Tuesday 25 September 2012

Carlingford's Adventure

This week we returned from tired wrecked but delighted with our adventure. Carlingford was amazing. We were to be at Esso at ten to seven. Bit early but it was nice to know we were going somewhere for two days of fun and adventure.
We boarded the bus with some hopes of sleep but all those hopes were forgotten as the energy on the bus was buzzing everyone was delighted. We arrived in Carlingford at around nine o'clock and after a regestration and putting our stuff away we were straight into the activities.
Our first activity was laser combat with Chris and Andy. After we were split into groups (go red team!!) the rules were then explained to us and we got stuck in. It was great fun although some competitive streaks came out in Teddy domination ang King of the Hill.
After this we returned back down a really big hill and lunch was ready and we were ready for lunch. We returned from lunch full and rearing to go. We were then taken down to the harbour for a spot of kayaking. I got into the boat with my partner and we were'nt quite as a good as expected as about halfway through our boat capsised and with an unable to swim partner we were slightly stuck. But we made it in the end and when returning to the beach we became much better at kayaking.
Then we returned for dinner it was starting to get dark and rainy but we still had to go out for one more activity: The Night Line. Basically we had to walk through the pitch dark forest with blindfolds on and holding on to a thin rope calling out to the people behind us if there was anything in front, calling out I'm a spoon if you lose the person in front of you. It was a huge trust excercise and was a lot more fun than it sounds.
We returned to the centre cold and some slightly hungry we went to the chipper and were in our rooms and tucked up in bed by the elleven curfew............. Just kidding :).
The next day we were awoken at seven and some were not overjoyed no names. We went down to breakfast and our first activity was high ropes and zorbing. We went to the zorbing first where your strapped into a giant rubber hamster ball and you get pushed down the hill it was amazing and a great way to start the day. The next thing we did was high ropes where you had to climb to the top of a thirty foot pole and stand an a square shaped box on top and get three other people up there with you its really really scary.
Our last activity was challanges. We had to work as a team to complete these challanges and collect gems and whichever team at the end had the most gems won. Great fun getting to know all the others on our team.
Sadly this was our last activity at Carlingford and we were all very dissapointed that it was over and didnt want to leave but we had maybe one day we'll get to go back......maybe.

Friday 21 September 2012

The First Two Weeks.

     Hey people :)

      We've been back about two weeks although it feels like two days. But I guess time flies when your having fun. Our first week was great craic. We had our first Wednesday of no classes. It wasn't an unproductive day though, We had three workshops to help us learn. The first was positive parties, This was great (not just because there were sweets) we learned how to keep ourselves positive even in bad situations. We had to put ourselves in situations that we wouldn't usually be in so Denise(the woman who was doing it) gave us a pair of (unworn) underwear and in groups we had to find as many nontraditional  ways to wear them as possible. It was great fun and she thought us how to channel positive energy from a happy moment in our lives to when were feeling nervous or sad. The second was an etiquette workshop with Brenda and Kate in this we learned our body shape and our facial shapes. We also learned about personal hygiene (not that anyone needed to learn about it). Although we did end up running out of time on that one. Our final workshop was one on social development with Austen. This one was great we learned how to work as a team and how to communicate and listen with others. After this we all went home with grins on our faces it was great. Then after the next two days of classes freedom arrived and then we were faced with an even bigger epidemic it was the week of Junior Cert Results don don don. We must all come in on Wednesday and face the music.