Autumn 2021 Update

It's been great having groups back at the Centre. In fact the Summer and Autumn this year have been one of our busiest ever. Schools had certainly missed enjoying their residential courses over the first period of the pandemic and were very keen to get back to them. The students certainly made the most of the opportunity to be outside in nature with their friends rather than sat at a desk with an online lesson.

Low Ropes Course Video

A new activity session at Deanfield is our Low Ropes Course. This has been cleverly designed to maximise teamwork. As well as students trying out the individual rope challenges they also have to work collectively as a team to get around the course helping one another as well as transporting 2 buckets of water. They then use the water to power a bucket, tube and rope system to raise a sign out of a box. The video above is a briefing film that the students watch beforehand and it gives a good overview of what the session involves.

Meanwhile we continue to feed our students well! In fact with five back to back 5 star food hygiene awards our lovely cooks have now been awarded Elite status!

They are cooking the first of a series of Christmas dinners tonight in our 3 week run up to Christmas with our residential groups.  

 

We have a new Logo for the Centre to add to our badges of accreditations etc. when providing publicity etc. See top left above. It reflects the excitement and achievement of young people and the fact that we are based in a forest.

Above is our latest You Tube film with Ian Healey, the Centre Manager, explaining about the courses we are presently offering during the pandemic. Whilst schools are in operation we can deliver day visits at the Centre and in schools themselves.

Despite cold weather as this is written, the first signs of Spring around the corner are already with us and the garden already has some flowers. Over the Autumn we have planted 90m of hedging + some new fruit trees and bushes - cherry, apple, blueberry and Tayberry. 

We have also been upgrading many of our activities including the ever popular 'Island Crossing' team challenge that we have now renamed 'Crocodile Swamp'

We have plenty more exciting new developments to share with you in the Spring, including news about our new Low Ropes Course presently in development.