Bouncing around at Woodhouse Fundays

Jenny Stevens (University of Bristol Guides and Scouts)

Monday 12th of June 2017

This weekend SSAGO took to Woodhouse Park to help with Fundays, a jam-packed day ran on both Saturday and Sunday for Beavers, Cubs, Rainbows and Brownies...

Two 6am starts in a row may seem like a breeze to the most attuned workers, but when you’re spending the day picking up kids in giant inflatable balls and trying to hold down tarpaulin that just wants to fly away, all you want is a good lie in! 

This weekend SSAGO took to Woodhouse Park to help with Fundays, a jam-packed day ran on both Saturday and Sunday for Beavers, Cubs, Rainbows and Brownies. When we arrived, we found a whole field of activities that we could run including Zorbing, a slip and slide as well as caving through a maze of hay bales. 

The most entertaining activity of course were the Zorbs. Small children running at each other in giant inflatable sphere was hilarious to watch especially when one would lose control and end up rolling all the way down the hill or lying stuck upside down. 

The caving was undertaken by only the bravest of young Scouts. The hay maze was covered with dark sheeting and was full of awkward twists and turns, so if you made one wrong move you could be stuck for a very long time (and I mean a long time, one Beaver took an hour to find his way out). 

For the lovely sunny weather, hundreds of kids running and sliding down a soapy sheet turned out to be the perfect activity and leaders found it a great way to get all the dirt of the day off their group. However, by the end of Sunday, this ideal summer activity turned into a mudslide and kids chose to splash in the muddy puddles instead of rinsing off! 

Overall, it’s safe to say this event was a huge success and the Scout Association definitely know how to organise a fantastic weekend, but they’d still be stuck without volunteers like SSAGO to run it!