Last weekend I finally completed my Duke of Edinburgh and whilst it was one of the most difficult and terrifying weekends of my life, I have never felt more proud of myself. I made so many memories with my team. I know I'll look back on the whole weekend with nothing but joy.
We left on Friday evening and it took about 3 hours to get there, but we all made the journey fun. Discussing our work experience which we had just finished that day and stopping off at McDonald's for dinner. When we finally arrived it was still quite early, but we still got straight to building our tents.
It seemed my friends and I had grabbed a dodgy one, it was missing part of a pole and the zip was broken so we couldn't close it. We only noticed this after we had built and pegged it. We ended up having to take it down and build another one ... In the dark. After that hassle was over we settled in for the night. Nervous for the day to come as our practise assessment had been painful and exhausting. Although we were better prepared this time, we made sure we packed light and dressed warm. Plus we bought tonnes of socks as they are the key to surviving dofe. We set off quite early. Our first part of the walk was over a collection of huge cliffs right next to the ocean.
Going down a steep pathway I took my first fall ... Brilliant.
We shortly took a break to re-energise and kept walking, we managed to get ourselves a tad lost. However after a quick group consult we where back on track and walked up the steepest hill. We all collapsed as soon as we reached the top! Our next part of the journey consisted of a very long walk through a massive, smelly, mucky and sheep covered field.
I was surprised to find that almost every person we met was extremely friendly, everyone said hello and
commented on how massive our bags were! It was very heartwarming. We kept going and after a few hours (out of the field) we hit our half way point! We where at corf castle.
Corf castle is a beautiful decaying castle with a lot of rich history. We met up with our group leader (before this I fell once again and ripped my leggings!) and after a quick break we set off once again on our final part of the trip. We went though a wet, muddy forest for about an hour before we finally got back to the camp site. We built our tents (a new one, not broken) and ate some dinner. After that we cleaned up and showered and played some games with the other groups before heading to bed. I actually felt quite good. It wasn't as painful as last time, I was feeling confident about the Sunday. Ready to get it over and done with.
We woke up extra early the next day, keen to get going. We dressed warm as the weather wasn't being so kind to us that day. After packing up our tents for the final time we were off on our adventure. The walk started well, it was very slippery though. The mud was thick in the woods and you sunk with every step so navigating a safe pathway was difficult. Soon we where out of the woods and at our first check point. We met up with our leader, after a quick chat we set off again past a cute little train station.
Things were looking positive until we reached the hill (it makes me sick to think about it right now), it was the tallest, steepest hill I had ever seen. It looked like an actual mountain (just to add I had joked about climbing the hill half an hour before we had reached it, I didn't think it was on our route!) I was petrified to climb it as whilst I am not scared of heights I'm scared of being up high with nothing to hold or falling from somewhere high. We climbed up the smallest, slippery steps, edging higher and higher. The view was quiet incredible, the sound of a church-bell could still be heard. After reaching the end of the pathway of steps I was exhausted! Yet I wasn't even at the top of the hill yet. It just kept going and going. I walked up in very slowly, trying to keep my grip as my heavy bag was being pushed by the strong wind making me wobble. When I finally reached the top I could see nothing, the fog encased the whole group and we could only see a few steps ahead of us.
We walked across a series of hills for about and hour and a half, stopping at one of our checkpoints and meeting many friendly bikers along the way. The pathway seemed to never end and we where getting more cold and more wet by the minute.
Although when finally we started moving downhill everything was a whirl. We reached our checkpoint, had a quick meet with our leader. Then we where off on our final stretch.
The end of our last trip had been the hardest part of the whole thing but after pacing ourselves and preparing a lot more it was a lot easier this time. It was painful, yet we got through it. We made it to the end, celebrating when our school van finally came to pick us up at the end of our very very long walk. The journey home was long, we all had a nap. When we pulled up to the school everyone just couldn't wait to get home.
Duke of Edinburgh has been one of the biggest challenge of my life so far, but it's been an incredible experience. I pushed myself in ways I never thought I could, I faced fears. Built stronger relationships with my friends, who pushed me out of my comfort zone. I made so many funny memories with everyone, that weekend will forever be one of my proudest moments in my life.
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