Archived Blog Site

You are visiting archived detail of the Harmelia Gardens Air Scout Group. 

To contact the Scout Group please use the email address

shane.tyson@scouts.org.za

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Fundraiser Event : May 24th

Get ready for the most daring 80s rock show ever to hit the Barnyard Theatre stage!

 

Yes, we are talking retro fashion, dance and of course music that will bring you an evening packed with the most delightful surprises. Featuring a colourful versatile cast that will rewind to synth pop, new wave and arena rock in the most authentic 80s style.

 

With the arrival of MTV in 1981 we experienced a second British invasion with new-wave bands like Duran Duran, The Police and Dire Straits, and on the pop synth scene we witnessed The Human League, Culture Club, Thompson Twins, Depeche Mode and many more…

 

On the other side of the Atlantic we had the more rocky sounds of Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty, Steve Miller Band, Blondieand Talking Heads.

 

On the pop front, Phil Collins and Peter Gabriel from Genesis were topping the charts, while alternative music was making its mark with bands such as REM, The Cure and Violent Femmes.

 

The 1980s is the most favoured tune decade of the last 60 years… so join the 80s Rewind cast and Harmelia Gardens Air Scouts to make this a party bash you will never forget!

 

For tickets contact Annette

mobile: 082 560 8938

email: fundraiser.hgas@gmail.com

FW: Flight Deck Newsletter : February 2015

Have you received your emailed copy of our newsletter ?

If not, please email   flightdeck.hgas@gmail.com   with your details and you will be added to our email listing.

Springbok Parade : 2015

31st January was a very special day for one of our Senior Scouts.

It was the day he received his Springbok Award Certificate as signed by the Chief Scout of South Africa.

A very proud moment for his family and our Scout Group as he became the sixth recipient in our Scout Group of this award.

Well done Gregory.

Note to Visitors to our Blog website.

Due to a delay by our "Blog Page Reporters" not e-mailing / submitting event news, detail of some important past events that have occured have not been posted to our site.

 

We are working on getting this corrected.

 

from Blog Webmaster

Festive Season Greetings

During this season of giving let us take time to slow down and enjoy the simple things.

May this wonderful time of year touch everyones heart in a special way.

Wishing all our members, parents and Scouters much happiness this week and throughout the New Year

JOTA/JOTI 2014 : 18 & 19 October

Follow Sinbad over JOTA/JOTI weekend.

Sinbad is a small Scout who travels around the world and will be visiting many countries over this weekend.

 

To join Sinbad on his travels visit http://www.world-jotajoti.info/sinbad-travels/

 

Flights attend District Archery Competition

The Northrand Troop District Archery Competition was held at Eastern's Archery Club in Kempton Park on Saturday 30th August.

A total of 43 Scouts and 11 Patrols from various Groups in our District attended.

The groups who attended were Harmelia Gardens Air, Kengray, Hellenic, Edenvale Girls and Sao Jorge (Boy and Girls).

Overall winners were Sao Jorge Boys, followed by Kengray and in 3rd place Harmelia Sabre Flight.

Because of the nature of this event, and to keep the excitement up, a "cattie" competition was also held.

Above are some pictures of our Scout members that participated at the event.

Oliphants Gorge Hike

Greg, our Troop Leader, completed the last task as required to complete his earning a "Springbok Award".

Seen above are the Scouts who joined him whilst leading a hike through the Oliphants Gorge near Middleburg, Mpumalanga. The hike also included an over-night stay.

Note from Editor: I did not want to include too many pictures as most would be included in his logbook covering this event.

Harmelia Air Scouts upgrade their headgear

The picture above shows some of our Scouts wearing the new headgear as designed for our Scout Troop.

The idea / design is based on that worn by the South African Air Force.

Our Troop is now the smartest Air Scout Troop in the country.

What is the common factor is these pictures ?

Well, I am sure you have been able to work it out.

The pictures are of of various "helicopters".

The names of these helicopters are also the "Scouting" names chosen by the Adult Leaders of our Scout Troop.

Can you work out who is who ?

2014 Perseid meteor shower and "SuperMoon"

Picture above : The perigee moon, or supermoon, rising over Mount Eden in Auckland, New Zealand, on Sunday morning. Photograph: Simon Runting/REX

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From the "Guardian Newspaper"

A dramatic supermoon is set to accompany this year's Perseid meteor shower, one of the most anticipated events on the skywatcher's calendar.

Given a dark, clear sky in a normal year, it is common to see more than 100 of the meteors an hour during the second week in August. But this year the Perseids have a bright shining rival. On Sunday, two days before the meteor shower reaches its peak, the moon will become full.

Coincidentally, it will also have reached the point in its orbit that is closest to the Earth, known as perigee. The supermoon will be up to 14% bigger and 30% brighter than other full moons during the year.

On one level, this is bad news, according to Dr Bill Cooke from Nasa's meteoroid environment office. "Lunar glare wipes out the black, velvety backdrop required to see faint meteors, and sharply reduces counts."

But all is not lost. The debris stream left by comet Swift-Tuttle, which produces the Perseids, is wide, so the shooting stars could make an appearance well before the moon becomes full. Cooke added that the Perseids were also "rich in fireballs as bright as Jupiter or Venus" that would remain visible despite the moon's glare.

Source of detail above : http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/aug/10/supermoon-perseids-meteor-shower-star-perigee-comet

Location in the sky

Perseids meteor shower for Johannesburg (Night between 11 Aug and 12 Aug)
Time	Azimuth/ Direction	Altitude
Tue 04:00	14°	3.0°
Tue 05:00	6°	5.3°
Tue 06:00	358°	5.9°

Direction to see the Perseids in the sky:

• Azimuth is the direction, based on true north, a compass might show a slightly different value.
• Altitude is height in degrees over horizon.

http://www.timeanddate.com/astronomy/meteor-shower/perseid.html

 

Young Scout given opportunity to fly a Piper

One of our junior Scouts and his brother went for a flip out to the Vaal dam area during the school holidays.

 

The pilot allowed him to fly the aircraft (a Piper) under supervision for about 30 minutes! Needless to say the Scout was super “chuffed”

 

The above photos taken on the day showing a pre-flight inspection check and the other whilst flying.

 

Well done to our Scout and thanks to the pilot for providing the opportunity.

 

Detail submitted by the grand-father of the Scout.  Thanks from Scouters : HGASG

Scout Scarf Day

Hathi was unable to wear his Scarf on "World Scout Scarf Day" however he did make a collage of all the scarves that he collected as a Scouter.

 

His collection included Scarves given to him by contingent leaders of Scouts from Kenya and Scouts from Mauritius as thanks for the local hospitality given to them whilst they were visiting South Africa to attend a South African Scout Jamboree.

 

He has called his collection "Memories" as each Scarf has an association to a Scouting event.

 

 

A Scouts Honour - working with the community

Detail received in an e-mail sent to our Scout Group

To whom it may concern, 

We would like to bring to your attention that we created a post on our blog about the work your Scout Group did at Oliver’s Village. Please check out http://olivershouse.co.za/scouts-honour/. We trust that the contents of the post are to your satisfaction. Also, we thank your organisation for your kind endeavours and hope we will see more of you.

Yours sincerely, 

David Sellar

 

An extract from Oliver's Village blog page

Oliver’s House was privileged to have the Harmelia Gardens Air Scout Group nominateOliver’s Village as the project at which many of their Cubs and Scouts carried out voluntary community service. Oliver’s Village is our flagship project. It is situated on the border of Daveyton and Benoni on eleven acres of property. Oliver’s Village is still under development and in its completed state will be home to a wide variety of social services – including a HIV AIDS clinic, pre-school, educational learning centre and a five acre self-sustaining food forest and vegetable farm.

These young Scouts were led by Greg who is currently in the process of earning the highest award a young Scout can achieve – the Springbok Award. In order to achieve this Greg has to perform 40 hours of community service and perform one exceptional task. Greg and his fellow Scouts spent two weekends at Oliver’s Village performing various farming tasks from re-composting soil to general farm clean-up. As his exceptional task Greg chose to clean our hydroponic tunnel – no easy task considering that we are in the process of redesigning it to produce stronger vegetable yields. Please visit the blog page above to see all the photos.

Well done to the Cubs and Scouts that assisted with the project, Hathi.

Senior Scout Adventure 2014

The Adventure programme provides unforgettable adventure and fun in the famous backpacking country of the Cederberg Wilderness Area along rugged, rocky trails. Programme features combine the best of advanced Scouting to provide you with fun and a real challenge - water activities, rock climbing, the ultimate challenge game, underwater diving, sailing, and many more! This is an unbeatable recipe for fast-moving enjoyment and action. If you are a senior Scout, 15 years or older, and you are looking for high adventure and an outdoor challenge in a famous mountain wilderness, then the SENIOR SCOUT ADVENTURE in December has been designed for you!

Come and experience the feeling of adventure and achievement backpacking and climbing in a vast unspoilt wilderness well known for its unique features like the Wolfberg Cracks, the Wolfberg Arch, and the Maltese Cross. Enjoy the soaring peaks like the Tafelberg, Groot Krakadouw and the Sneeuberg with their cliffs, pinnacles, ravines and valleys. When hiking along the high trails, thrill to the eye-stretching sweep of the peaks marching into the blue haze of distance. 

For more information visit http://www.scouting.org.za/adventure/

Save-a-Place entries for hiking participants to attend this adventure close at the end of this month on 31 July 2014.

Scout Patrols comprise a maximum of 9 Scouts between the age of 15 and 18 and one adult Mountain Ranger.

Your questions may be answered by looking at www.scouting.org.za/adventure/Downloads/InformationBooklet2014.pdf.

Scout Scarf Day : 1st August 2014

The idea of "World Scout Scarf Day" on August 1 is that all active and former Scouts are requested to wear their Scout scarf in public to make the "Spirit of Scouting" visible: Once a Scout - Always a Scout !  

You can visit www.facebook.com/Scout.Scarf.Day to see more detail   

In 2011 the day coincided with the World Jamboree in Sweden which was a perfect opportunity to show the close bond to all the Scouts attending.

Of course, the scarf is only a symbol but a strong symbol for the Scout Promise and for our mission to leave the world as a bit better a place than we had found it.

Our scarf colours are shown above for all to see. We wonder how many other Scouts wear the same colours. Please email us and tell us your Scout Group name and we will add it to the detail below with your website address.

1. Harmelia Gardens Air Scouts

Save our Rhinos

Some detail below taken from the website http://www.givengain.com/cause/4273/

23 May 2013: The number of rhinos poached in South Africa since the beginning of 2014 now stands at 350. The Kruger National Park continues to bear the brunt of the poaching, with 242 rhinos having been killed in the National Park since the beginning of 2014. In the North West province a total of 29 rhinos have been poached, while 28 have been poached in Limpopo, 33 in KwaZulu-Natal and 17 in Mpumalanga. The Gauteng province lost its first rhino to poaching this year during the past week.

RHINO SA Project is a youth-driven, outreach and awareness initiative aimed at educating today's youth about the unmitigated and ongoing slaughter of South Africa's rhinos, and, thereby actively involving the youth of South Africa in Rhino Conservation and Heritage Preservation. 

The Green Wall of SEE Project - Rhino SA Project are touching the lives of 2000 to 4000 pupils a week through their education and awareness program.

Attached above is a picture that was coloured in by one of our Scouts who attends the school at which this program was launched. The Scout gave the picture to Hathi (me, the name the Cubs in our Group call me) as he knew I love pictures of all wild animals.

Gauteng KonTiki 2014

Our Troop participated in the annual Gauteng Scouting event, KonTiki.  This year the theme was "KonTiki Goes Green" thus protecting our world. The event was held at the Scouting Camp Site, Arrowe Park in Benoni which is on the shore of Homestead Lake.

Some YouTube videos of the activities done at the event have been posted on YouTube and they can be viewed using the indicated links

Part 1:       http://youtu.be/bESGQTc2Eu8

Part 2:      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-0abF-juKc&list=UULtLWfCQNFtksedqg4D3p6A

Part 3:      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZLxs0cSZDQ&feature=share

Our Scout Group would like to thank those involved in the production of the YouTube videos. These give a great insight into one of the Scouting activities Scouts participate.

New Scouts South Africa website

SCOUTS South Africa launched the 1st phase of the development of the new national website.

 

The aim of the website is to reinforce the fresh, dynamic and innovative brand and to cater for the needs of many audiences.

 

The website address of the new site is http://scouts.org.za/. The old website address will automatically route you to the new site.

 

The screen capture shows some detail of the "Home" page and that of the "Our Team" page. 

 

Congratulations.