This was our first meeting of the new term. We started off with the investiture of three new members of the Unit, Craig, Louise and Sarah. Alan then talked about the committees and we had a self-election, where everyone put down their interest. We then played a couple of short games while Alan sifted through the forms: everyone wanted to join the Expedition Committee so some people then had to vote themselves off.  We finished off with a game devised by Mikael: we all had to find our way to the middle of a spider's web on the floor without touching any of the thread... blindfold but guided by our team.

Alan sent us out into Morningside to solve a fiendishly difficult problem with letters formed by street names. One team managed to come up with the letter 'A', but Alan decided that no-one had put enough effort on to merit a prize. We shall have to try harder in future.

The Unit was split into four teams, two to play each other at 'What's in the Bag' and two to play each other at a series of challenges posed by Martin. These were based on the games played in the  TV programme 'Friends like these'.  The final tie-breaker was a game of Jenga, which degenrated into a toppling of the Tower of Babel.

This was our first annual review, to which all parents and friends were invited as well as representatives from Morningside District, May Burrows and Brian Moretta. Alan started off by giving us a brief synopsis of the year and this was followed by three one-minute presentations showing the range of activities carried out in the last three terms. Term Three's sketch, starring and directed by Stewart, is being nominated for an Oscar. Martin gave a quick review of the financial situation, which was followed by a presentation by David Tibbs and Kev Mitchell on the Seven Summits Project. We finished with refreshments and chat.

A weekend at Fordell Firs to officially launch Explorer Scouting in Scotland may have been a year late as far as we were concerned, but eight of our Explorers went anyway! There were a range of activities on offer including archery and Salsa dancing, kayaking and blokarting (though there was no wind blo-ing), hill-walking and quad-biking (though the activity tickets for this were in rather short supply). The Saturday night featured a meal and a late-night disco. Most of our Explorers spent Sunday recovering.

The Explorers found themselves in three groups of failed secret agents. All had botched up their last missions, which meant that they should have been ‘disposed’ off, but due to a shortage of secret agents in the country they have been given a second chance. They had to compete against the other groups to see who would be given a second chance. Only one group could succeed. The losing Groups were to be made to ‘disappear’ at the end.

The tasks inlcuded finding the location of a bomb in Scotland (map reading), a covert operation to reach the next base without being spotted (stealth) and code breaking to find the combination a timer on an atomic bomb (general nouse). Only one group got to live twice... and even they were lucky...

Only a few of the North Face Unit and a few of the South Morningside Unit came to this camp, but the rest missed out! Three of us and four from the South Morningside Unit spent Friday night on a wide game followed by bad jokes and stories around the camp fire. Saturday morning consisted of challenges, including a game involving cheesy wotsits and skooshy cream, making ballistas and using them to fire eggs at each other, and seeing who could throw an egg the highest to the ground without it breaking.

Lunch was cooked backwoods including preparing a 'wood pigeon'  and the event was wrapped up with a final couple of challenges.

Fifteen Scouts turned up and went up to the Hermitage for a wide game. Teams were challenged to solve clues to collect missing x-files and take the completed collection to the cigarrette smoking man. The winners were someone...

The evening started with Jeremy, Sarah and John being invested into the Unit, bring our numbers up to twenty. The Unit then split themselves into four teams for a quiz on things Scouting. All the teams surprised their leaders in how well they did, the winners being Calum's Cronies. After this, we ajourned to the Hall, where we continued the theme, working in the same teams as relays, the winner was the first to sit on the correct chair TRUE or FALSE for a number of statements such as 'Baden Powell was the first Scout to gain a Tenderfoot Badge'. These were interspersed with simple relay races. The winners of this phase was Calum's Cronies again, this time followed very closely by The Girls

The Unit was split into three groups for this evening. The first went along to Longcraig with Alan and Caroline. Here they met Ian, who told them all about the sea-kayaks. After a hazardous exercise lowering them on to the floor, we inspected them for damage and set to work removing duck tape (a heartless task) and sanding and filling cracks in the fibreglass. The second group went to Kyle's house with Martin and under the light of arc lamps, started work on scraping and sanding the rust from the kayak trailer. Kyle's mum then invited the workers inside for juice and biscuits. The third group met at Cluny Centre with Mikael and started planning a meeting with Cubs working on the International Friendship Group Award.

Thirteen of us (Sarah was the thirteenth) met at Hillend for an evening on the slopes. Some took traditional skis, others took blades and three brave souls opted for snowboards. Two of these stayed on the nursery slope with a few of the beginner skiers and the rest took to the eastern run as the main slope was closed for race training. Some of those who haven't skied for a while and some who hadn't previously skied at all are now planning on taking lessons!

The meeting started off with Campbell's investiture into the Unit. Martin then divided us into four teams and gave us a music quiz with a Christmas edge.

The Unit was split into two groups, one sorting Christmas Cards for Scout Post and the other helping the 103rd Cubs.

Fifteen of us met with twelve of the South Morningside Unit and took over five lanes at Fountainbridge Megabowl. Brian succeeded in showing everyone else up, so we are glad that he is moving on to be Area Commissioner for Explorer Scouts, which will give us all more of a chance next year. This was part of a nationwide Explorer Scout bowling competition.

The Unit was given the chance of organising their own social events for this evening. Reports are due back from the various groups. The leaders went round to Alan's house for dinner beside the Christmas Tree. We decided that this was a good tradition to start, though who cooked dinner next year was left open!