A few days before 1st Gwydyr Squirrels were due to climb the first part of Eryri (Snowdon) a dad of one of the youngsters wished the group’s leader Kate Reeves good luck, telling her she had her work cut out taking the youngsters on such an expedition. “There’s no way my daughter will walk more than 10 yards without needing to be carried,” he told her.
It turns out he was wrong. This young girl was among eight Squirrels who donned their waterproofs and superhero pants and made their way up Wales’s highest and most famous mountain in the rain to raise money for Ogwen Valley Mountain Rescue.
Kate recalls, “It was only when the little girl was three quarters of the way down that she said her legs were tired and I said ‘well you have walked a long way’. I said to her, you know your daddy said you probably wouldn’t even make it out of the car park, and she her response was ‘well, I’ll show him’.”
She says this can-do attitude is typical of the four to six year olds in her Squirrel group. “They do encourage each other,” says Kate. “One Squirrel, his dad volunteers with us, and when they are out with the Squirrels he’s showing his dad what to do, leading the way. When he’s out with just his dad he wants a carry. They are different with their peers. There’s a mindset of ‘this is Squirrels, this is what we do’.”
And, as Kate says, even the youngest of Scouting members are capable of great things, if they are given the opportunity – and it has a hugely positive impact on their lives.
“We are outside as much as we can be, going to the woods, rolling down hills and so on,” says Kate, who helped set up the Squirrel Drey in January 2022. “We go out in the rain, we get out in all weathers and they gain so much confidence in themselves. When we started, some of the Squirrels were so shy, we were just coming out of lockdown, they were unsure of getting dirty and being in the mud and now they just take it in their stride.
“We took them sailing at Llyn Brenig and off they went on the boats, not worried about them wobbling. They gain trust and confidence,” she continues.
She says that one young Squirrel was chatting away confidently about there being sharks being in the lake. “When he started out after Easter, you couldn’t get a word out of him. And it is down to Squirrels. His school told his parents his speech and confidence, especially approaching adults, had increased and that wasn’t down to school, but Squirrels.”
Their trip to Eryri was part of the group’s efforts to achieve the Outdoor in 24 Scout challenge which encourages Scouts of all ages to take part in 24 outdoor activities during the year, with a blanket badge to earn if they are successful. The older Squirrels are currently up to around 14.
The group also decided to use the trip as their annual fundraising event for Ogwen Valley Mountain Rescue by asking family and friends to sponsor the children for taking part. As well as being a vital emergency service in the area, the charity and volunteers are hugely supportive of 1st Gwydyr, running sessions with the group, such as learning knots and forest walks. The Squirrels recently visited the mountain rescue base and rather than just a simple tour, the volunteers set up a mini mountain rescue for the children. Kate says, “They hid clues, like a hat and a glove and a ‘sandbag man’ and we had to go and get a stretcher.”
On the day of the hike, the weather wasn’t great, recalls Kate. “The weather was miserable,” she says. “When we got to Pen-y-Pass car park, it was raining so we went to the visitor centre and put on our superhero pants, went to the live weather station where they have nature boards of plants and 3D maps of the paths. And then when we got going one of the Ogwen Valley volunteers was telling them all about rocks and plants, and he helped them find some ‘fool’s gold’. “We were also litter picking all the way up too,” she says. “Snowdown have a thing where if you hand in a bag of litter, you can get a reusable aluminium water bottle, so we got a couple of those too.
“We weren’t just walking,” says Kate, “we were doing and learning a lot.”
She adds that 12 Beavers from their group were also taking part in the challenge and climbed to around 500m, which is a brilliant achievement for a group of six to eight year olds.
The Squirrels’ efforts have seen them raising £585 plus £133 in gift aid – a fantastic amount which will help the charity carry out its work in the area.
Listening to Kate talking about her adventures with the Squirrels, you’d think she was a life-long Scouter. She was a Brownie and Guide as a child but had no Scouting experience and had to be persuaded to start as a volunteer leader when the Squirrels group started.
Having lived around the world, she and her young family moved to Betws-y-Coed a few years ago. Their neighbour happened to be the Group Scout Leader (GSL) for 1st Gwydyr and suggested Beavers might be of interest to her older daughter. Not long after, the group decided to open a Squirrels Drey. As her younger daughter was of Squirrels age, the GSL asked whether Kate would consider volunteering with the group.
“I said ‘no, it’s not for me’. I didn’t think I’d be very good at it.”
She adds that having really supportive parents helps, not to mention their location being an advantage for their activities.
She laughs as she recalls one recent outdoor adventure where the group were playing Simon Says and they had to roll down a hill. Once the children had done it, they insisted she joined in. “I rolled down the hill too,” she says.
“We are lucky where we live that we have no reason not to be outside every week,” says Kate. “A lot of Squirrels can’t do that. That said, when I see groups with activity stations set up with glitter and paint, I just couldn’t do that – I’d rather be outside!”
Find out more about joining or volunteering with Squirrels here.