District Hike 2023
This year the walk was created by Mark and John from C&V, for the explorers they started near Polhill Garden Centre towards the Scout start at Otford, all the Scouts and Explorers then made there way through the countryside heading on a loop towards Hopehill.
We were very blessed with the weather on Saturday with nice warm sunshine for all the walkers, it was a shame I had to be in my car doing the route checking everyone was ok and ensuring the Checkpoint staff had all the information ready for when the walkers arrived.
All the teams arrived at Hopehill for the night camping in the small hike tents.
Sunday morning soon arrived and all the walkers were up and getting ready for todays walk from Hopehill to the Friars in Aylesford, today I was able to help out walking as a sweeper for the scout section.
We set all the teams out heading through the countryside on the way to Aylesford, we had been walking for around an hour when the calls started coming in of a problem in Luxon Wood where some of the teams had been stung lots of times by hornets, this is a 1 st for me to try and manage when running an activity when you are hearing about multiple persons being stung and trying to get all the leaders in the right places to deal with the issue, as
scouts, explorers and leaders we all come together to sort everyone out so they could continue the walk to Aylesford.
With all the issues that we encountered on Sunday the teams headed to the Friars for the finish.
So here goes the results are……….
Scouts
1st C&V - walking time of 12hrs 26mins
2nd 5th Northfleet - walking time of 12hrs 30mins
Explorers
1st Kipling 1 - walking time of 9hrs 50mins
2nd Sputnik 1 - walking time of 10hrs 20mins
3rd Kipling/Apollo - walking time of 12hrs 10mins
4th Phoenix - pulled out after CP2 on day 2
5th Sputnik 2 - pulled out after CP2 on day 2 (joined Sputnik 1)
Congratulations goes out to all teams that entered this year, yet again it has been a great weekend.
I would like to personally thank everyone who helped to ensure the event was able to go ahead.
If you would like to know anymore information, please contact me.
Darren Stanford
ADC Scouts
District Hike Day 1
District Hike Day2
District Hike 2023 Gallery