By Brian Collins

On Thursday 14^th July, 6 Winston Churchill students, Hannah Bracher, Katy Davidson (both 2010) Katie Slater, Joseph Gardiner, Felix Veale and Sam Crook (2011) and my good self all met in the staff room at 7 p.m to check, re-pack and then re-check our luggage again! We all agreed to meet at the school the following morning at 5.25 a.m. Of course there is always one who will be late, that one was me!! After months and months of saving and excitement for the students, the moment was finally here, and so off we went on an adventure that none of us would ever forget and probably never experience again.

When we arrived at Heathrow, we all didn’t know what to expect. We bashfully introduced ourselves to the other members of our travelling group of whom we were going to spend the next 4 weeks with. There were 16 other students from three other schools, Liskeard Community School, Cornwall, Sir John Colfox School, Dorset, and Winsford Academy, Cheshire.

After a long days travelling, which included a near traumatic experience at Nairobi Airport during our attempt not to miss our connecting flight to Mombasa, we arrived at our first campsite which was situated south of Mombasa in the holiday resort named Diani. It was 3.30 a.m! Here, we would spend the next 8 days. Diani was paradise!! Our campsite was situated approximately 100metres from the beach. Our main objective at this campsite was to complete our PADI Scuba Diving Certificate. Despite the fact we got to swim with fish in the Indian Ocean, the course was actually quite demanding but the students were fantastic in their persistence and all obtained their certificates. We took part in a little bit of community work while at Diani which included a beach clean up where our students along with students from a local school spent a number of hours cleaning a couple of local beaches.

On the 23^rd of July we departed Diani and made our way to our 2^nd resting spot which was Kaya. Although there was a slightly sombre mood leaving the paradise of Diani, the students were quite excited about the prospect of getting down to some work and fulfilling the experience they had come so far and waited so long for.

Kaya was very different to Diani. The campsite was very secluded in what could only be described as the African jungle. Here the use of ear plugs was essential at night time with the noise level of various different animals and creatures clamorous. The experience at Kaya was a real taste of life in Africa with the idea of having a 20 second shower and actually having to travel 2 km to physically freight the water for all uses were two among many examples. We were introduced to the community leader who conducted the project work with us. During our five day stay, we helped finish off the construction of a new community centre which included building the structure of the building as well as undertaking the process of Thatching, which involved gathering leaves from coconut trees and knitting them together to form adequate roof cover. We also conducted some forest clear out work which involved getting down and dirty with some machete cutting which as you can imagine excited the boys! Some students paid a visit to the local medical centre were they were truly astonished at how poor the facilities were. A very touching moment occurred when one of the Winston students, Joe Gardiner, paid for malaria treatment for a young boy no older than a few years.

Five days in Kaya past and so it was onto camp number three. It was just under a 2 hour hike through the country side and we were glad to get to the free flowing water and electricity assessable Makongeni!

 Makongeni was quite different to Kaya. It had a much bigger community and was also more developed (they even had an internet café!!). Here we again took part in community work which involved brick laying and desk making for the local school. We also helped build a new house for a family of ten whose house had been recently burnt down. This was a huge success and the students were extremely determined to finish the work before it was time to leave. It was also gave divulgence in to what life is like to live in a typical African household- a large mud house that is no bigger than your average sized living room at home. After the completion of the mud house, there was a great sense of satisfaction and accomplishment among the students that would last for a long time after.

After Makongeni, we made the long journey north towards the wondrous Tsavo which was to be our last campsite. 

There is only one word to describe Tsavo- Magnificent!! When we took a left turn off the Mombasa highway, we literally entered the Tsavo country side, were within a few moments, we were spotting animals we had only ever seen in the zoo! This was to be the resting place for our last week of the trip. Despite being situated in the middle of the African wildlife play ground, we had a large amount of work to do. This included digging a water trench for a new water area for animals near the campsite. We also paid a visit to the local school were we helped build a new toilet area as well as help with the creation of new building bricks. We also got an insight into what life were like in the school, a school of which had a population of approximately 720 pupils, 350 or so desks and with a total of SIX teaching staff. Do the math and just imagine the class dynamics in those classrooms just with the sheer number of students. However what was quite striking was how willing and attentive all the students were. Some students walking a whole 5 km just to get to a classroom that would have one hundred or so other students. It really began to hit home just how lucky we really are and it took a while for it all to sink in. While at Tsavo, we also took part in the process of making Elephant dung paper!! Yes we actually had to physically handle and maul elephant manure in order to make what turned out to be quite interesting writing paper! On one of our last days we did a Safari trip through Tsavo East Wildlife Park were everything from lions to elephants and giraffes to zebras were seen. It was a truly outstanding way to finish of the whole expedition.

Our final night in Kenya was spent in the luxurious Aga Khan Academy School Mombasa, which made Winston and indeed 95% of schools in the UK look mediocre to say the least. And so on the 12^th of August, we departed for the riot stricken UK, tired, drained, under weight and slightly emotional, but the entire better for what was a truly breathtaking awe-inspiring journey that would remain with us until our graves and with friendships and relationships that would last a life- time. The six students who travelled, worked and excelled in all the challenges that faced them are an absolute credit to their school, their families and most importantly themselves.

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Godalming School Team's Chris Owers travelled to Tanzania with Camps International this summer. He has published a personal diary of his experiences and it is so good I thought I'd share it here. Here is the first week and there's a link below to the other three which I would highly recommend checking out too.

Congratulations to Chris who got the grades he needed this summer to be accepted to study at Cambridge University in September.

Tanzania Week 1

Hi - I decided a blog would be a good way of letting everyone know what I got up to out in Africa. Firstly, it was the best thing ever. So amazingly beautiful and an experience that I'll never forget so thank you if you sponsored me in any way to go. This is going to be long so I'll do a conclusion at the end if you don't have long!... :o)

Day 1 Monday 4/7/11. The journey out from Godalming was a bit of a disaster for me as I had a nasty stomach upset so spent most of the available time in airport toilets etc. But we all got there in one piece! 13 students and 2 teachers from Godalming College and 1 leader from Camps International who are the travel company we went with. The flight was 8 hours to Nairobi then an hour from there to Kilimanjaro but unfortunately a bit of a wait in between flights. Interestingly, the clocks at Nairobi were 3hrs 10mins ahead of our watches but in Tanzania they were just 3hrs... Strange!

Day 2. Still pretty poorly but the excitement of being in Africa took my mind off things for a while as we travelled from Kilimanjaro airport, at first along dead straight roads then for an hour along a sandy track with vast expanses of wilderness surrounding us, to a place in the complete wild to the west of the mountain called Ndarakwai. It is a camp in the middle of an open ranch where all the animals are free to roam etc. It was amazing. The camp staff were all really friendly Tanzanians who welcomed us to our new accommodation of three man tents, drop pit toilet and bucket showers! Was still very ill so stayed in camp as the others went exploring and looking for fire wood and collecting elephant dung for a task the next day. While I was sat reading I saw some bright blue and orange birds, baboons, vervet monkeys and then giraffes came up to the camp too! Amazing!

Day 3. Woke up in the middle of the night needing the toilet. I only mention this because of the experience of being out in the pitch dark (also gets very chilly 800m above sea level). The sound of the insects and animals was very eerie and spooky but the stars were incredible! I stayed out just staring at them for ages. Like nothing I've ever seen. So many to see and it just felt like I was in the lion king! That day we went to work down at a watering hole. It's a half hour stroll from the camp through the plain so we had a ranger with us. On the way we saw wild giraffes, waterbuck, impala and zebra! At the waterhole our task was to remove the loose rocks and try and make the edge safer for animals to drink from. It is on the main migratory route for the wilderbeast etc and is often used as a back up watering hole for the sick, pregnant and injured animals so hence the need for the safe edges. There was an awesome two storey tree house that the owners of the ranch had built which looked over where we worked and beyond. From there you could see the beauty of the place to a greater extent. mountains in the background, vast plains with animals roaming and flat topped canopies of the trees. I went up there and watched my new friends hard at work. (Still feeling poorly and by 11am the sun is back in business to a good 34degs) Feeling a bit better we next cleared the furrow/stream which fed the wateringhole from the mountains. A better flow of water will help the hole increase in size naturally. We all got very muddy and saw lots of cool things like vulture eagles and lizzards! Went back to camp for a big lunch of pasta bolognese but still no appetite for me. Played a bit of  frisbee and badminton. Got some pills off Charles (The guy in charge of the camp) to settle my stomach. Then we went up the road to make some elephant dung paper with the dung the others had collected the previous day. It had been boiled overnight then we had to clean it, drain it, pound it, mix it with shredded scraps of paper and wood glue and water. Mix then filter with a mesh to create a sheet. It was good fun and nice to be in the shade. The process is helping prevent elephant poaching as the by-product can be sold on so locals can make money in an alternative way to ivory. That night we had a party for Georgie's 18th. I made an improvised birthday cake from Werther's Originals, cereal bars and found a few candles! Made a crown of shame for Josh as his forfeit for being generally daft (That's our 'leader' by the way) He had done a good job of wearing a police hat all day and clothes inside out to be fair... Soup then stew for dinner. The beef tasted a bit lamby and stringy out there according to Gwyn anyway. Spoke to some of the other staff there, Mike and Smasha, both a really good laugh.

Day 4. Feeling lots better by now! Had a bucket shower in the morning with the warm, rusty and leafy water! (Warmest shower all trip though so don't knock it!) We went to a school which took us a while to get to on the back of a truck through all the sand. Everyone got nice and dusty and scratched up by the thorny trees! Anyway, at the school our task was to dig a big trench so they can lay water pipes for a new kitchen to be built. It was very hot work. The ground was hard so it required hoeing the top soil and grass then pick axing the ground to loosen then shovelling it out. After about 5hours we had a big ditch about 2ft deep and maybe 100m long. We were pretty chuffed. Everyone got really stuck in and we got to engage with some of the local men and kids who joined in. Played a bit of 5-a-side at lunch with them. Everyone was covered in dust and mud by the end of the day. There's a great picture of my mud-tan lines when I took off my shoes! Soup then chicken for tea then we had a proper party for Georgie round the camp fire. A good fun night!

Day 5. Hiked to a nearby Maasai village. It was very windy that day but warm already for the morning. The Maasai ladies had all gathered to greet us. 8 of whom were the wives of the tribe leader! It was pretty fascinating seeing their culture first hand. The clothing so boldly coloured and such intricate jewellery. Lots of kids wandering about (both human and goat alike) The poor guys had lots of flies all over their faces and things. I guess they're just used to it but the flies got very annoying for me. We asked them some questions via our two translators (English to swahili - Swahili to Maasai then back again) It was good fun. Then the women grabbed each one of us individually and took us into their home. A tiny mud hut but complete with kitchen, bedroom and living area... just super small. And pitch dark! There we made beaded bracelets. Well she tried getting me to do it but didn't speak any English at all and I couldn't see a thing so she just made it for me in the end. It was when she was hunched over the beads when I realised the whole time she had a tiny baby strapped to her back under her tribal dress. Amazing, it was like she didn't even know it was there! Anyway, I then bought some things off her but had no idea how much the currency was worth at that stage so gave them a lot more than everyone else managed. We joked that they'll be buying Ferraris etc with all the money I gave them! It was worth it though, fascinating people and culture! Taught them the hokey kokey and they all did some singing and dancing of their own which we joined in on. Back to camp for some lunch (Japati bread and bean sauce - very filling) We then went back down to the watering hole and dug out a lot of mud increasing the area of water. That was good fun. I loved it out there, just being in the wilderness with the zebra and warthogs just staring at you but also the fact our digging will be helping out the animals was a nice feeling too! Collected fire wood on the way back to camp then had a nice last evening at camp Ndarakwai. I would have liked to have stayed there longer!

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

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We asked a few of our past travellers to comment on their Camps experience here's what they said:

The most amazing thing for me was to see what a difference I could make to a community... we went back to one of the schools we helped out at towards the end of our trip to give them some books that we had bought for them and check up on some of the work we had done at the start of our trip. Just seeing their faces light up when they saw us was the most incredible and exuberant feeling imaginable.
 The expedition gave me not only a second family with the people I went with (I'm still good friends with the ones I didn't know at the start) but a wider scene of what was going on around me. Since coming back from the expedition I have become a school house captain and the leadership skills developed in Tanzania have been invaluable to me. The expedition also helped me get a job as a Lifegaurd in a local pool as they were impressed that i had been able to not only raise the money but also been driven to make a difference.
In a way I don't want to recommend an expedition... purely for the selfish reason that I want to go back soo badly. Tanzania was the most fantastic month; it had it's ups and downs (namely toilets) but that's life. Being on a camps international expedition allows you to open your eyes and see another way of life that you have missed. Its not easy, but not for a millisecond would I regret any of it. The experience of Tanzania starts right from the moment when you think 'i wonder what Tanzania is like' of course then you go home and google it and you're hooked; everything about it draws you in. Its a once in a lifetime experience but it feels like a lifetime of its own, if that makes any scene. Its isolated and you learn to live with people who you have never met before. You also learn how to shower in a bucket and talk Swahili.   
 There was a girl in my tutor who had gone in a previous year and it was, seriously, all she talked about it. The massi, colors, language, people everything she could relate back to that time in Tanzania. But although it was exceptionally annoying i felt so jealous that she had got to do all these things that i desperately wanted to go... So i started researching into how I could get to go to Tanzania, i looked at loads of different companies but none of them offered what I wanted, a real diverse experience of Tanzania, not the tourist hot spots, real life. Then along came Camps. I had heard of it a couple times before when looking at various companies but never in detail. The real thing that made me choose Camps thought was an assembly given to my school year about what would be doing. The guy talking was so passionate and enthusiastic that it was hard even for the people who decided not to go to say they weren't envious. So that's what did it, for me i mean. I wanted to go with an organisation who felt as passionate about Tanzania as i felt.

Thanks Guys

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