Excitement & Contentment
There’ll be lots more to say about the first Àban residential camp. As I write this I’m pretty tired and ready for my own family holiday, but want to briefly express the deep sense of both contentment and excitement.
Does everything have to be a "thing"?
A few reflections on a fascinating day of staff training. On Monday Ola and I travelled over to Easter Kinkell on the Black Isle to do a day of bushcraft training with Rob Bashford from Coast & Cairn. We learned lots about how to do safe knifework, firelighting and basic camp cookery.
DofE Open Award Group
Volunteer with Àban for mentoring, qualifications and experience.
From September 2021 we will start running a new DofE Open Award Group. Focussed only on the Gold award, we’ll be there so 16-25 year olds from all over Inverness can come along to a friendly support group and work towards that dream of heading down to Holyrood Palace to receive their Gold Award!
Another successful funding bid – UNLTD
We’ve scored again! Hot on the heels of the Firstport funding, we’ve just found out that the UK-wide funder Unlimited (UNLTD) has awarded us £5000.
With this additional funding we can move so much more decisively to start making a real impact in Inverness. As you know we’re going to offer community based adventurous learning, making the outdoors more accessible to everyone regardless of income, fitness or prior experience. Watch this space to find out how you can get involved. As well as the cash itself, UNLTD and Firstport are giving me really good business advice and mentoring to help me navigate these first tricky stages of the journey. Thanks!
Successful funding bid – Firstport
Great news today as Àban has scored its first fundraising success! Back before Christmas, we applied for the “Start It” funding package from the Social Entrepreneurs Fund, which is managed by Firstport. I’m so pleased we’ve got this £5000 award under our belts because it means that we can build the best quality foundations for Àban.