What are your jeans doing today?

[Double 0 Soul]

Here you go @Hopethisoneisnttaken

https://www.dofe.org/about/our-story/#

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Duke_of_Edinburgh's_Award

It's a bit like the Scout movement but with less penetration

[Maynard Friedman]

Duke of Edinburgh Award

My son has completed his Bronze and Silver awards and is now doing his Gold.

Edit: OO beat me to it!

[jkbrwn]

I got lost on my bronze award back in.. god... 2006? My group left our parents waiting at a church in the Surrey Hills for about 5 hours. I get why, but not allowing kids to take a phone with them was stupid from an emergency perspective. Its not like you could do anything with a Sony Ericsson in 2006 anyway!

[Maynard Friedman]

My son did his bronze (practice) in the Surrey Hills too, in 2023 I think, did the proper thing on the South Downs. Still no phones allowed, although he managed not to get lost! 😉 Silver was in the Black Mountains last summer and Gold will be in Snowdonia (Eryri) this summer.

[Double 0 Soul]

During lockdown 2020.. i was still popping into work during the day while my wife and kid were doing homeschool.. he would have been 11yrs old at the time, one cold January evening, i took him on a night hike in the Peaks.. it was Friday night so no school the next day.. he'd done the Joe Wicks workout but still had lots of energy to burn off.. 

 

We left the car in the carpark at the end of the Burbage valley and took a route i've done 100s of times in the past.. it was around 7pm but pitch black and icy.. on the home stretch we were climbing up some rocks (a section he loves) he was up front carrying our massive search and rescue light .. i was behind him just in case he slipped with a poxy little torch.. when we got to the top, he shouted "Wooo! Parkour" and started jumping from rock to rock while i climbed up the last section.. when i got to the top, i could see his torchlight was way off in the distance so i shouted "stay where you are" and i made my way to him cutting through the heather loosing the path in the darkness and completely lost our bearings.. i could see a road in the distance so i thought.. it'd be safer / easier to figure out where we were from the road than waist deep in heather .. this was a period when i didn't have a phone and he'd left his phone in the car.. Whoops! .. familiarity breeds contempt thought i

 

It was so dark that even from the road i had no clue whether we should turn left or right.. one way is the road to Sheffield.. the other is the road to Manchester, i was 80% sure we should turn right but i spotted a light from a remote farmhouse in the distance and said (mainly to try and teach him a lesson) if you ever find yourself in this situation never wander off into the Peak District.. especially when it's -10°.. anywho.. we got to this farmhouse.. this was the era of peak covid paranoia.. and knocked on the door, the farmer was quite surprised to see a 40 something year old man and an 11yr old boy at 10.30pm.. he drew us a map to get back to the Burbage carpark.. (and gave me a bit of a lecture about being more responsible in future ) .. surprisingly it was the complete opposite way to where i thought we should be going (lesson learned or so i thought) .. and off we went .. any other time, i'm sure he would have just given us a lift.. we were following his map but nothing seemed familiar.. i saw no other cars on the road.. then all of a sudden the carpark came into view and it was the carpark at the opposite end of the Burbage Valley.. Oh Fuck!!!

 

..but all was not lost there was a car in the carpark and it was all lit up with what looked like studio lighting rigs? when we got there, it was a freelance photographer with a drone and a sexy model.. they had the car on loan from Audi and they were filming a promo... she was stepping out of the car as the drone flew through the Peak District.. i asked him the time.. it was 12.30am, we explained the situation and they agreed to drive us around the Burbage Valley and back to our car..

 

We got home muddied and exhausted to a greeting of "where the fucking hell have you two been?"

[jkbrwn]

7 minutes ago, Maynard Friedman said:

My son did his bronze (practice) in the Surrey Hills too, in 2023 I think, did the proper thing on the South Downs. Still no phones allowed, although he managed not to get lost! 😉 Silver was in the Black Mountains last summer and Gold will be in Snowdonia (Eryri) this summer.

My much younger sister also did both of those locations in those years and is doing Snowdonia in the summer! But she goes to an all girls school so unlikely they know each other. Maybe they crossed paths!

[Maynard Friedman]

Pretty unlikely as his is a boys school! It's in West London.

[UkeNo]

On 3/25/2025 at 10:02 AM, Hopethisoneisnttaken said:

@Double 0 Soul , as a non English person I thought the Duke of Edinburgh’s a person/title. 

That right, but the Duke of Edinburgh also founded an award (qualifications) /initiative to encourage young people, usually teenagers at school, to take up hiking and being outdoors. 
There’s levels to the skill, I think Bronze,Silver and Gold but the jist is you plan and go on a hike in the hills. Carrying all your own equipment, food and water. Navigating to your camp then staying over night and being self sufficient. Experienced guides go to help, just in case. 
it’s about encouraging them to push themselves and gain confidence. You see them all Over hiking spots in the Uk. 

[Dr_Heech]

Be careful putting the words Duke and Edinburgh in the same sentence on this forum 😉