The Penkridge Princesses and Pirates consisted of Luci Kendrick, Jane Green, Abigail Cotton, Bethan Jones, Lindsay Clayton, Rebecca Farmer, Laura Flynn, Kathryn Davenport, Alex Lewis and Eloise Durham. After a vote, the five countries that we decided to travel to were Sweden, Poland, Hungary, Slovenia and Italy – we tried to stick to places that we weren’t likely to have already visited or are ever going to.
After an estimated £1000 costing per person for the whole trip, £10,000 earned from fundraising seemed impossible, so a target of raising £5000 and each person paying £500 of their own money was set. Although, after the success of 3 bag packs at supermarkets, discos and 2 barn dances (to name a few events), the full £10,000 was practically made after over a year of hard work from the girls.
After all planning and preparation was done, on 27th July 2010, the adventure started when we all met up at 3 ‘o clock in the morning to catch a plane to Paris for the official Centenary Launch at the British Embassy. After a speech from the ambassador, Sir Peter Westmacott, official pictures of all the teams and a packed lunch, each team set off on their separately planned journeys.
Unfortunately for us, later that day, our plane from Paris to Stockholm failed to take off until the next morning. By then, we’d missed our connecting flight to Kiruna, in the north of Sweden, meaning we hadn’t completed the challenge of entering the Arctic Circle for Sweden. After an extended stay in Stockholm, on day 4 of the trip, we set off for Krakow where we visited Auschwitz, to complete Poland’s challenge of visiting a concentration camp. It was a very moving experience and we all renewed our Guide Promise there.
Then, we got a train to Warsaw where we took off to go Hungary. After another moving experience doing some community work at a children’s hospital, we spent the rest of the day in a thermal spa, once again completing another country’s challenge. Then, we caught a train to the beautiful Slovenia. After “dipping our toes into one of Slovenia’s many lakes”, completing Slovenia’s challenge, we chilled out at the hostel playing games such as Uno and table football. On the way out of the hostel though, poor Alex misjudged a step and injured her ankle!
After hobbling on and off trains and buses we arrived in Venice. The next day was spent exploring every alleyway of Venice by most apart from Abi and Jane, who spent the day in hospital in Alex who was having her ankle checked over. That evening we completed Italy’s challenge of trying a new variety of pizza when we ordered 10 into the hostel. The following day we caught a train to Milan where we chilled out for a day in a park and enjoyed the nice weather before leaving for the closing party back in England. It was an amazing experience had by all and although a lot of hard work and effort was put into it, we can all safely say, it was well worth it!
Eloise Durham