – the strap-line is #WorldReady, supporting 14-24 year olds find their purpose, place and passion in the world.

Just like the DofE, the make up of the Award is the same with four parts over three different levels. The levels are Bronze, Silver and Gold with the four parts in the Bronze being completed over a minimum six month period. Parts are physical recreation, a skill, commitment to the community in terms of voluntary service and an Adventurous Journey- formerly known as an expedition! The expedition for Bronze (and what I was on) was 2 days and 1 night and at least 6 hours “purposeful effort” per day.

As the levels progress so does the length of the journey and “purposeful effort”. The Gold Award also requires a residential component.

I have supported the Bronze and the Silver participants this year at school – but I was unable to go on either the Bronze practice route or unfortunately the Silver journeys. The Bronze practice coincided with a Shenzhen university fair in March that I took all Year 10-12 to and the Silver expedition coincided with Shrek Jr, and given that Eleanor was Princess Fiona and Martin was Papa Ogre, and my parents came over from NI for the performances, there was no way I could miss that. My colleagues who went on the Silver trip had an amazing time hiking on the Great Wall!

The Bronze award practice journey had happened in March, and the qualifying journey was supposed to be in April. The practice journey was just that – a practice – and for the students they realised what they actually needed and what was a luxury. A group of students brought along steaks for their evening meal while another brought a large 4-man tent. Everyone came back safely and all were able to reflect what they really needed and what they didn’t need. Sadly everyone decided that walking poles were a must.

The time came in April for the qualifying journey – but… it wasn’t to be. The rains came and part of the route flooded. Time was running out with exams happening but finally two days were found, a Monday and Tuesday and while there was rain on the way to the start of the journey and rain on the journey it was not as sustained as it had been the preceding month.

I had my group of 4, 2 girls and 2 boys. 3 out of the 4 were in my House and I had hoped to get to know them better. Also assigned to our group was a staff member from Lead Climb, the company running the journey. Tǔdòu (phonetically Toodoh it means potato in Mandarin, because he likes potatoes) was there to keep an eye on their location and I was there to make sure that everyone was engaged and to ensure all was fine. What neither of us could do was get involved in deciding the way we were walking or how long the students stopped.

Remaining aloof and unconcerned about directions was a skill that I didn’t have at the beginning of the journey but it developed throughout the two days. My group made excellent progress, we were the first to set off, and the first to double back on ourselves and walk past the waiting groups who hadn’t yet started. Despite the false start the walking pace was good while we were in a forested mountainous area following a path. Thankfully the forest protected us from most of the falling rain.

After 20 or so minutes of a good pace, the group decided to stop for a rest. For me, walking 20 minutes had been a walk in the park and I couldn’t see the exact reason of the stop. However, I was only carrying water as my bag was being taken to the camping location by car.

Soon enough we were overtaken, and once overtaken we had to wait 5 minutes before setting off again. This happened multiple times and the difficulty with everyone doing the same route was that on occasion the stops would happen at a fork in the path and when their map skills failed them, certain groups would wait until other groups made the decision. On occasions the group who had been brave to make the decision and strike out first got it wrong and they had to double back on themselves often back up steep hills that they had spent time getting down.

All staff had walkie talkies and school staff had a different channel from the company staff. The company staff used theirs sporadically, but we used ours to keep each other informed of the group decision to stop for no apparent reason or complain of the pace which for some groups could be a snail like pace. None of us wanted to be getting to camp in the dark.

Towards the end of day one, on top of a hill where the only option was down, the students took forever to decide which down they would go. One group went the wrong direction, my group decided to go in the right direction and then got cold feet so went back up the mountain only to return to their original decision 10 or so minutes later. The hill was muddy with no discernible path. When going down hill on horseback you lean back, and when skiing, you traverse down the mountain with parallel skis keeping body weight mountainside. My mum had always told me to keep my feet side ways across the mountain rather than pointing feet down the mountain and it is with all of that information that I used to get myself down the mountain relatively unscathed. Try as I might, the students didn’t listen to any of my sage advice. They all had two walking poles and they used them as if their lives depended on them. They descended down this rather steep hill leaning all of their weight (plus their rucksack weight) on the poles. Most of them stayed on their feet, some of the girls across all the groups fell down and where very muddy, others had to be coaxed down and one bent her pole beyond all recognition. I succumbed to the mud at the very last part having turned around to make sure a student was ok, I lost my footing and fell over.

Finally down the hill we came to a river crossing. All the groups, bar one congregated there and while working out how to cross the river we were viciously attacked by mosquitoes. The river posed a problem that while not insurmountable, did require our staff and Lead Climb staff to get their feet wet and help the students across. The river had no bridge and the all the rain water of the previous month had meant the river level had risen above the usual stepping stones.

Everyone over safely we made it to our camp for the evening – in the dark.

While students cooked (heated water and had instant noodles) all the staff had their dinner cooked and we were able to catch up and tell the highlights and lowlights of the day.

Everyone slept well, the staff more than most since we had actual beds. Because of the rain and condition of the ground we had gone to a campsite. The students still camped. The company had provided cooking stoves and tents for the students that had been divided up for them to carry but a student had still opted to bring his own tent.

That tent was apparently the lightest one on the market, in effect it was a ground sheet, and a piece of plastic over the top held up by a walking pole. The downside to this piece of kit was that the tent was see-through.

The next morning, everyone was up and ready for the final push. The dog from the campsite followed us for a period of time, which included the time when at the first junction the group came to, we went right. First mistake of the day! Having a map seemed to hamper some of the group. Eventually they came to their senses and we did an about turn. It was a lovely morning of hiking seeing local villages and farms. We went past a chicken farm, that was at a junction and for some groups some people spent far too long there, the smell seemingly not encouraging quick decision making. My group moved on before the stench of the chicken coop overwhelmed us.

We pushed on until the final stretch then a decision had to be made on the direction. Initially I thought disaster had struck. No one was able to locate the map. The map holder had put it in their pocket and somehow it had escaped unnoticed.

At this point I expected blame to be apportioned and tempers to flare. But my group showed none of those traits. Instead they actually worked as a group for the first time listening to each other. Previously the girls would venture an opinion and the boys wouldn’t listen. Tǔdòu and I stepped back and watched them work out what to do. This became more difficult when the suggestion was made to follow the dog. Common sense prevailed and we didn’t follow the dog in the end, which was good because the way the dog wanted to go was in the opposite direction of where we should have been going.

The students landed us 200 metres from our finishing point. We were impressed – as were the students!

We were collected by bus and taken to school. It was the quietest bus I had been on for some time!