~Anstey Rovers~

Northgate Xmas in July Dinner

2006-07-03T16:25:00.000+09:30

The third fundraising dinner was just as good as the previous ones with the Hillcrest Scouts helping out on the night as well as the Northgate Venturers. Crew beanies or formal? We picked formal, someone had to add a bit of class to the event and why shouldn’t it be us? Unfortunately due to mishap with our candle at a previous dinner we were given crayons and stuff to colour in rather that set fire to. Georgia managed to get her very own dillybag in the silent auction ready for wine moot and I picked up the most touchy feely scarf ever, knitted my our very own group leader. Just like a real Christmas dinner we ate too much and didn’t really want to do anything afterwards except sleep.

Pool Night

2006-07-01T14:27:00.000+09:30

After postponing the Goodies night until the school holidays we went out to the Holden Hill Pool Hall for the night where we were also graced with the presence of Undies and B2 who filled us all in on a huge amount of gossip. There was a lot of reminiscing especially when we pulled out the recently acquired Watergully Venturer photos from the hall earlier in the night. Anyone want a Watergully shirt??

SA Branch Scout Hike

2006-06-25T15:20:00.000+09:30

Rovers and Venturers ran a number of night activities at this year’s Scout Branch Hike held in Mt Crawford Forest at Chalk’s campground on Saturday the 24th. Ash, Brendan and I went up to help out and organised a few activity things, including the NONT jelly activity which was so god the Lyndoch Venturers turned up with their own jelly activity after getting the idea from us. With the team of Rovers mostly coming from EV theme team setting up and running everything went relatively well, being so similar to EV in the organisation and running, although there was probably a bit of excessive stressing on Craig’s behalf at the start. The most popular activity was by far the bucking Bull with a huge line up. I heard lots of really positive feedback both on the night and at our district leaders meeting (Mindari) from lots of different leaders, even if some weren’t so keen on how the rest of the weekend went.

Lego Night

2006-06-24T15:02:00.000+09:30

Anstey had a very cool Lego Night at the Hope Valley Scout Hall with the Beefacres Venturers on Friday night with a few other Rovers dropping in. Ash probably had the most interesting collection of Lego out of us all but other lego was brought by Simon, Brendan, Chris and I. Id even gone to the extent of swapping my bike for my sisters lego to make up for everything which has gone missing over the years. A great night with pizza, popcorn and cookies thrown in and once the Scouts left we progressed from the den into the hall and set up the projector and got into some Futureama. Congratulations to Brendan for organising his long overdue first Rover activity, hopefully something we will do again in the future. Is it just us or did everyone have a lego street sweeper in their collection?

Once upon a NONT…

2006-05-30T14:09:00.000+09:30

Night Observation & Navigation Trial
27th-28th May 2006

This year saw the biggest NONT for a number of years with 113 participants in 29 teams which included 9 venturer teams, 2 Leader teams and even one team all the way from Victoria. NONT 2006 was run by the Anstey Rover Crew with a lot of support from across the state and as the title indicates the theme was fairytales and nursery rhymes.

For those of you who don’t know what NONT is and have been living under a rock for the last year, the Night Observation & Navigation Trial (NONT) is a SA Branch Rover event run by the previous years winners. There are a number of aspects to the event including navigation, observations, theme and activities spread out over this years 238km course which spanned from Eagle on the Hill, through the hills and Finniss through to Prospect Hill.

Grants from the Tea Tree Gully Council, the Office for Youth and the Office for sport and recreation allowed a number of new event and promotional initiatives while lowering the cost to a mere $2 per person. This year saw the introduction of geocaching and mystery checkpoints in the course along with a BBQ at the start, extensive Radio coverage, maps supplied to teams along with bound course notes, extensive promotion activities and the restoration of the NONT trophy. We also introduced a Venturer specific class and a leader specific class to broaden our horizons and cater for more participants. It was great to see the extra teams in these classed and congratulations to the Belair Venturers for taking out the venturer class, which finished at the halfway point.

There was a fantastic array of costumes seen at the start point so congratulations to the best dressed as you had some pretty though competition even including a car transformed into a dragon.

Best Dressed Male
David Macmichael – Bloo Rover Crew
Best Dressed Female
Leslie Burge – Pt Noarlunga Rover Crew
Best dressed Team
Hook and the Hookers – Lyndoch Venturers

There were some outstanding efforts throughout the night at the various activities which ranged from the Big Bad Wolf (Peter Hann), Jousting, Humpty Dumpty, the Emperors Old Clothes and the Frog Prince through to Sleeping Beauty, the Sword in the Stone and the three blind mice. A number of teams would have left the Humpty Dumpty activity a lot poorer after their run in with the Troll and the Tooth Fairy (thanks to our Anstey Old Boys!). There were also a fair number of green arms and hands seen at the halfway point following the frog in the pond activity (Thanks to the BP Guild).
For once the halfway point, the Gingerbread House, was a hive of activity under the watchful eye of Margy Wright who came all the way from Victoria to supervise the catering. It was great to see so many Rovers and Venturers all packed together, tired, but obviously still enjoying themselves, so much so that they were very reluctant to leave and continue the course.

It was a very long night with most teams finishing in the morning light and the last two teams from Pine Forest signing in at the finish at 8:30am. At the end of a couple of weeks worth of scoring the trophies and placings were decided… Activities Trophy
For the most outstanding effort, teamwork, participation and achievement at the activity checkpoints.

EGA 4 BVA - Theatrical Activities Rover Crew (TARC)
Theme Trophy
For the most outstanding achievement in the theme aspects of the event including costumes, bonus items, theme questions, keeping humpty until the end and their once upon a NONT story.

Brothers Grimm- Pine Forest Rover Crew
Most Observant Trophy
For the team with the most observation markers, course markers and hazard markers correctly recorded.

Little Red Riding Hood- Pine Forest Rover Crew
Navigators Award
For the most outstanding achievement across the navigational components of the event including the number and order of Observation and hazard markers recorded, the number of geocaches found and the number of mystery checkpoints located.

Ali Baba and his thieves Sheherazade and Jack- GRovers
The Wooden SpoonA new perpetual trophy was donated by Anstey for the wooden spoon recipients, that is the team in lucky last place. This years awardees were particularly deserving, despite having by far the best dressed car, the Kullari Dragon, the team had to pullout of the course at halfway due to a broken clutch and weren’t able to hand in their book as it was left on the roof of the car at a servo never to be seen again. Well done anyway!

The Kullari Dragon

Venturer Class: 1st Nicolocks and the 4 Belairs 2nd Gretel – Beefacres Venturers3rd Hansel – Beefacres Venturers4th The Three Little Pigs - Aberfoyle Park Venturers5th Team Misteeq – Aberfoyle Park Venturers6th Kintaro 7th Loco 8th Hook & the Hookers – Lyndoch Venturers9th Blackhawk Leader Class: 1st They mostly come out at night… mostly – Glen Osmond2nd Peter and the Three Wolves - VariousRover Class:
Equal 1st The Brothers Grimm- PFRC Equal 1st Little Red Riding Hood - PFRC 3rd Ali Baba & his Thieves Sheherazade and Jack- GRovers 4th Bloo 5th FPR- Lones 6th Golden Nugget- Pt Noarlunga 7th Aesir 8th Hansel & Gretel- Ex-Blackburn & Pine Forest9th Speedy- Pt Noarlunga 10th 5 short of a good time- Crew 64 11th Indians-Pine Forest12th Grovers 13th 8 short of a full deck – Crew 6414th Discombobulated - Ridgehaven15th Scot none – Scots Own Rover Crew, Victoria16th EGA 4 BVA- TARC 17th Barra - Pt Noarlunga 18th The Kullari Dragon Thank you to all of the participants for attending and making Once upon a NONT such a success and for all of the laughs you gave us along the way. Thanks also for all of the positive and constructive feedback that was passed onto us, it was great to hear that our efforts were appreciated.

There is over a page of people to be tanked for their support and contributions for NONT so for this space I give you all a big blanket THANK YOU!!! We’d particularly like to mention Andre Freund who put in a huge amount of time and effort into the event and gave us a huge amount of guidance. Thanks also to the members of the BP guild and the BP lodge who helped with admin, catering and activities as all of our staff were critical to the event. For our communications thank you to the Scout Radio Activity Group.

Congratulations to our Venturer teams, you all added something to the event and we hope you return next year. Congratulations also to both of our leader teams who were both new to the concept of NONT and yet did outstandingly well. In the end They Mostly come Out at Night… Mostly from Glen Osmond came out on top and came third overall, well done. Lastly our congratulations to our joint winners, “The Brothers Grimm” and “Little Red Riding Hood”, both from Pine Forest Rover Crew for an outstanding effort across all aspects of the event; theme, navigation and activities. We hope your fairytale castle provides you with hours of fun and we wish you all the best in running NONT 2007. we also hope that all other activity organisers have a good look at their activities and see how they can be revamped and promoted to see a similar increase in participation across the board.

Congratulations to all teams, a fantastic effort all round. Photos for NONT can be found at www.salmond.net/moment.
The End.

Ted Whitworth Award Presentation 2006

2006-03-03T09:50:00.000+10:30

Anstey acted as the Honour Guard for Pine Forest at the unifom night of the BP Lodge for the presentation of the Ted Whitworth Rover Award to Scouting for community service. It was great to have five members of the crew attend, the biggest honour guard to date and the same number that Pine Forest had attending. We were all looking very tidy in khaki uniforms all round and crew scarves. Marc took up the position of flag bearer as Crew Leader as we only had our crew flag and Pine Forest doesn’t have one.

The speeches, toasts and food afterwards were generally the same as always though we were a bit more vigorous with joining in the singing than we have been in the past. It was great to go along and we even found some more helpers for NONT so it was a very productive night. I’ve even found a new challenge, collecting the ring pulls off cans to be recycles into new hip joints.
Thanks to the BP Lodge for having us and congratulations to Pine Forest.

AdVenture Expo

2006-02-18T12:09:00.000+10:30

Adventure Expo is a Branch Venturer activity held at the Glenelg Activity Centre, which provides the opportunity for all activity groups to have promotional displays or run activities with venturers to help get the word out about what Venturers can go and do.

We ran a NONT display outside with Julian’s car and our banner and inside we had a display with all the info and flyers and our newly made giant beanstalk, inflatable castle and the creepy manikin doll, Anastasia, dressed as a Fairy. On top of this we ran a matchbox navigation activity which comprised of a large town/ street play mat which our very talented and would be town planner, Brendan, altered a bit which had 3 different NONT style navigation courses worked out on it including a Crow’s Foot. The aim was to have a practical activity, which sort of emphasised what NONT navigation was about while still being fun. I think we picked well as the activity went down pretty well, better than I expected considering it was inside with not much going on. Hopefully we will get a few Venturer Teams along to NONT this year, fingers crossed.

We were also running around helping set up the EV display and activity, doing jungle style air brush tattoos. This also seemed to go pretty well, but then when do tattoos not go down well? I was a little concerned with the set up as I hadn’t touched all the gear for a couple of years but it all went ok and now we have everything together to run it whenever. Something to keep in mind for the future.

Other than that it was a good night, started way too early for us to get down there and set up in any reasonable time and it was a bit all over the place with the organisation of the Expo but oh well. We finished off the night as we have the last couple of years at Café de Villi’s.

Surfmoot 2006

2006-01-31T15:10:00.000+10:30

It was an extra long Surfmoot this year due to the inconvenient placing of the Australia Day holiday on the Thursday. A fairly large SA contingent went over this year and three of us from Anstey, Marc, Brendan and Myself went over with Daniel on the Tuesday night staying at my Mum’s before getting to Surfmoot Wednesday afternoon. From Mums house until about lunch it was pretty smoky due to all the recent bushfires and from the spare room window you could see where the fire had gotten to the week before, right at the back fence of the first row of houses. We were by far the first of the contingent to arrive as we expected and picked out the best sport we could before heading off for tea in Anglesea for some pretty good pizza. Aesir rocked up later that night with a few others coming in drips and drabs through the night.

The reason for going so much earlier was that we were on the 4WD expedition, which was planned for Thursday, but due to a complete fire ban and a 45 degree day is was postponed to Friday. we went for a drive around the place and found an apparent "nude" beach we were told about, which want really nude, but with some nasty rips and lachies down hill battle with the sea we went back to camp. Pizza again for tea and as wed been their before we sorted ourselves out pretty quick, unfortunately it seems that the rest of South Australia seemed sowewhat incapable of making a decision about anything let alone what to have on a Pizza.

4WDing was fantastic, some fantastic views around the place and really nice scenery even though there were salad rolls for lunch. We found a fantastic Thai restaurant in Torquay with the best red curry ever, it was so good I made everyone go back again the next night.

NONT Course Drive V 2.0

2005-11-21T12:04:00.000+10:30

It took a while to finally get on our way for the second and more thorough drive of the NONT course after Simon’s car not starting, dropping of flyers at Pennington, getting to Marc’s house, some more specific route planning and lunch on the way we finally made it to Eagle on the Hill. The course we picked out seemed to be pretty good, challenging but very nice scenery and different areas, though admittedly we did take a few wrong turns and get a little misplaced at some points. Just after half way around we veered off course and went down to Milang to the caravan ark to have a look around to come up with questions for the Treasure Hunt at Supersplash. Since we didn’t leave Milang until 4:30 we well and truly missed catching up with everyone on the bike ride and finished the second half of the course around 8ish. we then went into town for tea at Cafe Michael 2.

Northgate Venturer’s Christmas Dinner

2005-11-20T11:54:00.000+10:30

This was the second fundraising Dinner Northfield Venturers have run but this time it was a 3 course buffet dinner which was absolutely fantastic with stacks of food that was really really good. Marc, Brendan, Daniel and myself went along and finally got the opportunity to show off our new Crew beanies. We were also quite lucky to have the Peace Boomerang for the night as it was going to Craig’s bike ride in the morning so we made the most of the opportunity and spoke about ti to everyone at the dinner and showed it off and got everyone to sign the page and make any comments about it. This was pretty good as there were Venturers, Leaders from Joeys, Cubs, Scouts & Venturers, the Hillcrest Group leader and District Scout leader, parents, Rovers and Scouts so it was a fairly broad range of people that we spoke to about the boomerang. Once again a big thanks to the Northgate Venturers who put on an even better show than last time.

Scrooge

2005-10-22T13:48:00.000+09:30

Brendan, Marc and I went to show our support at the Northern Light Theatre Company’s production of Scrooge at the Shedly Theatre on the opening night. This is mainly because Daniel is in the show and plays a number of different parts from the Town crier to a Clown (with quite possibly the most embarrassing clown costume ever made). The show was pretty good and as it was the opening night there were a few technical difficulties, which made for good entertainment, the best of which was the goatie falling off the ghost of Christmas present in the middle of a song. The other negative was that there was also a blue light disco in the other side of the building so the toilets were shared and police standing at the doors of them. After the show everyone was then kind enough to escort me to Woodhouse for a conference.

Almost Summer…

2005-10-10T15:23:00.000+09:30

We had a very productive Crew and NONT meeting on Sunday, and so it should have been since it went for the best part of the day. Nevertheless we still got through everything, and picked a theme after going in circles for several months. We had a BBQ lunch out by the pool almost like its summer, with the exception of a covered up green pool, which got an uber dose of chlorine for good luck and even the garden got weeded while we were waiting.

And All That Jazz

2005-10-09T15:24:00.000+09:30

Having a Friday night off of scouts Daniel, Brendan, Marc and Myself went out to Club 199 which on Friday nights is a Jazz Club. It was a really nice venue with mood lighting, tables and booths upstairs with really cheap drinks to go with it. Not dingy smokey atmosphere that some people associate with Jazz clubs. The band was pretty good and played a fair bit of Miles Davis and Michael Buble amongst other stuff. The Sax player had an uncanny resemblance to Damian and one of the others looked like Sam from Lord of the Rings. Possibly better was the few people who got up and danced who were pretty damn good at what they did. We even saw a couple of people that we knew. Afterwards we headed off to San Gorgios for some very fine pizza. Funnily enough we went to a resturant the next night called Jazz, though spelt JAHZ.

Recharge 2005

2005-10-05T15:27:00.000+09:30

A fairly small turnout for Recharge this year, especially for Anstey with Brendan and Myself sharing a tent and meals with Daniel and Michael who came up for Saturday. Nevertheless it was a nice enough event, based in the middle of the grassy and somewhat boggy Oakbank Racecourse which fairly nice weather all weekend.
Following the Ramble we are now quite proficient at packing and setting up everything, which was pretty evident when we arrived, although long wet grass and Hills climate was quite a change from red sand or rock and warm nights. A small, smokey fire featured all three nights with a fairly quiet and relaxed atmosphere with the exception of Benny and Rob’s arguments about politics.

Saturday Brendan, Michael and I went off the Birdwood Motor museum which was interesting and every 5 seconds or so I would wish I had a camera! We then travelled to the Giant Rocking Horse for a climb, again wishing for the camera and came back down for lunch. There’s nothing like the smell of woodwork and the toyshop has a whole stack of old school toys including a lawn mower, which actually turned when pushed. All I bought was a small flying cow which bobs when you push its base… we were also convinced to go for a walk through the animal enclosure which was packed with different things; swans, peacocks, galahs, ducks, sheep, chickens and so forth which were all eager for some food. We even saw a duck with a cleft pallet, which I kept trying to feed. During the night the 100 club was run once again, unfortunately resulting in the lowest thing I have EVER seen while ive been in Rovers, boys actually peeing into bottles at the table so they could continue drinking....

Brendan and I want into Hahndorf on Sunday and back to camp to pick up Craig. We then went the Birdwood wine and cheese for tastings and although I will never ever touch goat cheese ever again, there were some nice cheese and wines. The highlight of the weekend was probably going Geocaching, which neither Brendan or I had done before, since Craig had the GPS and info on some local Caches. So we went back to the horse and ended up tramping through the centre of a national park in Charleston which was very picturesque and had lots of native orchids only to find an easy track around the fence to get back to the car.

The standard boat races and drag race were run Sunday night with the handbag and beer bottle toss and a pie eating competition. Our Apple Pie was commandeered by Craig as a makeshift birthday cake for Kirsty though he was less successful at finding a candle.
Monday most people ended up going to Grumpy’s for wood oven pizza for lunch which was nice enough, although it was over an hour wait to actually get it. Daniel tried making friends with the giant goat out the back too. Never park your car within reaching distance of a goat on a rope….

There are a small number of photos from Recharge Here
More photos can also be found at Aesir's Website and another report at the Recharge site

Dukes of Hazard

2005-09-15T22:38:00.000+09:30

Whats better way to celebrate your Birthday than going to see a movie about a sexy looking car? I'd been looking forward to seeing this movie since i first heard about it being in the pineline 3 or 4 years ago and I recon it was worth the hype. thanks to Brendan, Michael, Ash and Marc who came along to see it too.

Dinner at the German Arms

2005-09-13T23:00:00.000+09:30

To celebrate Ash's short visit home from the NT we all went to the German Arms in Hahndorf. While the food and company were good, the service was pretty abismal or completely absent at some times, so bad in fact that we added it to Wayne's Blacklist.

Roverball 2005

2005-08-20T09:50:00.000+09:30

After weeks of anticipation and costume preparation, for me anyway, Roverball was held at College Park Scout Hall and organised by Blackburn Rovers. We were able to get most of our Crew along, even Alex made an appearance. This years ball had a Rock and Roll theme so think Grease, Elvis, Poodle Skirts and most important of all – The Juke Box. Id even managed to bring bubble gum and had something resembling a milkshake with a straw to get right into the theme. Surprisingly pretty much everyone was in theme with the Blues Brothers, Austin Powers and Marilyn Munroe all making appearances, though it was Crew 64 which got all the prized for the best dressed. There was lots of dancing, though not much by us, and even a limbo competition. Well done to Blackburn for a great night.

Photos can be found Here and there are more on the Aesir Site

Anstey Hill Hike

2005-08-07T23:09:00.000+09:30

What better to do on a cold wet day than go for a hike?? As a bit of practice for our trip to central Australia we thought a short hike up Anstey Hill would be in order, especially since I at least had never gone to our namesake hill. It also gave me an oppurtunity to look at the revegitation sites for a potential service activity. Daniel, Brendan and I went uphill and did a fairly large loop but by the time we’d reached the top it had started raining pretty heavily. Despite the rain it was a fairly nice walk but I'm sure the lookout would have been good if we could see further than a few meters in the surrounding fog. We didn’t hang around long at the lookout since the hum of the power lines in the gloom was a little unnerving.

Lawn Bowls

2005-08-03T11:21:00.000+09:30

Alex organised for us to Play Lawn bowls on Sunday at the Clearview Lawn bowls club (think Footy club but astro turf instead of an oval). Seven of us managed to get there with various attempts at flat-soled shoes for bowls, I took the ugg boot option. We were shown the basics starting with the little pictures each set of balls had to throwing the kitty, scoring and eventually how to bowl the bowls to curve the right way. We then started playing in pairs and swapped partners before playing a team game, girls VS Boys. There was some natural talent amongst us, Alex and Michael especially so they became our captains. Lachie and Alex’s friend Kat became our seconds and Brendan and I became the not so significant starters (so if we stuffed up it could be fixed by our following team members). After 3 games we decided a draw between the teams was a good place to finish. We then progressed to Norwood for free ice cream at the Baskin and Robbins Ice cream place at its official opening and met up with a few others and then went to Villanova’s for lunch. It was definitely an enjoyable morning, partly due to the really nice whether and party cos its not the most strenuous of sports, some of us would even consider playing socially during the week….

All Class, No Ass Boot

2005-08-01T11:11:00.000+09:30

Aesir held their second Boot for Spiro, Matt Voller and some other guy called Alex who we eventually worked out was the one wearing the sheep pelvis on his head. This all class, no ass Boot party was held at their hall in Beaumont and even included a spa, which you may recognise from such memorable boot parties as B & B Boot and Triple J Boot. There was a small crowd, with Aaron's estimation of 50-75 people possibly exaggerated by seeing double or triple by the time we arrived. There were some good speeches and trophies and much drinking. We even managed to get Dougal and Aaron to do the broomstick spinning thing, Dougal just managing to roll over the broomstick and Aaron actually jumping over the broomstick but then falling down a hill. We eventually left after things started going down hill with the Viking helmet, may we never ever have to see it again, and went to the pancake kitchen for tea after following some fire engines for a while.

Aesir's Christmas in July Dinner

2005-07-28T13:28:00.000+09:30

Aesir Rover Crew kindly invited us to join them to celebrate christmas in July with a dinner at their hall, on the night we had about 8 Anstey people and 5 Aesir people attend. Arriving just as Stuey was leaving as the desert had been forgotten, we found that the boys had done a pretty good job of decorating and setting the table complete with christmas crackers and candles, something Im sure was regretted later on. The meal was pretty good, esspecially considering how cheap it was, we all had finger food, soup, roast and cheesecake for desert. this was all toped off with some classy Christmas music and a visit from a local possum. Thanks for inviting us, Im so glad we didnt have to clean up and that they werent my table cloths!

A couple of photos can be found Here or more at Aesirs site

Anstey Quiz Night 2005

2005-07-10T13:55:00.000+09:30

About 90 people attended the 3rd Anstey Quiz night at the Illingworth Hall including Rovers, Old boy’s, parents and friends. The night had everything from a potato Eiffel Tower complete with an accompanying harmonica rendition, a hat for alcoholics complete with spew bag and a hat to put on grapes to keep flies away, 150 blown up rubber gloves and 22 flavours of jelly.

The hall seemed a lot more spacious than previous years and after a bit of culling, there were fewer questions and a much better pace. We had lots of games this year; the Mintie wrapper competition, the bottle toss, the Glove of Love, stand up/ sit down, potato carving, Mad Hatters, and what items were on tables. There was much contention between the two tables competing for the jelly shot competition, one having taped their shot glasses together, eventually this was decided by a crowd vote and we never want to hear about it again. The Quiz itself seemed to go well with a lot of flashbacks in the TV theme songs round and the monopoly board to fill out and we even had an Anstey Pot luck special round with questions from each crew member.

In the end Pine Forest was the winning Rover crew and second overall by 1 point, taking home the Rover trophy with first overall going to the table of Alex’s friends.

Thanks to all of our sponsors, to everyone who came along and to those who helped with the organisation and cleaning up afterwards, we really appreciated your support.

Quiz Prep

2005-07-08T15:35:00.000+09:30

there has been a stack of Quiz prep for this years quiz night. the weekend before was spent going through the questions and getting the TV themes for the audio round which was the biggest blast from the past. as a bit of time out we all went for a look at our neighbours house directly opposite just because the was a open inspection on, a bit too small for my liking. The cash and carry expedition was pretty good, lots of impulse buying there and the rest of the week Brendan and I made jelly shots with michael coming to help on fri night too.

Northgate Venturer Dinner

2005-06-19T11:48:00.000+09:30

We attended the Northgate Venturer Fundraiser Dinner on the 18th which was a fairly good night, most people being conned into going by the reputation of Bunny's webber roast, Bunny's Mum's apple pie and the promise that the venturers wouldnt be cooking, only serving. We decided to go dressy which most of us managed though Marc really took the cake with the hat, scarf and all. None of us did well with the pinyata, throwing coins at the bottle or heads and tails but we did get a bottle of wine for compensation for running out of vegies (I think the wine was more appreciated than the vegies anyway). Aside from the games we kept ourselves entertained by totally destroying our candle in its glass holder and learning that pepper flairs up when put into flame. Other things to note was how damn cold that hall is and Daniel trying to eat a rock out of the candle holder. Congratulations to the Venturers for a pretty good night, I thinkthey made about $400, so well done!

Mudbash 2005

2005-06-14T13:02:00.000+09:30

Mafeking Rover Park, Victoria

"It smells like Camp around here..."

What better time of the year for it to finally bucket down with rain than the weekend of Mudbash? Actually we were quite lucky in our trip it only really rained when we were driving over stopping at my Mums in Goroke half way on the Thursday and going from Horsham to Mafeking on Friday. Setting up in the rain was a big fat pain in the ass especially the 20 X 20 marquee we brought with us but eventually we got it all up more or less. After pouring out bean slime next to the entrance of the marquee and being told he had bad campcraft skills, Brendan spent the rest of the weekend commenting on how bad everyone’s campcraft was. Saturday started with re erecting the Marquee, which hadn’t made it through the night before going off to investigate what Mudbash is all about. Mud, as it turns out.

The set up of the park is amazing, all built with motor sport in mind so there are some great spectator areas, and the area its in is quite scenic, even if it is wet. There was so much effort put into some of the cars with a heap of V8's and some very nice paint jobs. Some of the stand out events were the tug-of-war, especially when the drive shaft twisted in half of one car which then hit Roger, the V8 mini, and the obstacle course was amazing with huge cut out ditches full of mud and pretty hard core stuff, nothing like the obstacle course at Sandblast. The first car over the second obstacle had its exhaust ripped off but they just put it back on the bonnet and they continued on. The hill climb was pretty full on and few cars made it and the motorkhana was good for some photo opps but the main race was mostly out of the way and the triple challenge and spring pull didn’t have much to them. The Army had a display and also did a couple of demos with the armed personnel carriers, which was also something different.

One very stand out thing with Mudbash was the epidemic of Drizabones, maybe it’s just because it’s a lost culture in SA now, but it was unbelievable how many drizabones there were. Another thing which stood out was the wanky extras most crews had with them, like the fire thingy which held burning wood stacked up over a metre high with a huge chimney, surprising that it didn’t end in tears, it seems Vic Rovers haven’t learnt much fire safety.

All in all a pretty good trip for the six of us (Brendan, Michael, Terri, Marc, Daniel & myself) with Craig, Julian and Ski also came over from SA. It was definitely good having the marquee even if it didn’t rain much during the actual weekend and we never lacked for food which was good. Quote of the weekend goes to Brendan “it smells like camp around here…”

A whole bucket load of photos from Mudbash can be found Here

Anstey Maze Challenge

2005-05-31T14:28:00.000+09:30

Puzzle Park GRovers and Crew 64 were both challenged to a Maze Challenge at Puzzle Park on the 29th of May by the Anstey Rovers, which was accepted by both crews. The Challenge was to get all crew members through the maze to each of the four corners where they had to pick up one of four specific coloured bits of paper and out again first, with every crew member having all four coloured bit of paper (having gone to all four corners).

Although Puzzle Park doesn’t have that great a reputation anymore it was chosen because of its 4.5 km maze (according to the website!). It was fantastic weather all day, surprising since it was cloudy, windy and rainy out there the day before. There were 15 people all up from the 3 crews and Daniel who’d come to help “referee” so the winner was the first crew with three people out. We all started at the same time so it was a bit of a push to get in but we were lucky and had our well-trained attack ferret, Brendan leading the way. Getting to the corners seemed to be the easy part it was the getting out part which had most of us stumped. GRovers were well ahead but got stuck in the wrong area near the exit and had to go all the way back to get to the right side so in the end Anstey was the first crew with 3 members out, hence the winners of the challenge.

The rest of the day was spent doing all the stuff there, paddle boats, the merry go round, flying fox, ball crawl, mini golf, the giant slides and all the other things which them not to be allowed to have anymore because they are so dangerous. Brendan and Michael organised a BBQ for everyone with a phenomenal amount of onion. I’d like to thank GRovers and Crew 64 for coming along, Brendan and Michael for doing the BBQ and Daniel, Alex and Michael for being in the corners of the maze.

Photos can be found Here

Anstey Canoe & Gliding Camp

2005-05-18T14:14:00.000+09:30

The Anstey Canoe camp was held over the May long weekend at Roonka and was definitely a great camp with a huge range of stuff to do. A pretty small group went including Alex, Brendan, Michael, Marc Daniel and Myself. We decided to go somewhere easy for our first trip canoeing in many years for most of us and to make life even easier we booked a dorm room to ourselves and the smaller kitchen/ dinning area so all we needed was ourselves, our personal gear and food, probably the least amount of stuff we've taken to a camp ever.

We went shopping and got all our stuff together on the Friday night before leaving around 8ish, with both Daniel's and Brendan's cars packed with stuff. It was a very educational trip with an in depth discussion about the KFC secret herbs and spices which resulted in getting the definitions of herbs and spices and deciding that salt is a seasoning not a spice. A very quiet night and probably the most peaceful of the weekend as we weren't next to anyone else.

We managed to be up at a reasonable time to get breakfast and prepare to go canoeing. We spent the morning going upstream and stoped in a side part to the river to practise some techniques before heading further up and down a off shoot of the river which went under an old bridge and ended up at a lake.

The weather in the afternoon looked a bit doubtful, which, coupled with exhaustion from the mornings trip, meant a very reluctant walk back to the canoes for another lot of paddling. Again we found an inlet and followed it round to a dead end back near Roonka. We ended the day with a candle lit diner outside with lasagne and pudding for tea and bad shirts all round, followed by a game of compatibility.

Since semaphore scout group had arrived during Saturday, Sunday morning we were blessed with the sounds of a bazillion little kids running around and around and waking stuff and playing with the fire unattended… we left mid morning to go gliding but had to wait for the other kids to go first before us. Gliding was fantastic but unfortunately Alex threw up when she went up, but did get to take it home with her. Even more unfortunate was the fact that Michael had to go after Alex with a microphone which smelt like spew. Since each flight was 20 min there was plenty of waiting so we took cards and so forth and after my flight Daniel even took me for a Driving lesson out in the middle of nowhere which went well.

We held a scouts own type activity before going down to the billabong for a Crew Vigil. One by one everyone was taken and invested as a Rover Knight down by the river with a ceremony which took all weekend to put together. After the ceremony we all changed and rugged up and headed back to Armstrong with Daniels telescope for a bit of astronomy, with some port to keep warm. We did get to see a few things but the cloud covered most of the sky eventually so we left and hit a kangaroo on the way back (hilux 1: kangaroo 0).
Photos can be found Here

Comedy Capers 2005

2005-05-14T12:17:00.000+09:30

Daniel Brendan and Myself went along to Comedy Capers for the Thursday Show before the long weekend. The show was based around Caper’s 40th anniversary so there were lots of “flash back” and reminiscing about past shows and people in them. There were also a lot of videos of local people congratulating those involved in the show. It was good to see Simon and Terri in the show with the highlight probably being Simon dancing very gracefully in his pink tutu with extra frilly bits, congratulations to both of them for being involved!

Bloo’s Netball Challenge

2005-04-26T14:58:00.000+09:30

Held at Camden Beach sports Centre each year, this is probably the one time a year anyone in our crew plays netball. Luckily for us Brendan’s Sister Nat and her boyfriend Mark came to help us out. Nat also came last year and once again she showed everyone what to do and where and how and organised us quite nicely into a team. We had just enough people for a team with Alex, Michael, Brendan, Terri, Nat, Mark and Myself. We kicked ass in the first game against one of the Pt Noarlunga teams winning around 13:3. Our next two games against Lones and TARC didn’t go so well as they both had people who played netball and we lost both games. Our last game was against the other Pt Noarlunga Team which we won although Michael fell and hit his knee and we had to get a ring in from Lones. We did a lot better than last year and it was also a lot more enjoyable (partly cos we didn’t lose every time we played). it was also good to see that there was no trip to the hospital and michael was our only injury, although i skinned my knees falling onto the ball. In the end we came about 5th so didn’t quite make it into the semi finals but neither did we have to play off for the wooden spoon. Everyone did a fantastic job and hopefully we do even better next year, a big thankyou to our two ring ins Nat and Mark!!
Photos can be found Here

Anzac Day

2005-04-26T14:28:00.000+09:30

As always, Rovers were asked to help with the ANZAC Day Dawn Service and March in Adelaide. From 5:30 in the morning Rovers hand out the service programs to everyone coming in which appeared to be lots more than previous years. Barg, Michael, Alex, Brendan and Myself came for this and afterwards the Rovers went to the pancake kitchen for breakfast. Brendan, Daniel and I went to go check my rats first but I realised that id forgotten my keys so we went to Maccas for some much needed food (which wasn’t so pricey) before meeting back up with everyone at the pancake kitchen. Only Barg, Brendan and I stayed for the march were we were flag point at the Torrens parade ground. This meant 2 people at a time held flags by the side of the march in front of the dignitaries, the first where they salute and the second where they drop salute. After the march we went down to the Cross of Sacrifice for the service there and met up with Terri before going to the REX for lunch which was packed so we went to Café de Villis.
Photos can be found Here

Jekyll & Hyde

2005-04-25T14:27:00.000+09:30

Sunday the 24th Brendan, Marc, Michael, Clare, Daniel and Myself went to the Norton Summit Pub for Lunch, which I think everyone enjoyed (except for Brendan) -the tart was particularly nice too. We then went to the Stirling Community Theatre, with very little time to spare, to see Jekyll and Hyde the musical. It was a pretty good show which looked at (my interpretation anyway) morals and ethics and the good and evil each person is capable of, all in all a very dark and tragic show, but good.

NONT 2006

2005-04-18T11:58:00.000+09:30

Well... We Won!!

Now all we have to do is organise it next year.....

Youth Team Challenge

2005-04-14T13:15:00.002+09:30

Once again a few Rovers from Anstey volunteered their week end to going around Challenge hill multiple times scoring kids on team work. Barg, Daniel and I went up on Friday night and Brendan ferreted us out up the hill on Saturday and Michael came for tea. The event wasnt as big as it has been in the past so it wasnt as much work but it was still tiring. Unfortunately, I got the record for the quickest injury when a girl from my first team sprained her ankle on the first activity. Dinner was at the crafers pub followed by Lego Starwars for the rest of the night. Sunday was a little busier than Saturday butthere were a few extra volonteers so it all worked out good.

The Esky drawn on the teamwork sign is still up there from last year, all ready for the Anstey Esky Challenge...

Photos can be found Here

Drive In

2005-04-04T13:28:00.000+09:30

On a spare of the moment impulse (or a craving for drive in hotdogs) a few of us went to the Drive in at Gepps Cross to see Robots and The Ring 2. Good movies but never ever go to the drive in uring a dust storm, it really kills it and its a nightmare walking to get food. But the hotdogs were definately worth it!!

EV 05: Dawn of the Living Dead

2005-03-30T13:05:00.000+09:30

Anstey at EV
EV this year was held around the Blanchtown area; flat, dry, dusty and generally nothing visually stimulating. Rover camp for Theme team was at Armstrong, the scout Gliding Campsite near Roonka, so for once we were in bunks for the weekend and we had pretty good facilities compared to previous years.

Anstey was once again an Activity Crew and six of us went up; Michael, Brendan, Simon, Ash, Marc and myself. We ran four activities the first the cube of death; a giant cube of fridge boxes filled with dog bone biscuits and 2 glow in the dark skeletons in bits. Venturers were blindfolded and needed to get as many bits as possible and the construct the skeletons. Apparently dog biscuits taste like a cross between Nutrigrain and Vitabrits. We had two giant dot to dots, one was a bat and there was some debate to the other one, what started as a cat was also found to be a werewolf or a rabbit. The unlocking the dead involved a tree covered in keys and 2 locked boxes, this proved to be incredibly simple for some teams or so hard for other teams that they couldn’t unlock either box. Our last activity was coffin racing, with the coffins made up by Simon and venturers having to race around as pallbearers, unfortunately this was on the Sunday when everything was at Roonka so there were less teams doing activities.

Venturers also got stuck into collecting the set of 60 trading cards from Rovers and other leaders with the most sought after being the signed Michael Woodward card. Although ash signed a whole stack of Ash from army of Darkness with different colour pens and pancake mix for extra points for the team. Aside from activities we also has teams sculling milk, eating flour, snorting tang and I even managed to get myself some 2 minute noodles for a trading card.

There were more crews than usual, Crew 64, TARC, Aesir and Grovers were also there, but besides running our activity checkpoints, we also helped with venturer camps and the set up of themed locations. The locations were based around horror and included the Sunnydale Cemetery, the Laboratory, a Sacred Burial Ground, the Temple of Doom, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the Devils Playground. Anstey Helped with the Set up of the Cemetery, which was a bush camp, for which Simon had made the very impressive Iron Gate. Along with the gate there were a stack of tombstones, Michael Woodward seemed to appreciate his very own grave, and even a pet semetary.

Back at camp we had candle lit dinners and reasonable food, at least we didn’t have the salad sandwiches that theme team had. Simon even fixed the Armstrong water tank on the Friday night. We helped set up some of the disco on the Sunday night, most importantly we set up the bubbleator, which venturers were asking about during the weekend. after a few repairs and makeshif parts it was good to go and once again looked great. unfortunately there was an injury when a venturer was pushed in and cut her leg on the metal holding down the hose.

Venturer feedback about the activities was good and the compliments from other EV departments regarding the assistance provided by the Rovers were outstanding. Despite the amount of work, I’m sure most people had a lot of fun and the outstanding efforts of the Rovers really promoted the section to both Venturers and other Leaders.
Photos can be found Here

Plaster Fun House

2005-03-22T15:58:00.000+10:30

Sunday Afternoon on the 20th of March, Brendan, Daniel and Myself went to the Plaster fun house for the Afternoon. We all picked out something to paint up, Brendan had a grumpy dragon and both Daniel and I picked really big things to paint, one a horoscope thingy and the other was an Aztec type patter in a big disc. Brendan finished with a very nice looking dragon in the end, Daniel painted his black then realised what a pain in the ass it was to paint over it and didn’t quite get it finished by closing time and after working forever on the horoscope all of us worked on getting it finished just before closing. Definitely worth doing again as a group!

Afterwards we did a bit of Prep for our EV activities and had tea and a movie at my place (once the DVD was sorted out) when Simon and Barg came round.

Advanced Rover Training

2005-03-15T13:51:00.000+10:30

On the 11th-13th of March Barg and myself attended the Advance Rover Training Course at the Lones hut at Woodhouse. The Rover training team ran the weekend and there were seven Rovers on the course in total. The weekend covers topics such as communication, conflict resolution, adventurous activities, event planning, service and we also went on a hike and a GPS activity (the clue of “leaf” of “stick” at woodhouse is not particularly helpful!!). Tea was at the Crafers pub, which was fantastic, though the rocky road mud cake was a bit of a let down. A couple of the things from the course have been trialed or put into the “management of the crew” such as trying to include short team activities at the end of crew meetings.

Nont 2005

2005-03-11T17:46:00.000+10:30

This years NONT was all Aussie adNONTures run by Lones Rovers, starting at Hollywood plaza in sailsbury and featuring the area around Gawler, Mallala, Port Gawler, Riverton and Angle Vale. There were a total of 9 cars in the event; Aesir, Anstey, Blackburn, two from Crew 64 and four from Pine Forest.

Anstey originally was going to have 2 cars but this dwindled down to one car with Michael driving, myself and two prospective members, Matt Sawyers and Zaho – a Chinese exchange student. Although we didn’t put much effort into going in theme we did manage to get all of the bonus items on the list including modified condoms as quandongs and a cutout of Russell Coight as big as the word life, making it life size.

For some suspect reason we started second rather than first as we were drawn and Matt soon showed his value as an expert Morse code decoder to work out the first section of the course. All of the mapping was more or less straight forward, there were a couple of tricky bits but we sorted them all out eventually. Unfortunately however we did get a little bit lost on the second stage and once we found ourselves back on track we realized we’d been off the map which is why it was so hard to workout where we were.

The activities in the first half included sheaf tossing for which Zhao threw a phenomenal 18 meters, fishing with Peter Hann for magnetic fish for which we got 27 out of a possible 60, campcraft gadget construction for which we build a kickass cow which held a dryzabone and hat and was so well trained it demonstrated how it could sit, a first aid activity (with an indepth discussion on breeding programs of the threatened yellow flashing whatsit…) and lastly a Morse code activity with Brownie. The halfway point wasn’t too bad, at least the food was much better than last year’s and everyone kept trying to feed us and it was also pretty cozy (despite being told I looked like a drunk bum when I had my gaurana hit). The second half included a sheep collecting (herding) activity, a very poor effort at line dancing and being crammed into a very smelly outback dunny for a minute. We then finished off at Angle Vale Scout Hall being the second car back at 4am ish followed by Blackburn.
All in all we had a pretty good time, Michael and I both enjoyed this years one more that last years, there were more and possibly better activities, the observations and caution signs all had reflective tape on them making them really easy to spot and we had plenty of bribes for every checkpoint ranging from snickers bars, strawberry and creams, Chilli Tim Tams and sticky buns. Even though the puzzle bits we collected over the night said bribery gets you nowhere, I think it was still worth it. Lones did a really great job of organizing the night, now we just have to wait to see how we went….

Ted Whitworth Award Presentation 2005

2005-03-06T17:47:00.000+10:30

The Ted Whitworth Award to scouting was presented on Thursday the 3rd of March 2005 by the BP Masonic lodge 222. The award recognizes outstanding service to the community by a rover crew and as such it is presented to the Rover Crew which has carried out the greatest amount of service over the year. The award not only recognizes the service preformed by a single crew but that all rovers and rover crews contribute a great deal of time to service activities which is why the award is given to a rover crew. The award is in honor of the late Reverend Ted Whitworth, a member of the BP lodge who is fondly remembered. Ted Whitworth was dedicated to serving others and the lodge members said he characterized the principles and strengths of both scouting and masonry.

The award (a pennant) is presented at a formal ceremony at the Masonic Lodge at an open ceremony with the BP lodge members, the grand lodge, scouting members, BP guild members, Rovers and guests in attendance. Along with the pennant, framed certificates are presented individually to all Crew members. Following the ceremony a reception is held in the main hall with food and drinks, a number of toasts and an address and a raffle.

Anstey Rover Crew was honoured to receive the Award this year for service over 2004 and we appreciate the BP lodge extending their hospitality to us once again.
Photos can be found Here

LANstey

2005-02-27T22:52:00.000+10:30

This was an activity suggestion put forth from Daniel to the Crew, a mini LAN party at our house (Primmer Ave) over Friday and Saturday. Brendan, Michael, Clare Ash, Daniel and myself were there on Friday networking everything while partly watching Alex’s maraTHUMB video (thumb wars, frankenthumb etc).once we got set up the obvious choice of game was Red Alert. Later on we progressed to Age of Empires and then Brendan, Daniel and myself were left to play Age of Mythology. Brendan was back the next morning to play more Age of Mythology right through the afternoon.

“Into the Woods”

2005-02-24T23:03:00.000+10:30

Anstey at the Theatre

Wednesday night Alex, Marc, Daniel and Myself went to see the musical “Into the Woods” at the Odeon Theatre at Norwood. The show was based on a mix of different fairytales and the first act ended with the happy ever after, the second act showed that nothing is ever happy ever after. It was a pretty good show with pretty good actors and singing and the first act was definitely a good laugh. Although we planned for coffee and ice cream afterwards, by the time the show was over everything was closed.

Jacobs Creek Golf

2005-02-22T14:09:00.000+10:30

Barg, Brendan and I helped at the 2005 Jacobs Creek Golf Tournament from the 17th to the 20th of Febuary as the Rovers help do the scoreboards and scoring as bits and pieces and get paid a minimal amount for their time. Barg did the most work, doing the wind stick on Thursday and Friday and then the scoreboard on Saturday. Brendan and I did a scoreboard on the weekend. Unfortunately it was the board in the far far corner of the course away from anything with very few people to actually look at it. Barg also proved his navigating skills when we almost ended up at the front gate when the scoreboard we wanted was in the complete opposite direction. Sunday we helped pack everything up and had some wine and drinks donated to us so we sat down for a bit behind one of the main score boards.

AdVenture Expo

2005-02-20T14:01:00.000+10:30

Brendan, Michael and myself helped out with the Easter Venture display at the years AdVenture Expo on the 18th. the Expo is a night for Venturers where they do some small activities run mostly by the adventurous activity teams and can see displays on things or activities relevant to them. Unfortunately promoting EV required being in theme (horror) so Brendan was given a brown hooded cloak and blood coming out of his eyes, which is apparently really itchy. Since Michael came late he was given the worst costume ever -a stripy flannelette sheet (every one has one of these at home I’m sure) with two eyeholes cut out, making him a stripy ghost. I’d already bought a Goth dress for EV but hadn’t modified it as yet. There wasn’t too much for us to do, EV ran apple carving and a game outside and that left us to pretty much just look the part. Afterwards we went down to Café De Villis for some pretty good food considering most of us hadn’t eaten all night.

Alex had her “Bad Shirt” house warming this night but unfortunately since the expo went so long we weren’t able to make it but Simon did go.

Andre and Heathers Boot

2005-02-14T16:51:00.000+10:30

Heather from Pine Forest and more importantly, Andre from Lones were both booted at Bloo’s hall on Saturday. It was a fairly low-key event but once they finally got some music it wasn’t too bad, though we pretty much just kept to ourselves. There was a huge turnout of Old Boys, which seemed to make up most of the crowd.

B & B Boot

2005-02-07T17:45:00.000+10:30

Bunnies and Bogans

Sat Febuary the 5th saw the eagerly awaited and very overdue Boot of Andrew “Bunny” Perger and Gavin “Gav” Johnson at the HopeValley Scout Hall. In true Anstey Tradition both were well past Rover age though Febuary was our first opportunity to fit the boot into a vey busy 12 months. The event was the first ever crew organized boot party, unfortunately for Jason Stnading who resorted to throwing his own boot party.

Fortunately Anstey secured and continually double checked the most important factor for a Boot Party – The Bootees, who have a tendency not to come to things…

Both Bunny and Gav were founding members of the Hillcrest Rover Crew started in 1999 which later became the Anstey Rover Crew and both have had numerous roles in scouting through out their time in Rovers. Both contributed significantly in the shaping of the crew.
Bunny was the inaugural Crew leader for Hillcrest/Anstey and was crew leader again in 2001-2003. Bunny has been an assistant scout leader with Hillcrest Scout Group and activities officer briefly for BRC. He also attended the fateful NRC held in Canberra in 2003 during the bushfires. Bunny was a big supporter of Sandblast where he is remembered for once disappearing for a whole night remembering only that he’d seen a small furry animal and dug a hole somewhere.

Gav was crew leader for 2000-2001 and heavily involved in Sandblast organization as
Track coordinator. He has been and continues to be involved with numerous large scouting events such as supersplash and Youth Team Challenge as part of “Team Jim”. Gav is also remembered for the naked dancing at sandblast and the new years with the shoe.

A huge amount of effort was put into the night by the crew not to mention our severly depleted bank account. The boot sported a pig on a spit, spa with DVD player, fantastic punch and a powerpoint presentation of the boys over the last few years as well as old and current crew members. Bunny and Gav both received (car) boots with photos as a memento of their time in Anstey, now an Anstey tradition.

It was great to see so many old crew members there to see the two booted which was appreciated. Thank you to everyone who came to the boot and to those who helped set up and pack up. Im sure everyone also appreciated Ash carving the pig in Spedos as well!
Photos can be found Here

Skyshow

2005-01-31T23:57:00.000+10:30

29th January 2005

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The crew met up on War Memorial Drive for a nice relaxing BBQ before sitting back and watching the fire works. Note: when planning a BBQ, don’t forget a lighter or matches and no one likes to see a hair brained scheme for lighting a BBQ with jumper leads off a car battery… Nevertheless a really nice night out and a great show. Pine Forest managed to join us just before it started.

Photos can be found Here

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Crew & Surrogate Members Camp

2005-01-25T22:28:00.000+10:30

21st – 23rd January 2005, Victor Harbour

The Camp was held at Michael’s Shack near the Bluff at Victor Harbor which was considerably cozier than last time we stayed given the larger numbers of the group. Surrogate members of the crew were invited along for the weekend mostly from Pine Forest. The camp was held as an alternative to traveling to VIC for Surfmoot which was not on a long weekend this year, however less than a week out it was discovered that Surfmoot was on the following weekend.

People arrived throughout Friday night for a relaxing night in with some DVD’s, learning how a microwave works in the process and Anna’s singing practice in the background. Surprise, surprise the first thing Brendan grabbed when he got there was the binoculars to spy on the neighbors and passers by, a job taken quite seriously for the rest of the weekend. Saturday morning saw Maccas for breakfast and then a walk to Granite Island. Half of the group went to see “The Incredibles” while the rest went back to the shack for more DVD action. Dinner was no structured affair and everyone was left to fend for themselves, though some of us had some damn good tacos. The night progressed with some singing, the guitar coming out and some more DVDs. Despite struggling through Dog soldiers we will never know the outcome of the movie, the last 3 scenes kept skipping. Nevertheless watching Willow was just as good as it was when I saw it at the drive in when I was six or so. Sunday morning and a few of us went down to cheer for Lachie on the Go Kart track before lunch at Pt Elliot. Those who stayed behind went for a trip up to the Bluff. After everything was packed up and a few failed attempts of Daniel trying to spin me round his arm and vice versa we headed back to Adelaide.

This was a really well attended event and it was good to have the extra Pine Forest Rovers along with us to adds to the group dynamic, especially since they are all fairly close to our crew anyway. It was a fun and relaxing camp with little fuss or effort required.
Photos can be found Here

Moonlight Cinema

2005-01-17T17:20:00.000+10:30

Another last minute activity… Who could see that The Princess Bride was showing and not want to go?? After spending all day debating weather it would rain or not it actually cleared up in the evening. A fair size group of us went down to the Botanic Gardens to watch a true classic in the same league as Willow. Ash and Marc came very prepared with their drinks and we had a few bits and pieces to nibble on. Unfortunately we didn’t bring any beanbags or chairs so it was a bit uncomfortable but still, what a movie!!

Christmas Lunch

2004-12-23T10:29:00.000+10:30

Instead of a Christmas dinner this year we had lunch in the park and Barg organised the copious amount of food. Barg, Alex, Andrew, Michael, Simon, Marc and myself attended and once again we had a secret Santa thing. Although it was a really really hot day there was almost no one around when we got there and it was quite nice under the trees where we were. After lunch we came back to my place for a swim, (did I mention how hot it was!), and have another big meal for tea. So all barges food didn’t go to waste it was brought around as well. Unfortunately Brag got it in his head to BBQ his block of ham which had been left out too long only to realise it still had its protective cover on. Dinner was followed by bon bons for all…

Supersplash

2004-12-09T10:39:00.000+10:30

Four of us, Brendan, Michael, Simon and Myself, volunteered to help with Supersplash catering for the 300+ people at the event making up half the catering team. We all attended a food handling course prior to the event at Kidman Park and Bob Ellis and I worked out a menu prior to that, not that we ended up following that menu. We arrived Friday night and set up our tents while waiting for Bob to return then unloaded food and set out supper. Early starts both days for breakfasts and not much time before lunch and then prep for tea. Clare, Brendan, Daniel and myself dressed up for tea as horror characters to promote EV while everyone was lined up. All in all it was a long and tiring weekend but not as much work as youd expect for 300 people. Brendan did a fantastic job as fidge bitch except when we thought hed gone home with the key and the door was taken off the cool room just as he rocked up with the key.

Peak Bagging

2004-10-24T22:22:00.000+09:30

Anstey Vs GRovers

GRovers challenged Anstey to a peak bagging challenge in October in the Adelaide hills starting at woodhouse and finishing at Mt. Lofty. The challenge was to hike up as many peaks, hills or mounts as possible with each worth different points. The crew with the most points (and photographic proof) would win. After the challenge we met at the Crafers pub for tea the challenge was decided as a tie with GRovers having conquered more strenuous peaks but Anstey having bagged a greater number of smaller hills. A game of risk was proposed to settle the tie but Anstey eventually decided that the trophy could go to GRovers.

Photos can be found Here

News Paper Hockey

2004-07-06T15:41:00.000+09:30

Anstey Vs Blackburn

Anstey Rovers challenged Blackburn to a game of newspaper hockey as a ST Georges Challenge on Saturday July 4th at the Hopevalley Scout Hall. For the underprivileged of you out there who never played this game in scouts it consists of a bean bag, rolled up newspaper bats and 2 chairs for goals.
The games wasn’t that long with half time called after 15 minutes when it was discovered that Rovers have neither the energy or stamina that they had in scouts.
I dare say that not one person left without a bruise, ache or pain of some description especially Barg who spent most of the time on the ground. However fortunately the only blood drawn was before the game for which my profuse apologies go to Simon Taylor.
Despite a complete lack of fitness (except for Simon), Anstey finally defeated Blackburn 28-17. The day was concluded with dinner at Fasta Pasta with the suggestions of a meatball challenge.

Thanks to Blackburn for going along with our challenge and to Julian for acting as our referee and photographer. We look forward to a crew finally challenging us to something, as long as it’s not so physical!!

Anstey Quiz Night 2004

2004-06-21T22:19:00.000+09:30

Around 130 people attended the Anstey Rovers and Hope Valley Scout Group Quiz Night on Saturday June 19^th at the Para Vista Primary School.

Congratulations to TARC and GRovers who jointly won the trophy for first Rover Table and came second overall to a table from the Hope Valley Group despite the hard questions (our apologies). TARC were also the proud winners of a bucket of jelly for the tallest stack of jelly shot glasses despite the efforts of Aesir.

There was tough competition during the games with Miriam going head to head against jelly man and his side kick with their special superpowers (including diamond tipped nipples) for the title of best superhero. There were also strange potato animals and a shower of coins thrown at a Bundy bottle. Two crews, Aesir and TARC, stood out especially for making their own fun and having a good time, which was fantastic to see.

We would like to thank everyone who helped us plan and organize the event including the Hope Valley Scout Group and all of our sponsors who gave us so many prizes we had to make up more things to give them away for. A special thanks to Ski for arranging the sound gear and projector, and for Daniel for being our surrogate crew member for the night as our MC – we hope you both enjoy your Anstey Crew shirts. Thanks also to all the people (mostly rovers) who stayed behind to help us clean up, it was most appreciated. Thanks to everyone for coming along for an evening with friends and for supporting both out crew and the Hope Valley scout Group which receive all the fruits of our labor. The night raised $800 which went to the group to subsidise part of the group camp.

Ark! Polly-Wanna-NONT

2004-03-21T17:50:00.000+10:30

2004

Anstey had two cars in NONT this year Barg and Simon in the Datsun and Michael, Brendan and Minky in Michael’s car which slowly rattled apart. The starting point was at Munno Para shopping Centre and went northish and finished at Gawler Scout Hall where we had to look for treasure.

We all dressed as a crew of pirates more or less with matching Anstey bandannas and belt and fuzzy green eye patches, I even had a pet penguin on my shoulder. Before the night we got together one night to also go through my collection of Pirate Lego which makes me still think we should have a Rover Lego night. We managed to scrape together most of the bonus items down to a message in a bottle from Michael phone.

Although we (in Michael’s car) started 15th we got to the first activity at the St Kilda pirate ship 3rd (without speeding!) and rummaged through the ship for “stuff”. Other activities along the way involved making a chocolate toasted sandwich (????), throwing a stuffed crocodile the furthest which Simon apparently did extremely well at, shooting pirates which were all but lying down anyway. In the second half we made a pirate hat out of newspaper and skulled red cordial at a cemetery (which I threw up!). The food at the halfway point wasn’t overly appetising but more so than the toasted sandwiches. Navigating was “relatively” easy with only one section being a bit iffy but “allegedly” if you zoom in on the map the directions were correct….

In the end the two crew cars came 3rd and 11th out of 16 cars which wasn’t too bad.

Anstey Quiz Night 2003

2003-07-14T22:08:00.000+09:30

On the 12^th of July over 110 people attended the Anstey Rover Quiz Night at Marden Masonic Hall. The night was the crew’s first attempt at running a branch event and it also gave us a well needed cash boost. Aside from the standard questions which are often found at quiz nights there were a number of games.

The fish like creature won the potato carving contest with the potato Anstey Goat and the dog also deserving a mention as well as the other body parts that people carved. It was difficult to judge the costume created with everything from $2 hookers to miss India and a violinist but the prize went to the guy that kinda looked like Santa with a tie.

Congratulations to BRC chair Rob who won the $50 gift voucher to the casino as door prize and to Rhonda who took away the padded toilet seat and Margy who is now planning on repainting her kitchen with the 10L of paint.

First second ad third prizes all went to rover tables:
1^st GRovers ( + Peter Hann)
2^nd Ridgehaven (+others)
3^rd Team Swoosh (Pine Forest & a couple of Athelstone)

Last place also went to a rover table which may or may not be because they put me down as a mother goat, congratulations to Blackburn who received some appropriately shaped chocolate as the boobie prize.

A big thanks to everyone who helped plan and run the night, to everyone who attended and to those who stayed behind to help up clean up the copious amounts of toilet paper.

Ted Whitworth Award Presentation 2003

2003-03-08T23:27:00.000+10:30

The Ted Whitworth Rover Service Award is given to a rover crew each year in honour of a man who devoted his life to serving the community. On March 6^th the Anstey Rover Crew received this award at a ceremony hosted by the Freemasons of lodge Baden Powell 222 for community service.

The Anstey Rover crew is based at the Hope Valley scout hall and has approximately 23 members. In the last twelve months Anstey has worked hard towards developing the crew structure and relations. This includes introducing squire training, members becoming leaders, and 5 members starting their Baden Powell Award.

Our members have participated in major events such as the promotions at the royal show through to ongoing service to the Hillcrest, Glen Osmond and Kingscote groups. We are looking forward to extending this service to the newly formed Hope Valley group at our hall. We have also had members involved in an ongoing basis in a variety of community service groups including Edmund Rice Camps and the Anti-Cancer Foundation.

The Crew would like to firstly thank the Branch Rover Council for selecting us as the recipients of the Crew Honours Award for 2002. We thank the Lodge Baden Powell for both the award and its presentation and for their hospitality during the night. Special thanks goes to Michael Baden Powell as guest speaker and the other guests who were there to support us. Lastly we would like to thank Blackburn for coming and acting as our “honour guard” with their stubby flag, which paled in comparison to our broomstick flag (just kidding, Thanks!)

This award has given all crew members a huge amount motivation and encouragement and if nothing else gave us the push we needed to get both our crew scarves made up and a broomstick for our flag for the presentation.

As good as it would be to get this award again, we hope that other crews are motivated gain the award, as a variety of recipients reflects a high standard of rover crew in SA, rather than the same crew getting the award over and over again. We hope that future recipients of the award find it as rewarding as we have.

Minky Cockshell, Alex Rungie and Simon West

NONT WARS 2002

2002-08-31T13:09:00.000+09:30

In a galaxy far far away……

Alex, Simon, Brendan and I entered a team in Alex’s car for NONT, none of us having competed in the event before. Alex went all our with her costume, a white sheet thing and varnished bagels aka Princess Leia, Simon had Jedi robes and I had mu multipurpose NONT costume. Since Brendan didn’t come with anything he was forced into a pair of PVC pants and a chick’s top which was a good call because we got extra points just by pointing out the pants at some checkpoints. Lots of other rovers had gone all out with costumes, not surprising considering the amount of promotion for the event.

After some creative navigation we were pulled over by the Police, not for the navigation though, so we let Alex deal with that in costume looking like a member of KKK without her bagels on. Following that, but not because of that, Alex was feeling pretty sick and from that point onwards managed to throw up about once ever stage of the course so Brendan took over the driving. Added to that just before the half way point both the headlights went out when we had no idea where we were…

We did pretty well at most of the navigation considering it was our first NONT, although we did give up on the crow’s foot. We eventually finished at woodhouse at daybreak, finishing in 6th position. Considering the time effort and promotion of the event I’d hate to be the one to run the next NONT.