Martha tells us about her Gold Expedition in Wicklow

I recently completed my Gold Duke of Edinburgh’s award qualifying expedition with Outdoor Concepts in Wicklow.  Our group did a number of training sessions with the OC instructor team prior to the expedition where they helped us think about our route and how we could plan this as a group together.  These sessions allowed us to visualize our route and mentally prepare for a certain Scarr mountain (after the four false peaks we were very glad to see the OC Staff at the bottom again!)

The expedition itself was an amazing bonding experience, especially when we forced the boy’s group to stay behind and help us to cross the river. Nothing says Duke of Ed like shouting at one of the boys to hold my hand across the river.

One of the key motivators was talking to the people we crossed on our path each day. I don’t think our group will forget the amazing woman that says she, ‘eats handsome young men for breakfast, lunch and dinner’. We laughed our way down the mountain after that one. Even the mid- day meetups with the OC Team where we were told we still had 5 hours left to go, were still faced with an Icelandic slow clap to hype us up again. And it worked every single time. It was in one of thosesessions that we found out that OC Managing Director, Craig was secretly the world’s biggest Britney Spears fan… boy did that motivate us that day!!

Even through the creepy crawlies, the mud slicked legs, the cold tuna salads and making use of ‘natures toilet’, this was such a grounding and exhilarating experience- I genuinely think everyone should try Gold DofE. 

I honestly think DofE was one of the most fun weeks I’ve had in my life, what more could you want…amazing views in Wicklow and a mountain walk with your friends!! Every time I see any of the girls from my group we do have to take a moment to talk about how much we miss DofE (but I do not miss losing every single card game every night!!). I honestly think my face hurt more than my feet from all the laughter my group had, some could’ve looked on and said we were delirious with walking but it genuinely was the most fun I had experienced in a long time.