Nice Birds

Photo: The kids are alright...and so are the leaders!

We are just back from Scripture Union camp in Comrie in Perthshire. I was there working and Emma decided to come and cook for us all. Isabelle went off to Arran for a week whilst the boys stayed with us. It's a great base for a camp as it's a hostel on a shared campsite. What I liked was that the public are milling about amongst the stuff we are doing, especially the 'God Slots'. I like the fact that they can see and hear what we are doing as sometimes there is a danger we keep all that behind closed doors, and so attracting unfair criticism. This lot was there for all to see so no dark secrets.

The other thing I liked about the location was the scenery. I managed to get up early and run 3 times, each time covering 7-8 miles and getting to some high ground to see the massive views of the many mountains and lochs. The highlight had to be the discovery of an osprey nest, fully loaded with mum, dad and 3 fledglings. I know these are rare birds and hoped I would see one sometime, but to get 5 was beyond belief. I borrowed a pair of binoculars and spent many geeky hour watching them, as I could get within 200 meters without causing too much disturbance.

The camp was good too. SU have a lot of women volunteers and this camp was no different. However, the blokes who were there offered suitable laddish role models to the kids, and we did stuff like building a huge fire which involved tying a rope to the minibus and a pile of logs left by the forestry commission. You can't beat a good camp fire! We played cricket and footy and stuff like that. An old favourite was hunt the leader, where we dress up and go into the town of Crieff and the kids have to find you. Some disguises were good, like the girl who was a chav sat drinking Irn Bru at the bus stop. I dug out the Roman Centurion outfits from the Holy Ghost Walk and stood guard outside the public loos. It was funny watching the faces of elderly people on coach tours nipping for a pee, wondering how to get past us. I told them the emperor had granted permission for them to pee. The American tourists loved it too, seeing some genuine 'Scotlanders'. The dork in Subway was confused. I was with Lachlan who was dressed as a hippy, and the dork thought he was Bob Marley and I was a Viking. I don't recall Bob being a ginger white man with red arms from too much sun. The food was good and there was a lot of tray bake. In fact I think I ate my own body weight in tray bake last week thanks to the ladies of SU.