Summer Camp, August 2005

Camp 2005 began in the evening of Sunday 13th August. The Watsons were kindly having it at their house in Great Oxendon, near Market Harborough, where there were stables, an arena and a field for the vaulters to camp in. So once everyone had arrived and been introduced (new girl Emma had soon made many friends and we also had Marie-Amelie from France and Ana from Spain join the group), we set up our tents and settled in for the night, ready to be up bright and early the next morning.

Unfortunately, we were woken a little too bright and early the next morning, as many of the younger vaulters woke up at 5am and made a large amount of noise choosing which leggings to wear! Breakfast was three hours later and then after mucking out we were all sent on a run round the roads (and hills!).

Most of Monday was spent perfecting our compulsories and getting to know each other a bit better, although there were a couple of assault course races and games of rounders thrown in throughout the day.

Luckily Tuesday wasn’t quite such an early start as the previous day, but everyone was just as keen. Kate, the dance teacher, came and started teaching some of the vaulters a dance in the village hall, not only to give them something different to do but also to get them out of the burning sun! John McNally came along too and taught some kung fu forms.

The rest of the day was filled with lots of horse and barrel work. In the evening, when we were all really hot and in desperate need of a shower, we made our way down to the local swimming pool. We had a great time there, although the lifeguards weren’t too pleased when we started flying each other in the middle of the pool! Afterwards we headed back to the house where we were fed a delicious dinner then settled down to watch Robin Hood (the cartoon version – Sarah W’s favourite).

Wednesday was spent in a similar way to Tuesday. The advanced team took time practising their freestyle and the others made up a short freestyle of their own, ready to show the parents the following day. Tests were done in the morning for the different levels of badges and nearly everyone had earned one by lunch. In the afternoon Liz Philips brought along their new horse, Del, to have a go and he went very well.

But when vaulting on Go Fast, with two people up in canter, we had a little problem – the roller broke! This was rather worrying, but fortunately nobody was hurt. Afterwards the advanced team trained on Bowler, but the heat of the sun soon became too much to bear and we decided we preferred sitting in the shade of the Watsons’ umbrellas! Even Bowler agreed to this! Wednesday evening we went swimming again and afterwards the dancers went over their dance for a couple more hours and Kate taught some of us a tribal clapping dance to perform the next day.

Thursday morning was a manic rush to finish and perfect the display for the parents after lunch. But soon we were sorted and the parents started arriving. The display went well, showing a bit of everything we’d done and including everyone.

Thank you very much to Dick and Pam Watson for letting us stay at their home, and especially for feeding us so well, it was great!


Sarah Reid