St. Francis of Assisi – School Blog

Learning and growing together in God's love.

Whitwell Hall by George

Are you bored with life at home? Do you want to go outside, just not in your garden?

Make a beeline to the nature palace also known as Whitwell Hall! Don’t do it well, do it Whitwell! Come and step into a world full of fun! Meander in our meadows, be riveted by river dipping and have fun fire lighting! There’s a lot of other things  to check out, too. Come & have game at the large football pitch, or have a ball playing stuck in the mud round the tent field! Create amazing sculptures out of the wildlife around you (I’d suggest that you’d make your friend lie down, space out the area & do patterns around him/her!) and orienteer around the campsite.

Claim your bunk bed in your room and snuggle in at night!

Love the high seas?  We’ve got boat racing!  Colour your ship and name it, avast ye hearties!

When you’re done with the fun, Paula the chef will come round with a delicious dinner for your break! Truly Whitwell Hall is an amazing place. Come round as soon as you can!

“This has been one of the best trips ever. Thank you so much!”

                                                                    Enjoy, explore,

                                                                      Experience.

                      Never before will you have experienced nature like

                                                           This!

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Whitwell Hall (By Tabatha)

 Going to Whitwell Hall was an amazing experience. It was so cool being around so much nature and wildlife .

One of my favourite activities was Fire Lighting ! It was so cool to light your own fire with a flint and steel and watch it burn while you add sticks.   Later that day, we experienced a magical campfire and toasted marshmallows as we sang songs  merrily. We also made catapults out of bamboo which was really cool.

Another activity  was tracking. In tracking, we had to follow the stick signs to find our way!

The activities that we got the wettest in were den building and river dipping. In den building, we had to make our own shelters out of rope and fabric and then Steve poured water on it while we were in it to see if it was water proof. I didn’t get very wet at all . In River Dipping , a large crayfish was caught!

One of the evening activities was a bat walk in the dark! We used bat detectors  to find Pipistrelles when we were walking around!

Paula always pleased us with her fresh meals – even the picky eaters!

At bedtimes we had proper bunk beds to put our sleeping bags on !

I would definitely come back to Whitwell again.

Thank you.

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Whitwell Hall – by Hayden.

Hayden particularly enjoyed the bat walk and the experience of a residential trip.

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Whitwell Hall by Rui

OUR TRIP TO WHITWELL HALL

On 29/9/2022…

5B and 5W…

Two brave, adventurous classes…

Went to Whitwell Hall!!! 🙂

It was so fun and included extremely exiting activities such as River Dipping, Boat Building and Lighting Fires. You could even explore, in your free time, the luscious forests which lead to the sheep-filled meadows. The food there is so delicious that it can satisfy any picky taste buds. For us they served lasagne, outside BBQ and even meatballs! There was even a TV room with Harry Potter, Jonny English and… Mr.Bean!!! We went to bed at 10:00pm and got to sleep with our friends! We really enjoyed our trip to Whitwell and would love to go again. Bye! 🙂

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Whitwell Hall – by Hania and Primrose

Whitwell Hall is an amazing place to visit! You can do so many activities like Den making, Campfire, River dipping, Bracelet making, Shelter building, If you’re lucky you could even go  for a Bat walk!

The food at Whitwell Hall is so delicious, freshly cooked and even homemade! Thanks to Paula. Like for the first day we had Lasagne and Garlic bread with Salad, YUM.

Primrose’s Favourite part: My favourite part was River Dipping and the Meat balls!

Hania’s Favourite part: My favourite part is probably the desserts and breakfast!

More about bats at Whitwell.

  • Bats can eat over 3000 tiny insects in a night.
  • Bats are the only flying mammal.
  • Whitwell bats are called pipistrelles.
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Martha and Carissa Whitwell Hall

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Hannah and Jill’s story at Whitwell

When we first arrived to Whitwell Hall, we put our bags in the hall/ games room, got our dorms ready and did the fire drill, just to be safe.  After we had done some activities, we had a little break and tried blorange juice. We went back to do some more activities.

On the first night we all listened to a story and afterwards we did a talent show. We all fell asleep eventually and some of us were whispering at night because we couldn’t sleep.

When we did an activity, which was team building, it was very fun and very hard because the girls` team failed and the boys’ team won. Also at bridge building they won again, we had to build a bridge first but it kept on falling down. Ours kept falling because of the surface.

On Wednesday night, we had a bat walk and a few people were scared of the dark like me. I stuck around my friends and kept saying family. You can get the chance of getting a bat detector and to hear the bats’ echoes.

Thursday night we melted marshmallows by the fire and when we were done we played in the meadows with our torches, some were playing zombie, and some were playing manhunt while I was sitting down with my friends.

On the last day we had the normal morning stuff as usual, then we had a boat race and before we left we had jacket potatoes for dinner.

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Whitwell Hall – Jayden

My favourite day was Thursday because we got to do a camp fire and we were roasting marshmallows.

After we ate the marshmallows, we went to play ‘It’ in the dark with flashlights.  My flashlight wasn’t working so Theresa gave me hers.

When it was Monday the first day I was nervous but also excited.

When I came in, we met this person named John.  He’s the one who lives here.  After that I met Max.  He was the one who helped us to build a bridge and test it out.  We couldn’t actually do it on real water, so we used a blue carpet, so we didn’t get wet.

Another activity I loved was the bat walk because we all get bat detectors so we can hear the bat making sounds.  After that we all took turns and when it was my turn, I was really excited and I had it on the wrong number and the teacher saw and helped me get it on the right number.  After that, every time I was moving, I kept on hearing bats talking inside the bat detector.  It was crazy!

When it was Friday, we had to go I was going to miss this place so the teacher took picture so we remember next time so we said bye to John and max and we went home.

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Whitwell Hall – Lennon and Guinevere

It’s an amazing place to stay, I enjoyed all the brilliant and fun activities. I mostly enjoyed shelter building, river dipping, team building and bridge building. I enjoyed most of the food including meatballs, BBQ and especially the doughnuts.
At the hall we saw all sorts of animals such as bats and sheep in the river dipping we even caught a giant freshwater crayfish and in shelter building we were soaked to the skin in the rain. In team building we played loads of fun boys v girls games. We enjoyed fire lighting especially when we got to roast marshmallows. The bat walk was also fun because we got to have a chance to use electronic bat detectors. So that’s all from us I hope you enjoyed this blog and make sure to book today.
BYE!!!!!!

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My time at Whitwell Hall By Machaela

From my experience at Whitwell Hall,

It is a very nice place if you want to spend more time in the wilderness and if you want to learn more about nature it a great place for you.

Whitwell has a wide variety of activities you can do like fire lighting, pioneering and river dipping. It also has so many creatures roaming around and has great places to play any games .The cook, who is called Paula, cooks immaculate meals like hot dogs, pasta, burgers and pizza. At night we played manhunt and it was super fun. My favourite activity was when we did river dipping, me and my group caught a huge fresh water sea nymph and tiny  crayfish and small shrimps. At nigh the stars are dazzling and the moon shines beside them.

 

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Whitwell Hall Blog Malachi and Xavier

Whitwell Hall is a total BANGER!, fabulous food, rocking dorms and WHOAH annoying sheep, “they really scared the juice out of us”.

If I were you I’d stay there for  a long time, to get you into this let us start.

You do orienteering, boat building, teambuilding, boat racing, fire-lighting, river-dipping and a nature walk.

In the evening you go on a bat walk   and then you have a cosy campfire, you get to roast marshmellows, play in the meadows ( at night) and you’ll have the best time of your life.

At Whitwell hall there are super rare wild animals speaking of foxes, frogs (not to wild), bats, this is a wild sea creature A CRAYFISH but something that isn’t wild but rare a trout.

See ya later!

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Adam’s trip to Whitwell Hall

Whitwell hall is a great place to go for camping and just for a nature walk.

If you’re staying there for a night/s you will experience very comfortable sleeping and in the morning you will have  breakfast. For breakfast you can eat porridge, cereal or toast, after breakfast you will do activities such as shelter building or orienteering then there will be lunch. For lunch you will have to choose something. Once you have eaten you will do certain activities. After that you will have tea. When you finish your tea, you will go to the living room and chill out for a while.

On the next morning breakfast will be at 8:00 or late breakfast will be at 8:30 after breakfast you can go to the hall, outside the woods, football pitch or the meadows. After that you will do some activities and for the rest of your stay that is what you’re going to do.

On the last day you pack your bags and go down for breakfast. After breakfast you go outside and chill out or play your own games. 15 minutes later you go inside and wait for the instructions after that you go to do fire lighting and finally the bus comes to pick you up.

 

 

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WHITWELL HALL, By Noah and Francis

When we arrived at Whitwell Hall, we were all excited to do the activities and have fun together.  We all unpacked our bags and had lunch then the first activity was…

Orienteering

Our first activity was Orienteering, which was trying to find cards around the whole estate.  It was on the 1st day when it was pouring with rain, we all loved it! We grouped up and searched and then we were called in to go to the next activity which was…

Shelter Building

Our second activity was Shelter Building which was building a good enough shelter that you won’t get wet when the staff or teachers pour a bucket of water on you! You will group up to build these shelters, and also those were only two activities, we did about 13!

Staff at Whitwell

There were 3 main staff members who are: John the manager, Paula the cook, Cathy activity leader and Matt the educational manager. THANK YOU WHITWELL HALL STAFF!

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Raphael – Whitwell Hall

I really enjoyed our experience at Whitwell Hall, so much so that I have decided to share it with you. Firstly, when you arrive you will be greeted by the Whitwell staff team –  this consists of Steve, John, Paula, Emily, Matt and Cathy.

The activities are very fun, such as pond dipping, team building and bridge building, plus so much more to enjoy also the food’s pretty good and the chef Paula is nice.

The house is huge and really nice (especially the dormitories). Over all it was extremely fun and I really loved it.

 

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Whitwell Hall Blog    By Pierre, Luciano and Filip

To get to Whitwell, we took a coach. When we arrived, we had to grab people’s luggage and put it in the main hall. Then they talked about the rules, and then did a fire drill test.

After that, we had lunch. It was pouring with rain and we got soaked to the brim!  We started our first activity, shelter building!   We made a very successful shelter since we had no water coming through, we also built some bear traps which included a spike to stab the bear and a mud stick man to head-butt the tree.

Next we did orienteering.   In this activity we had to certain destinations to find numbered poles.

When the rain died out, we went back in the hall and took our waterproofs off, as we warmed up inside.   Then, we all got called for dinner and had the best spaghetti bolognaise EVER!

After dinner we went to our dormitory for free time, and we stayed up until 2 am making very funny memes.

The next day they called us outside and said we had to do a roll call so when there was a fire we knew if everyone was there. Then we did a nature walk around Whitwell’s woodland, then after that, we built our own mini rafts/boats and got to colour them in.

At lunch we ate sandwiches at a picnic.

After lunch we did river dipping and caught a freshwater sea nymph and two freshwater trout!

After the activity we did fire lighting which was our favourite subject.  In fire lighting we learnt different ways to light a fire.  One of them is finding dry wood for the fire.  Next we had to get special hay and set it alight and Pierre was the master at the fire lighting!

So that was the end of the second day.

Come, Book, Now

 

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Whitwell Hall experience By Zuzanna

From my experience at Whitwell Hall,

I think it is a very nice place to stay if you want to explore more in the wilderness. I really enjoyed the food such as, the crisps, pizza, the donuts and the toast,

Although all the beds aren’t as good quality as the bunk beds, the beds were very comfy.  We also had a barbeque there and we had burgers hotdogs and ice cream!  It was very delicious.

At night a lot of bats appear (normally pipistrelles) they looked so small and were very quick.  We also did activities which were very fun and my favourites were boat building, shelter building, river dipping and fire lighting, at night, the stars are amazing there and very mesmerizing, and the moon is like a huge lamp with stars dancing around it.

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Whitwell Hall by Zioni.

Whitwell Hall
Hello my name is Zioni and I’m going to talk about my school trip to Whitwell Hall and talk about the most fun parts and activities!

So one thing about Whitwell Hall, I liked is the food it was delicious.   One time we had pizza for lunch, and ice cream for dessert.  It was great.

One of my favourite activities were fire lighting because we got to roast marshmallows and they were great and on the last night of our stay we got to roast marshmallows around a campfire and played a game called zombie in the meadows and one more thing I liked were the doughnuts we had after the barbecue.

So those are some of the things I liked about my school trip.  Thank you for listening  – bye!

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Whitwell Hall Fleur and Jess

Whitwell hall
Residential
By Fleur and Jess

Fleur
To get to Whitwell it took about 40 minutes

jess
When we got to our dorms, we got out our sleeping bags and everything else. The beds were super cosy.

Fleur: on the first night we had meat balls and they were so delicious my favourite desert was fruit salad

Jess : we went on a bat walk and we had these devices
And we could hear the eco of the bats

Fleur: we did so many activities such as smashing shelter building fun fire light and in the evenings we played games and had a camp fire

Both: Don’t miss your chance BOOK NOW!!! Bye!

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Gian and Cairon’s perspective of Whitwell Hall

This is Gian and Cairon.   This is what we think about Whitwell Hall.   Our first activity was shelter building.   Shelter building was the one of the ones I didn’t like, we got really muddy and Gian is kind of a germ phobic and I think the others didn’t like it as well.   Next one was orienteering.   It was very hard and everyone found one clip which was sad.

Lunch now, we had our packed lunches and for dinner/tea we had meatball with pasta.

Next day, for breakfast we had cereal and toast (it’s the same breakfast each day).

First activity was pioneering I forgot what I did in that so I will skip that.   We will say my favourite activities.   River dipping was our favourite, we had to go in the river and catch little creatures or big like the fresh water crayfish or a trout.   Our second favourite was team building.   We had to play a game called shipwreck, we had to go on a tarp and jump to the other one but then the other tarp would get smaller so we had to either bunch together or sacrifice.   Our third favourite was fire lighting.   We collected wet sticks and then John gave us dry wood and matches to light it so we could toast marshmallow.

Ok Bye now.

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The story of Whitwell Hall by Louis and Frankie

Come visit Whitwell Hall  – a beautiful place to see wild life. When you go you will see foxes, badgers and rabbits,
deer. Frogs can even get in your bathroom and beetles being put down by mites.

When you go on a nature you will be looking and hugging trees. You will also be doing bridge building that is very fun but if you win make sure you go crazy [don’t forget].

When you go for dinner your food will be amazing [cooked by Paula and Emily
you will see crayfish . Fun fact all the non-native crayfish]. killed the native crayfish. You will go fire lighting with John and roast marshmallows on your very own fire.

When they’re passing out the drink, make sure you have a mix of blackcurrant and orange.  We called it blorange .

You might do a bat walk you will have a chance to use a bat detector hopefully you will find or see bats they fly so low and hopefully hear there echoes they are all different. Also bats are the only flying mammals at the moment they are also so special because there wings are so thin bats are the size of your thumb.

Whitwell is AWESOME!

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