9.5.-12.5.2016

Introduction

Since 4 months we’re running through forests, making fires, building shelters while trying not to die here in Norway. As only 3 people left back home yet, I think we were pretty successful. So now it is time to pass our gained knowledge on to more inexperienced human beings, such as some college classes from Kristiansand. From Monday to Thursday we used the already prepared plan from last year (what a relieve hearing that we don’t have to plan everything, this saved us approximately 2000 hours of work) to carry college students between 17 and 19 from one outdoor activity to the next. The different activities were chosen, so that there was a balance between technical, team and fun challenges.

Main part

9.30 Monday morning, time to start… maybe? Our class meets up in front of Spicheren to discuss how the following week will be approached.

10.00 Monday morning, everything is clear and we can start to the area where the fun will happen. It’s close to a lake called Donnevannet where 3 Gapahuks* are installed. Call it lucky or unlucky, but as some of the guys have to take the bus, which isn’t really frequent and takes a long time, we can go back home for another hour of relaxation.

12.00. Max, Julian and I arrive at the campsite and together with the others we look around the area which offers a lake 200m from the Gapahuks and a hilly forest, providing the perfect environment for the activities the students will have to master. The following week I’m going to be in charge of three out of these nine tasks. Here’s a short list presenting the six activities I won’t go in detail later: Abseiling, shelter building, fire making, blindfolded obstacle course, canoeing and the chicken game (I think no one really knows what the chicken game is and we also dropped it due to the small number of students that should arrive the following days). I’m going to team up with Adrian (A-Dog) and we will organize orienteering, stretcher and the lava game. For the first day we are in charge of orienteering and as preparation we run through the forest placing cards with different symbols. Which isn’t as easy as it may sounds, because we have to make sure that the cards aren’t too easy nor too hard to find. Further on, every single location has to be marked precisely on the map, and attentive readers may remember that maps have already proven to be our main enemy during that course.

18.00. The first group of students arrives at the campsite only 15 minutes later than expected. They are being divided into 7 small groups which are going to go from one activity to the next. This evening they will start with 3 out of the 8 remaining tasks. A-Dog’s and my concerns that the cards may be too easy to find soon dissolve as the first group only scores 4 out of 10 points. Thoughts come up if it could be the other way round and the task is too difficult, but the second group proofs that the previous group wasn’t really motivated. Scoring 7 out of 10 points they shall remain the best group for the day.

20.30. The first day has ended and while the students prepare their meals and the Gapahuks for the night we spread out to find a sleeping place in the woods. Some decide to stay close to the Gapahuks, others paddle over the lake to sleep at the seaside and the three of us find the way back to the car and into our comfy beds at home. Yes, we are the real outdoor guys. Just following our teacher, who may has the excuse of housework waiting, but as sleeping in the forest isn’t mandatory we’re going to be the lame guys everybody’s jealous of.

Time to change the writing style, because I already used more than half of the words allowed. Short & simple now, go:

After oversleeping the next morning I was really tired when we arrived at the Gapahuks. So I was really glad that the orienteering activity mainly consisted of telling the students what to do and then waiting for them to come back after 20 minutes. I used this time to drink my coffee and get fit. This worked so good, that I could go on and practice my knife throwing skills while the second group was out searching. Thanks to Len I could optimize my technique and I stopped sucking too bad. At around 12 all groups were finished and the winners were announced. When the students had left we had a short briefing to sum up what happened and improve some small things. One of the students had hurt her ankle and two more failed to start walking with the others so we took the canoes and paddled with them across the lake to their pick up spot. After arriving safely Martynas, Julian and I walked to the seaside, discovered some jellyfish, got scared, walked back to the lake and canoed to the Gapahuks. The following two days two more groups of students arrived, as the first one, each consisting of 35 to 40 motivated teenagers. Adrian and I offered the Stretcher activity on the second task which is all about carrying an injured person for a short distance only using a climbing rope**. We could observe a lot of different efforts and group dynamics. In some groups everyone tried to help, while there were also team members in other groups that relied on the others to do the work. Still the most groups did really good work and also the second day was a great success. On the last day, A-Dog and I played the lava game with the third group of students. This game is all about teamwork, as they have to cross a “lava-field” only using small cardboards. It offers a lot of different possibilities to adjust the difficulty to the skills of each group spontaneously (carry a bucket of water, only use one leg, carry another person…) and it showed me, that even 18 year olds like made-up stories to make a game more interesting.

After the last group left we were really happy that everything went so well. Because on the past trips there were always some difficulties occurring between our class members I was astonished on how good we performed together this time. If anyone of you is reading this, thank you, you’re awesome!!

Oh I almost forgot: The award for the best victory speech in history goes to the guy in the second group. I may have forgotten your name, but your words will remain forever:

“Thank you all, for sucking so bad!”

*Gapahuk: a built sleeping hut in the forests installed by the Norwegian government to get lazy people outdoors

**Emergency stretcher: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1PYnel1g14 (we didn’t use a sleeping mat nor a sleeping bag, as it was only for showing the right technique for the knotting)