Cork Girl Guides return from ‘Orbit’ and it was ‘Out of this World’

By Maria Creedon

Crosshaven, Kinsale, St Barbara’s Ballincollig and Barnagore Ovens Guide Groups, spent the last week at the Irish Girl Guides International Camp, Orbit 2025. They shared their campsite with two representatives from Girl Guides of Canada. Upwards of 1500 Guides, Senior Branch, leaders and staff came from all over the world and the four corners of Ireland to Clongowes Wood College, Co Kildare, to participate in this year’s camp.

The excitement from the girls was obvious from the minute they got on the bus in Cork with chatter and singing coming from the back. This was their first international camp and though they did not know exactly what the week would hold, they knew they were going to have fun and lots of it. Even Storm Floris couldn’t dampen their spirits and a few broken tent poles and flying flysheets were of little consequence to these girls. After all a Guide is always prepared!

Crosshaven, Kinsale, Ballincollig and Ovens Girl Guides, return from week long International camp 'Orbit 2025' hosted by IGG- Irish Girl Guides Association' 

The first international camp took place in Ireland in 1932 and has gone from strength to strength ever since. Orbit, the first ‘in person’ IGG international camp in Ireland since IGGnite 2017, saw representatives from: Canada, US, UK, India, Portugal, New Zealand, Malta, Ireland, Northern Ireland and beyond.

With a learning by doing ethos and a nod to the Cosmos, there was a busy schedule of activities and challenges for the girls to enjoy in nine distinct areas: Creating, Energizing, Engineering, Expressing, Leading, Sparking, Sustaining, Uniting and Uplifting. These activities included forest craft, outdoor skills, advocacy, Lego robotics and STEM, dance, drumming, yoga and much more, encouraging the girls to grow in confidence, build resilience and learn about the world and beyond. All of this achieved, whilst having fun, making new friends and reconnecting with old friends.

Day Three welcomed Ladybirds and Brownies on site for the afternoon, the younger members of the association, and Trefoil Guild, catering for past and present adult members of the association, were there to impart their knowledge and share their memories of Guiding down through the ages. Day Four allowed each country to showcase their own culture in an international night of music and dance and Day Five saw the culmination of all that is guiding with an epic Campfire; an age old tradition of Guiding and Scouting.

Guiding began in Ireland in 1911 and by the looks of things in 2025, it is only getting stronger. Camping today does not look all that different from how it looked back then; going back to basics, cooking outdoors, washing dishes by hand and sleeping on the ground. Better equipment perhaps, but the best sight of all? A group of young women, chatting and swapping badges, working together to complete a task without a mobile phone in sight.