Looks like rain dear!

Photos: Stuart gyroscoping and zorbing. Our water feature and the mud

Last weekend I made my return to camping after a 2 year break. We were away with the church youth group to a big event called Spree. It happened to collide with the worst weather we have had all summer and there was heavy rain, constantly for the whole weekend. Our tents were already for us on arrival and I did wonder if they had picked the wrong field for a campsite when I noticed reed beds all over it. Our luxury 3 man tent was dry enough in the sleeping chamber, but the foyer had a water feature running through it. Still, it survived the strong winds, unlike others in our swamp who were evacuated to the sports hall. Namby pamby's, don't they know that this is what camping is like in Scotland?

The event was really good. packed to the rafters with activities. The organisers were brave enough to not cancel anything, which just meant getting wet all day and night if you wanted to do them. Stuart was with us and had the choice of going to the under 8's cabin to do craft and stuff like that, or join the teenagers doing paintballing, rock climbing, bouncing on the inflatables, zorbing, gyroscoping, archery, power kiting, go karting, swimming, Wii, mountain biking and kayaking. A tough choice to make for a 7 year old but somehow the Under 8's programme had little appeal to him. So he did most of those things, including zorbing which had the longest queue, but 10 out of 10 for novelty value. Zorbing is climbing inside a huge inflatable ball and running around a giant paddling pool. It is fun, but very tiring. I can imagine Stuart had great difficulty explaining to his teacher exactly how he had spent his weekend. I am expecting a phone call from social services concerned that Stuart's imagination is getting overworked. All in all a good weekend and we bumped into a few old friends from various other camps, including Rich Townend who used to come to Criccieth so lots of reminiscence going on there. Despite the mud and suffering (Emma packed wellies 2 sizes too small) it was a welcome return to camping!