Tue saw 11 cadets from 1368 Sqn (and 4 from 1289) spend the night indoor climbing at Redpoint in Birmingham. A great venue with both climbing walls and bouldering. Great instructors, and some fantastic adventure training experience. Many thanks to Sgt M and 1289 Sqn for helping transport.

Long term favourite this one. Normally we do as an IET/practice with NCOs helping, but tried this as assessed to get some through Bronze sooner. Was a step-up for sure, a few stories to tell about cows and getting lost, the DofE classics. New day 1 start route with canal/train route elements to seemed to flow well. First time anyone has tried making a cake/fishing. Slightly more challenging due to some footpath obfuscation around MOD Kineton on day 2 but they made in the end. Campsite was a stunning backdrop to fun in near perfect weather on the Sat and great comradery shown.

This weekday during half term saw a great day making use of the hot weather in half-term to do some river-based adventure training. Contrast with canoes in the afternoon worked well, very relaxing (until the water pumps came out and then it was like the Battle of Trafalgar).  Good fun though, and nice mix of first timers and previous, incl. help from one of our very own Paddlesport Instructor cadets. Looking getting Paddle UK Start Award certificates for those who've done multiple sessions or full day.

Well done to the 10 cadets who attended 1368 Sqn's first "lets do something new" National Navigation Award Scheme ( NNAS ) practical training in 2026 over Easter at Cookley and Kinver. Also a lot of fun exploring some new places for 1368, discovering stuff like Nannie's Rock, Kinver Hill Fort, Locks, and a Dragon Tree.  This is our first proper year of trying to dovetail NNAS with our traditional DofE Bronze and Initial Expedition Training (IET) build up for newbies. Great to get 2 groups going, Friday turned out to be a lovely sunny day with great views from Kinver hillfort.  Great engagement for newbies plus some doing Silver DofE very soon. It'll be interesting to see how lost they get in upcoming expeditions.

One of 1368's most senior cadets, FS R spent a week in the Lake District. "Not a PGL week", this W&W Region Staff (and senior cadet) development course focused on training and logbook entries for professional qualifications in outdoor leadership. A chance to experience new locations and meet like-minded people.  It's great to see these region and national opportunities open for senior cadets, and them taking the chance while they have it, challenging them in their chosen sports and developing their qualifications and experience for the future. RAFAC's redeveloped Windermere AT centre is pretty swish, apparently (it even has a TV).

Great evening session  at Redpoint in Birmingham on Tuesday. Nice to see a mix of newbies and spread across ages. Real enthusiasm for a challenge. Nice venue, with strong climbing enthusiast vibe. Turned out fastest route back involves putting the wrong postcode into the sat nav so you avoid the M42. Many thanks to Sgt M from 1289 for providing their minibus though (couldn't do it without their help).

Well done to 6 cadets from 1368 (Warwick and Royal Leamington Spa) Sqn and 3 from 1289 (Stratford) Sqn that managed to get their Bronze expedition bagged before exped season end. Lucky on weather, finished wet but managed to avoid worst of it. Very solid fitness and good comraderie. Worked really well with 1289 (Stratford) Sqn cadets joining and taking up spare spaces. Staff from 496 and 1289 also came along hence good staff shadowing happened for future joint exped liaisons. Also great that we have potential to get 6 more Bronze's signed off in Q1 next year. The DofE Scheme remains one of the key pillars of 1368 training programme. Although many schools have started running it, we run the expeditions using cadet staff and hence it tends to be smaller scale and lower cost. We expect all cadets to do DofE Bronze in the first year, if they're not already doing it. Accomplishing an expeditions makes them work as a team to overcome challenges as well as learning about each other an...

14 cadets from 1368 attended a Silver Practice and Assessed Expedition in Peak District. Very impressive Silver-level performances again especially the younger participants. Everyone who started finished and both practice and assessed groups finished strong demonstrating excellent teamwork and comraderie, great preparation and personal resilience, which sets us up for the next one. Well done.

Well done to the 1368 cadets that did their Bronze DofE last weekend. Very short turn around to get kit issued/checked, route cards and food done but we did it! The mother of all water fights with a 3 year old (who is going to keep that as a first memory, I suspect). Staff pretty impressed with map reading/good pace and they even took away some learning points in the effect of water on kit weight. Great to get first tranche of Bronze expeditions out of the way, as we have a lot more to get through. 

Thu/Fri saw 3 of our instructor cadets Sgt B, Sgt G, and Cpl H undertake 1368 Sqn's inaugural delivery of the NNAS Bronze Navigator Award. Focused on core basics of map reading, the National Navigation Award Scheme offers a chance to explore fun ways of delivering outdoor lessons in basic navigation using map & compass, and solid foundation knowledge for future Lowland Leader Award candidates. Lots of interesting things seen, wild deer's and friendly bullocks, and excellent skills demonstrated.

Friday saw cadets make the best use of a summer's day with a River Leam kayaking session at Royal Leamington Spa Canoe Club (RLSCC).  There was a nice mix of seniors, mids and juniors and plenty of wet games at the end.

Last week saw 6 older cadets from 1368 undertake an assessed Gold DofE expedition in Wales. A self-sufficient 4 day Gold expedition is a unique experience and challenge and it was nice that some got to finish off their cadet career with friends they've known since joining. It was an old school, 4 day Gold in wild country. Route was created from scratch by FS R and then tweaked encompassing Rhinog's and Cadair Idris in Eryri National Park. Sqn Ldr W from Staff Wings assessed them and was very impressed by their strong teamwork, fitness and nav skills. New route made it interesting for staff. Well done.

Last weekend saw 18 cadets undertake more Initial Expedition Training (IET) with camping, cooking and map reading. Aim was to get them ready so that stuff like providing forms, passing on JIs, kit checks and food shops are 2nd hat for unescorted Bronze DofE's in Aug or Sept (we will start enrolling current year 8's on Bronze on Aug 1st, when they technically go into year 9).  Adventure Training and DofE is one of the pillars of 1368 Sqn with our desire that every cadet completes their Bronze DofE and gets the opportunity to progress to Silver and Gold expeditions. The Initial Expedition Training that we do contributes to the Pre-DofE Blue Badge that was introduced by the progressive training syllabus to support pre-DofE aged cadets in year 8. IET provides a pathway for their safe introduction into cooking and campcraft and we like to do it for real.

Thirteen cadets from 1368 Sqn were joined by four from 2286 Sqn to have an evening of instructor-led training at Redpoint climbing centre in Birmingham on Tuesday night. Redpoint has long been a favourite with 1368 with staff with a really passion for the sport and a nice club vibe. Some great skills and confidence progression by all, and a bit of excitement with a how get stuck in a crack challenge for some. Thanks again to 1289 staff who helped us with staffing and transportation. A great evening of climbing facilitated by collaboration with others. With many of our GCSE and A Level cadets otherwise engaged it was a great evening for some of our mids to further develop their skills with new challenges and juniors to have their first visit.

Secret of enriching cadet training is staff quals. Looking to try some new things for 1368. CI M & Fg Off C both qualified as Archery Instructors as part of a 479 Sqn OC led initiative on a 2 day course 8-9 Mar 2025. Goal is to get Archery into the arsenal of things we can deliver at Sqn-level. Back-end of 2024, CWO C and Fg Off C also did Mountain Training's Climbing Wall Assistant (CWA) run by Regional Adventure Training Technical Officer (RATTO) who's traveling the country expanding RAFAC climbing quals. Fg Off C achieved National Navigation Award Scheme (NNAS) tutor course on 8 Feb 2025, hence looking for 1st delivery of a Bronze/Silver NNAS (a little different from DofE, more micro-nav) so lot's of new things to set our sights on as we push boundaries into some new areas in 2025.

Tuesday 19 Nov saw an evening trip to Redpoint Climbing Centre in Birmingham, a much loved venue by 1368 Sqn cadets due to the friendliness of their staff, ease of booking, and their love of climbing. A great night was had with a balance of ages from 12-19 year old including our newbies getting involved. Great mix of bouldering and climbing with ropes including belaying practice. Adventure training is one of the pillars of 1368's training programme. As well as allowing people to develop outside of their comfort zone, the shared experiences help to gel friendships which is really what the cadet experience is really about.  

1368 cadets pulled off another amazing display of campcraft competence and team comradery in their 3 day practice DofE expedition in the Peak District. The umbrella hats did their job of keeping away the rain. One of the most enjoyable groups to run expeditions for got even better. Combining with 29F staff, we also managed to get a team of 7 from 3 different squadrons (1289, 29F and 156 Sqns) through their Silver actual.  Amazing scenery, plenty of laughs, and some really really tired cadets. It is what the DofE scheme's expedition section should be about.

First batch of mad Hattoner's 2024 undertook their 2 day actual last week. Strong performances from all to be honest. Almost like we/they know what they're doing. Bodes well for future. Here's a few photos, The ATCs was historically the largest operating authority of the Duke of Edinburgh Award Scheme. The scheme is recognised as having a strong overlap with the ethos of the corps and cadet activities. 1368 Sqn has a strong commitment to DofE in its training calendar, principally because expeditions help build friendship, teamwork and leadership (they can challenging but really good fun). It's also really cheap to do it with the Squadron.

July saw a small group 1368 Squadron expedition to N. Wales. It was minimum Gold practice (2n/2d) focused on giving senior and able cadets who've already experienced unescorted 3 day expeditions at Silver level, experience of wild country navigation/mountain terrain plus a bit of history/ideas for expedition purpose for an actual. Excellent nav. skills and fitness shown. 2 mountains in 2 days. In the UK, a mountain is generally defined as a height above 2,000 ft, or more latterly 610 m, is considered necessary to be classified as a mountain – as opposed to a hill – in the British Isles.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_mountains_and_hills_in_the_British_Isles . A ‘Quality Mountain Day’ for the Mountain Leader should take place in mountainous terrain in the UK or Ireland. All the following criteria should be fulfilled for a QMD for Mountain Leader (Summer) qualification hence they all did QMD days as defined by the Mountain Training qualification organisation: The individual...