As we set of on our evening activities, I was informed that my room (me, Josh, Lucas, Reid, Shaheer, Finn, Kian and Aiden) would be undergoing rock climbing, which was taking place at a massive warehouse around 15 minutes from the centre. When we entered the warehouse we had to put on our rock climbing shoes and harnesses on from the centre, unfortunately for me I had picked a shoe the same size as my normal ones ( when we were meant to go get a size up ) , which meant my toes were curled up at the end and felt like they were in a vacuum seal. When we started climbing, we were having our group mates belay us, as an example of what belaying was Jez (who was our instructor for the night) had told Josh to jump off the wall and hold onto the rope and when he did, he hung up there not moving. When Shaheer tried to do the same he climbed up 2 metres jumped of the wall and fell back to the floor with a sudden bang. Halfway during the activity, I took my shoes of to see them how they felt like they were bleeding, but it turns out they were fine, and I was just being a huge baby. Later on that night we used automatic belayers which were machines that replaced what humans do, but the 1 rule was that you don’t let go of them, but unfortunately for Josh he let go and the belayer swung back to the ceiling, so Jez had to free climb the rock wall to retrieve the belayer. After the rock climbing, we head back to our rooms and went to sleep.

The next morning, we woke up and went to breakfast, I had scrambled eggs and porridge which was delicious. after we went to our activity groups and were told what we were doing that day my group was doing sea traversing with the top group. As we got in the bus to head off to the sea Finn fell asleep and there was no waking him up only when we poured a cup of water on him, he woke with a sudden jolt upwards. When we arrived at the sea we went to the cliffs where we would be doing the sea traversing. At one bit during the activity we had to harness on a rope over the sea about 15 metres up and the sea would smash against the rocks sending water pouring up at us, another bit was when we were climbing sideways on the cliffs and a huge wave crashed against the rocks soaking us in water. When we got back later that day, we sat down for dinner which was a choice of beef burger and chips or fish and chips. I went for beef burger which was the best food I had had all week. For desert you had a choice of chocolate cake and ice cream or pancakes and ice cream.

By Kai

So starting from last night’s evening events, our group started with the hanging maze. For this challenge, there was a black 8 ball and a hanging maze (literally) with holes and numbers. We had to move the ball to the numbers (from 1-35) in order without the ball falling into the holes. When our group started, we were doing quite well, due to the fact we were actually concentrating, and were able to get to 1 because we thought 27 was 2 but never mind whereas the other team got to 4. For the blindfold square, we were blindfolded and were told to make a square out of rope. This was actually quite difficult for us as we were all over the place but we soon found out a “good” strategy. That was Grace lying on the floor looking like a star fell on the floor and then my team wrapped the rope around Grace (which kind of sucked because she got kicked in the head like 5 times). As for the other team we found that having four people (one on each corner) walking backwards made a rough square, then one of us walked around the edge and tried to figure out whether it was a square or not. Turns out it was a rhombus. For levitation, both of our teams were together but still split. We were all told to make a structure which made the whole team at least half a metre off the ground. Rebecca’s team made a really good structure that worked but I think it was only because they actually knew how to tie knots. Our team were happily making failed structures because we didn’t actually know how to tie poles together.

The next day, we climbed Glyder Fawr, it was more of a scrambling mountain than a walking one which we found better. When we first set off it was a quite a long, steep walk to the scrambling part. We walked across a large bog and we bounced on it because it was bouncy. We found some blueberries growing on a bush and we all tried some (they were quite sour since it was past season). After that we carried on the steep part which killed our legs and were talking about our childhood TV shows and then stopped for a short tea break before the climb started. When we started climbing, it was a bit slippery because there was a small waterfall the entire way up. Issy and Lily both slipped on the way up which was quite funny. When we got to the top of the mountain we saw some large sheep and goats. We found a large boulder and climbed on top of it, Lucas slipped off but was able to make it to the top of it his second try. We found some weird grass things that has a material that when you peeled it, you could use it as a candle wick. We started walking back and found some red moss that you could drink but the water when it got squeezed out is slightly acidic. Issy tried drinking some but failed. We stopped by a waterfall and drank out of it and it tasted like ice. On the way down there was a small flock of sheep and the rocky steps were really slippy and we all at least fell down once except Kai. On the way back (since everyone was exhausted) we all fell asleep except from Rebecca and Lucas.

By Grace and Rebecca

As the evening activities begun we were sitting at the dining room tables and were split into 2 groups, Slippery rats ( Kai, Tanzin, Aiden, Reid ,Hazel ,Eleni ,Shaheer) and the other which i do not know the name of. The first activity was a problem called shepherd and sheep where the sheep were blindfolded and had to get to the middle of a pen by whistle blows, me of course being the shepherd. The second problem was called swamp walkers, where we had to get across two pairs of cones on one plank of wood and we couldn’t fall of. The third activity was called rope bucket, where we had to swing on a rope from platform to platform with a bucket of water and Shaheer referred to himself as a human wrecking ball , unfortunately when I swung with the bucket it tilted backwards and all the water poured on me making me remain wet for the rest of the night, Hazel was a called a monkey as she Swung without any difficulty. The other group won and we then went to sleep.
As we woke up we stared at the wooden bunk above us and wondered if we would ever get enough sleep, i realised that is was 8 o’clock and we were late to breakfast. All of us sprinted downstairs to be greeted by the fact that i read the clock wrong and we were just on time, ( we were later greeted by Finn who only just got out of bed) the breakfast that day was as good as ever and then we collected our lunch and headed off to our daily activities. Our activity was gorging and we attempted to walk up the waterfall without falling, but with no surprise we failed and got soaked, at one point during the waterfall we had to go under a submerged rock and come out the other side, unfortunately for Simon he got stuck in the middle and couldn’t get out for 10 minutes the activity ended after about 4 hours and it was safe to say that we were all exhausted, When we got back to the van we all had to get changed in the parking lot and i forgot to bring a towel , a t-shirt and a pair of trousers, so i was sat shirtless in the back of the van for 45 minutes in soaking wet trousers. when we got back we had to put our stuff back in the storage room before we could hop in the freezing cold showers and make our way to dinner which was macaroni cheese. STONKS

By Kai and Simon

On Monday night there were various activities for different groups. Lily’s group went to a public climbing wall. After a short minibus ride with Keith and Karl, we arrived and practised on a small wall. We then got harnessed up and began climbing, belaying and helping each other. Almost all of us climbed to the top of each wall; we did traversing, bouldering, top-roping. Then we went back to the centre listening to the minibus’ music.
I did problem solving it was alright, on the first activity we had a bomb in the middle of a rope circle and then had little ropes that we had to tie together and then try to get the bomb out of the middle. We had to put a hard hat and goggles that blacked out so you couldn’t see anything and we hat to go and follow a rope and at different bits there were bags with things in them and we had to remember what they all were and repeat the order of them at the end. the last challenge we had to transfer tires onto a hoop it was very hard but we did it. my group did very well and got full points on two activities and got a total of 25 points.
After a quick biscuit and drink break, we were all exhausted and headed to our dorms to get ready for bed.
Mrs Webster banging on the door, we woke up tired. we showered got dressed and went down to breakfast. I had toast, cereal and orange juice to drink. We then met with our team leaders and they introduced the day’s activity. We were told we were climbing Tryfan.
We went on the mini bus and set of, we left the mini bus and all of us put on our coats because it was proper cold we started the mountain and were told that it was going to be fun, we found a rock that said on the back to bring to the top so we did. we had to come over some hard obstacles and nearly fell off.
Compared to yesterday, there was a lot more climbing rather than walking.
Once we got to the top we ate lunch, we went down a different way from when we came up which was good because it was quicker on the way down. On our way to the minibus, we stopped by a field of short legged ponies.
Then we all fell asleep in the minibus at dinner time we ate pizza or mashed potato and for pudding we had jelly and ice cream or toffee sponge cake.
We love you Keith and Karl
By Lily and Finn

Today we ventured up Y Garn one of Wales’s mountains that stands 947m above sea level. When standing at the bottom of the mountain there were many stunning views of mini waterfalls covering all over the cliff faces. The higher you got up the mountain the more exotic views you experienced. Before we got to the mountain there were still amazing views on the way. Everyone in our group walks at different paces so some people had to stop for a while to let the ones falling behind to catch up. Even though it was quite tiring, once you got to the top it was worth it. You could see all the surrounding mountains, rivers and houses, even some piles of slate down by the river below which makes you then realise how high up you actually are. Over parts of the cliff there were quartz covering the cliff top. There were a variety of different sizes each with a unique look.
Throughout the day we all did many things. Some were stupid and some.. Yeah. It all started when Lilly decided it would be fun to fall into a deeply muddy puddle and coat her leg with mud. Then everyone followed. Issy fell down the mountain because she’s quite clever. Simon Decided to try giving a rock a hug by falling into it, lets say it looked quite painful. Kai tried falling into a waterfall and got a bit wet. Rebecca almost fell over everything even though she’s not clumsy. Grace and Lucas. Well they didn’t fall and stumble like the rest of us. That leaves one. Finn. Once we arrived back to the centre Finn had fallen asleep but didn’t wake up at first. Honestly we questioned whether he was dead at first but after a few slaps and a bottle to his head he woke up 🙂
This was our pretty good day

By Issy and Rebecca