Water Filtering, Fire Lighting & Local Knowledge

After the excitement of Marwell at the weekend, it was time to head back to our regular meetings. They're just as fun, but fewer animals.

As ever, let's start with the Squirrels and Beavers.

They continued to work towards their Million Hands challenge, focusing on water conservation.

This week, they created their own water filters using plastic bottles, paper, cotton wool and stones. They were pretty effective! It helped us to learn about places where they don't have access to clean water like we do and the amount of work people have to put in to try and clean what they do have.

First we put paper in our filters

Next we add stones and cotton wool, gravel and sand

Trying out our filters

Checking out each other's progress

Deborah shows off her filter

Kyron watches his progress

Story time to complete the evening

With Squirrels and Beavers finished, it was time to pack up and make room for the Cubs and Scouts.

There were several activities on the cards for our older sections. The main event was having a go at fire lighting outside in the enclosed car park of the church where we meet. No worry of cars coming in and space to have a go in safety.

While waiting for their turn, or after their turn, the Scouts took a look at an OS map of our area and compared it with the Geocaching map to plan the route for our walk next week, and the Cubs found out what they needed to do to achieve their Local Knowledge badge and made a start by creating posters advertising our fair town.

Sam draws the swimming pool at the Leisure Centre

Hannah and Robin hard at work

Annalise and Poppy work on their posters as part of their Beaver to Cub link

When it was finally their turn, they went outside where they had a go with flint and steel, lit small fires and toasted marshmallows to create s'mores on a slightly larger, already established fire.

Shiann and Millie practice creating sparks before trying to light a fire

Two more try the flint and steel

Millie tries out the flint and steel

To round off this week's blog, we'd love to share the posters the Cubs made. As ever, don't forget to head over to our socials to check out more about our adventures on Facebook, X and Instagram!

Millie's Gosport poster

Noah's Gosport poster

Poppy promoted the animals of Gosport

Sam drew the Leisure Centre's swimming pool

Annalise focused on the playground

Hannah included a giraffe from our zoo visit in her playground poster

Robin thinks Gosport is a perfect place to raise a family