From Scott Macintosh
“The highlight of the 70’s for me has to be the trip to Holland in 1979. Over 40 of us spent 2 weeks at Amersfoort under canvas at a youth campsite. All tents, equipment and catering was provided. There was an enormous amount of fund-raising activity before the trip – well done to the parents committee.
Memories that stick out include: visit to the bridge of the North Sea Ferry, tour of a windmill (of course), sailing a traditional Dutch boat on the Zuider Zee, Phillips museum at Eindhoven, war graves at Arnhem, football match against a Dutch team (we won !!), ham/cheese/chocolate vermicelli every day for breakfast, canal tour in Amsterdam, loads of games and activities with other groups at the site, demonstrating Scottish Country dancing to the rest of the camp (we all had kilts, including the boys) and “Smiley Bill” driving the bus on the wrong side of the road after our visit to the local swimming pool.
I think Hamish was in a bad humour the day of his xxth birthday, so the rest of the leaders celebrated on his behalf at a local fondue restaurant.
It would be great if anybody else who was in Holland with us could get in touch or add in a few more highlights of the trip. One of these days, we might persuade Mike to organise a re-union and dust down the slide projector. “
From Steven Conner (1969 – 1975)
“I started going to the 87th inverleith cubs in Granton primary school’s dining hall two weeks before my 8th birthday in 1967, progressed to the scouts in the scout hut on Boswall Parkway aged 11
in 1970, then drifted away from the scouts after my 16th birthday in 1975
The best memories for me were the outdoor activites, the camping, the sailing and the night hiking. i remember the hikes were on corstorphine hill and over the pentland hills.
There was six camps, one with the cubs and five with the scouts
1 1969 New Cumnock It must have been all the inverleith troops as there were lots of cubs (the locals must have thought it was an invasion of little green people)
2 1970 Auld Reekie (The Puffer)
3 1971 Lauder
4 1972 By Loch Fyne
5 1973 Killin (with a hermit!)
6 1974 back by Loch Fyne
Some of the memories that srick out are:
The weekend camps down at peebles where we were given hand axes and shown how to chop down the dead branches for the campfire (happy days).
sailing on the forth i remember one time the fog was so thick that i was sent forward to bang a frying pan with a wooden spoon so the other shipping in the area were made aware of us.
The time the troop came last in a first aid compition up at bonaly (what an embarrasment).
Being in two Edinburgh gangshows in 1972&73
I really enjoyed my time in the cubs and scouts and i hope that the kids of today enjoy it as much as i did”
From Chas Macintosh – PL of the Seagulls 1973-1975, GSL in the 80s, Troop Leader in the 2000s
“I started Scouts in 1970. First night was the night that the Troop moved Headquarters – out of the old hut at Denham Green and into the District Scout Hut in Boswall Parkway. Scout Leaders were Sam Colville and John Cox(?). There were I think 3 Sea Scout Patrols – Seagulls, Ganets and Skuas, and one Land Scout Patrol for the landlubbers.
PLs were Norman Colville, Tam Muirhead and David Wood. Bill Hood was GSL and ran the Troop with Sam and Dave. In the recent past there had been a Scoutleader called ‘Titch’. We used to sail in the RNSA – spending every winter scraping varnish in the boatshed that we rented behind the old Granton School at Granton Square. Every spring and what seemed like al summer we used to scrape seaweed from the pier at Longcraig which was in its infancy then.
Hamish Kaye was but a lad – with ‘special responsibility’ for Papers.”
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Summer Camp on Auld Reekie – see news item
We’d like to capture as many past memories of the group as possible so please email your contributions to chas.macintosh@yahoo.com
