Once every now and then something happens to us all that leaves you thinking did that really happen? Well on October 16^th one of those things happened to me, but first I must go back 17 days to Thursday 30^th of September. Nothing special happened on that day, I went to work as usual, came home had my tea nothing out of the ordinary about that, apart from a phone call late that day, asking could I get a Patrol together to represent Wyre District Scouts in the West Lancashire backwoods cooking competition. It came as quite a surprise because we had not qualified for this particular competition having come third in our District, which meant we had not trained a team to enter. Perhaps I had better explain Wyre District Scouts run some competitions to see who will represent them in County Comps, it’s a bit like having a local knock out in say football, or cricket, to see who’s the best to go through to represent them against the best teams in West Lancs. Unfortunately this year we came third, and only the first two go through to the next stage. The problem our District faced now was their best team had dropped out, so because Gt Eccleston Scouts had come third they were asked to fill the gap. Fortunately this gave our Group the opportunity to prove we were worthy of the challenge, but the problem was with only three Scouts eligible to represent the District and just two days to get a team to together, let alone practise, it all seamed a bit beyond us. But in true Gt Eccleston style, come the day of the competition we had a team of six Scouts, having trained three in just two days.

Another shock was on the day of the competition Great Eccleston Scouts were the only group representing the Wyre District, because despite the other Group having over 27 members, surprisingly they were unable to get a team together. So it was on the 3^rd of October, six young people from Great Eccleston were the only Scouts representing Wyre to see who were the best Scouts in West Lancashire at backwoods cooking. Now if anybody tells you that all young people today are lazy, well read on, because despite only having one days practise they came an astonishing joint first. Yes joint first with a Group from Ormskirk!  This meant in less than two weeks they would be up against the best Scouts in the North West of England. to put it in perspective they would be competing against the best Scouts from Cheshire, North, South, West, & East Manchester, Merseyside, The Isle of Man, East Lancashire, West Lancashire, and Cumbria, That’s all the Scout Groups from Birmingham To Scotland. Now becoming the best in West Lancs is something special, but trying to beat the best in the North West of England in less than 17 days, is beyond anybodies capabilities. The thing is you never know what you will be cooking, so it’s vital when practising to learn to cook as many things as possible, but with only two practise sessions they did the best they could.

 So it was on the day of the Competition knowing full well their limitations, they set off to Manchester, with the sole intent of having a good time, improving their practical skills, and to gain more competition experience, this is something you cannot duplicate when practising. Unbelievably the judges had decided to give them a whole chicken to cook something that you would normally avoid when cooking on an open fire, for the obvious reasons. But despite this the Scouts from Gt Eccleston, are now able to say they are the best at backwoods cooking, in the North West of England, by winning the Regional Competition at Middlewood campsite West Manchester on the 16^th of October 2004.

The Scouts have been trying to get in the

 record books with a trebuchet

It started some time ago when the scouts built their first ballista at one of our District camps, but having recently contacted the Guinness Book of Records to see if it were possible to go for a record attempt, the scouts have started to build them once more.  The thing is they have got bigger, so much, so, that at our last camp we built an 11meatr tall monster, with an estimated metric ton of thrust. But the best is yet to come, because during the school holidays we have been working on a better one, starting small at first and once more building up to one just over 8m tall but with a grater horse power and a lot more efficient capable of throwing things a grater distance. It’s been quite a learning curve, and the scouts have had a great time throwing various objects across the field. The problem now is, we can throw things into the cricket field. So we have to do our practising when nobody is playing cricket.

Below is the trebuchet we have entered for the Guinness Book of Records. As you can see it’s quite impressive and is capable of throwing a 5lb weight from one end of the filed to the other, quite an achievement for a small Scout Group like Gt Eccleston.

Hopefully we will know if it’s a record before Christmas

The Cub section

At our AGM the Cubs entertained everybody with some of the best entertainment I have seen performed by Cubs for many a year, their doctors surgery sketch with the IQ machine was better than the Scouts performance some years before. But not content on that, they went on to perform two more equally funny and entertaining sketches finishing with, dance of the zombies But not to be out done the Scouts had us all in stitches with their rendition of, “and what did your auntie bring back from France” routine. But just when we thought it was all over, in came "Elvis Presley" yes you all missed the “King of Rock and Roll” at Gt Eccleston Scout Hut.

We had displays on Scouting heritage and demonstrations in backwoods cooking, and pioneering. There was a mock campsite complete with camp kitchen and gateway. We also had a number of games for the entire family note the white but smiley faces. But the best thing was the fantastic BBQ kindly put on by one of the parents I.H. Daniel the Butchers