An overnight stay for our Holiday Club in the Dales

Beverley Gilbert our our Community Wellbeing Worker tells us about an overnight stay to finish off the wonderful FGF Holiday Club experience this long summer holidays…

The final two days of Holiday Club in August were spent at Grinton Lodge Youth Hostel in Reeth which is in Swaledale a beautiful part of Yorkshire Dales National Park, with 12 very excited and slightly apprehensive children, some of whom had not been away from their parents before.

The stay included a ramble taking us across the moors, past old lead mining buildings, over bridges and introduced us to some of the wild life including a lizard, rabbits and lots of sheep, we also picked and enjoyed eating berries.

The evening was spent eating dinner, settling in and making new friends. At a campfire we toasted marshmallows and made smores, followed by bat spotting which was very successful and then inside for downtime reading and colouring.

Sleep eventually came by 11.30pm.

On Day 2 breakfast was enjoyed by all and then we headed down to the stream for the first of the morning activities – stream dipping. Armed with nets and buckets we started to find the all sorts of creatures in the nets and carefully transferred them into the buckets and used charts to identify them. The unexpected catch of the day was a pair of small rainbow trout. Everything was safely returned to the stream at the end of the session.

Stone tower building found some children going for height, while others went for quantity, lots of grasshoppers were found as we searched for the correct shaped rocks, adding another type of wildlife to our list.

The early part of the afternoon was spent orienteering, and like a lot of the activities it was new to all the children. We finished our time at the residential with an ice-cream, before all getting on the coach for the return journey. No coach games were required on our return journey as most of the children fell asleep after a thrilling and stimulating two days. The whole experience created new opportunities for the children, encouraged team work and most importantly formed new friendships.

Games on the moors.

Identifying bats.

A big “thank you” must to the Yorkshire Dales National Park for making this residential possible; and also to Grinton Lodge Youth Hostel which was so welcoming, provided all our home comforts and wonderful food plus such exciting activities, especially the fire pit and the bat spotting which were big favourites.

It was fabulous and I do hope I can secure funding to bring another group to stay. The trip encouraged independence, allowed them to develop essential life skills like decision making and problem solving as well as team work and making new friends.

If you would like to know more about future Holiday Clubs contact Beverley Gilbert – Mobile: 07702 869457 / Email: beverley.gilbert@fgfleeds.org

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