Hi everyone, my name is Charlie Hunsche and I was fortunate enough to get a scholarship through OGHS to attend an 8-day Leaps & Bounds course at Outward Bound with my Aunty Hannah.

When we arrived in Picton, we got straight into learning how to row and sail on our kutter called the Endeavor 3. We spent the whole afternoon doing this until we got to camp TK, where we spent the night there on the boat. 

The next morning on Monday we packed up and sailed/rowed to the actual Outward Bound school at Anakiwa, where we spent the afternoon talking, cleaning and doing admin.

On Tuesday we spent the morning doing team bonding and trusting activities so we could spend the afternoon rock climbing, with heaps of laughs and trust.

Day four was Wednesday, and we got to do kayak training and normal kayaking. We learnt how to do a safety water exit in a skirt kayak, and we also learnt how to flip our friends back over if they're stuck underwater. We also would get pushed off the jetty, and then we would flip upside down and two kayakers would jump in and rescue us, we had to all have a turn at everything in under 10 minutes! That night we got told we were doing our solo and had to sleep out in the bush for two nights.

Thursday I woke up in the bush with just my aunty.  We had set up our tents the night before, so we just sat by the river all morning and talked. It started raining in the afternoon so we went back to bed and stayed there for hours because it didn't stop raining.

Friday morning we woke up, and it was still drizzling, so we packed up and walked down the track to wait for our instructors. We all got picked up, then went back to camp to unpack and clean everything. We then spent the afternoon learning knife skills and getting taught how to make a fire with no lighters or matches.

Saturday was our last full day at Outward Bound, so everyone was feeling a bit sad but also super excited because we were going coasteering (cliff jumping). We spent the morning gearing up and driving to the beach. We then had to learn how to safely get out of the water. We jumped off of three different rocks, the highest being around four meters because the weather was too bad.

Sunday we spent the morning packing up and saying our thank yous, doing more admin, then it was time to say goodbye to our friends. 

A lot of the time, when we were not doing physical activities, we were doing classroom work or learning useful skills or doing bonding activities. We learnt how to light fires with no matches or lighters, and heaps of knife skills. We got taught about our RAS (reticular activating system) in our brain, as well as our prefrontal cortex, along with many other things.

Outward Bound is a place to go for everyone. If you're super into the outdoors, or you're new to the outdoors, you will have a great time either way, because everything they have usually has an easier or harder option. If you would like to get out of your comfort zone and meet new people, OB is a perfect place because there are so many people doing different courses and a lot of the people will be exactly like you. 

What I got out of OB was a group of new friends, experiences and memories and also a whole bunch of life skills and a new, stronger relationship with my aunty.

I would just like to say a massive thank you to OGHS for giving me this opportunity and support to participate in Outward Bound, it is truly a once in a lifetime experience. I would also like to thank my Aunty Hannah for taking the time off her busy schedule to spend an entire week with me.  This is an experience I will never forget.