District Camp took place on 12-15 July. We took 8 Wolves and 9 Stags and hopefully all of them had a good time. Certainly the change in the weather came along at just the right moment. By the end of the weekend we were nicely toasted.

Because space on the site was a bit tight our tents were much closer than usual. In addition to the normal leaders - Akela, Bagheera and Raksha - we drafted in reinforcements with Rikki and Baloo also being joined by the Venture Scouts (Neil and Rhys). We also had help from Nathaniel and David - our Scouts that are going to the Jamboree in Thailand. Catering was done by the SMICCTSO team - now smartly turned out in their new blue aprons. It's a little known fact that our kitchen tent comes with a built in wide screen TV. Looks as if there is a programme about lumberjacks on at the moment. We'd asked the parents to donate cakes but as Baloo was doing the cooking he got to the rice Krispie cakes first! Don't worry - there were still enough for the Cubs.

The camp was themed on the Golden Jubilee and Commonwealth. Each of the packs came as a different country. In addition to national dress they had to run a base based on the country as part of the Commonwealth Market. This took place straight after the opening ceremony.

• We were the Canadian contingent. We decided that our national dress would be as lumberjacks and so the Cubs were asked to wear checked shirts and bring axes and saws. On the group picture take a moment to look at our "Lumber-Jill". The Venture Scouts decided that they would rather be Mounties than lumberjacks - and very smart they looked. Our base focussed on the moose - we had two games where you had to get rings caught on its antlers or throw balls through the holes. We also had our balance game where golf balls had to be thrown into a bucket until the balance tipped over. Thanks to the generosity of Scouts Canada and the Canadian High Commission we had loads of badges so anybody who came to our base was able to go away with a Canadian souvenir.
• The Cubs from 7th Bracknell were representing Cyprus. Their base was all about Cypriot dancing - giving Claire a chance to perform.
• The Binfield cub packs came as New Zealand and decided to dress as the all-blacks. Their base involved paper folding.
• Over at 1st Ascot (All Saints) they decided to represent Fiji. Their activity was making clay pots.
• Sunningdale decided that Australia was the country for them. The leaders had to get through a lot of cans of Fosters to make their base work. They also ran a base about panning for gold. In addition to the Australian flag, their camp site was also home to several other Australian creatures and emblems.
• Meanwhile, 1st South Ascot had obviously predicted the nice weather when they chose to be Jamaica. They ran a base where you could ice a biscuit with the Jamaican flag.
• The Cubs from 6th Bracknell represented Kenya. They ran a base where you could try your hand at soap carving.

Also during the morning the Cubs were given the chance to do either rifle shooting or climbing. Our Venture Scouts helped out on the climbing wall while Charlie Taylor had a go at climbing.

On Saturday afternoon we had the Commonwealth Games. It started with the parade of the flags with everybody in national dress. The Cubs were then split into groups and challenged to various activities such as throwing balls into buckets, a football slalom and a water carrying game. By the time it got to the finals things were getting quite exciting. The sack race final included two Canadians and it was almost a photo finish in the skipping race. The Canadian team earned the most medals - although none of them were gold.

After the medal ceremony it was time for tea. The organisers of the camp decided that it would be nice to have a group banquet with everybody sitting together. This made it easy for the leaders as they didn't have to cook - the catering was done centrally by Margaret Kemp and her team. Cooking for such a large number wasn't easy. We had chicken nuggets, roast potatoes and sweetcorn to keep the golden theme going. This was followed by apple crumble and custard.

On Sunday morning there was time for a Cubs Own church service before everybody headed to the 999 Day on the other field. This gave the other leaders the chance to get the tents down and packed away without having the cubs hanging about. It was very hot on the field and even the Venture Scouts needed to take a break sometimes.

All too soon the camp was drawing to a close and it was time for thank yous and awards at the closing ceremony. As usual, Bernice was in charge of proceedings with our leaders looking on and the Cubs waiting patiently for things to start. Before we could finish we needed to select somebody to do the Grand Howl and flag down. We chose Robert to lead the Grand Howl as this was his last activity as a Cub. After the Grand Howl we asked Ryan to lower the flag. Suddenly it was all over and after some last minute words from Raksha is was time to go home.

Thanks to David Ferrington and Mr Wellington for some of the pictures used on this page We'd also like to thank Scouts Canada for all the badges and resources they sent us and the Canadian High Commission for the loan of the flag which flew so proudly over our site.