Dearne Valley Weekend
Nat: [00:00:00] Hey, Chris, how are you doing?
Chris: Yeah, I'm good. Thanks. Nat, how are you?
Nat: I'm really good. I thought we could just catch up about this Dearne Valley Weekend that you're running and you could tell me a little bit more about
Chris: it. Yeah, cool. So the Dearne Valley Weekend is one of our weekend events. We've got quite a few of those on the website.
Chris: Really what it involves is. People turn up after work on a Friday. So the official start time is 7 PM, but really we allow people to arrive anytime between six and nine. Cause people will be traveling. And yeah, we have a bit of a sort of a bit of a meal and a social time on the, on the Friday evening have accommodation for Saturday and Sunday night.
Chris: And we've got a whole load of different activities going on all day on the Saturday and a half day on the Sunday, and then people head off home on the Sunday afternoon which kind of gives some chance to. Travel home, put a load of washing on, stick a pizza in the oven or whatever and chill out before work on the Monday.
Chris: So that's our fairly standard [00:01:00] weekend event set up and that's what we're going to be doing at this Dearne Valley Weekend.
Nat: Sounds action packed. What can people expect to be doing over the weekend?
Chris: Yeah, so the activities for the Dearne Valley one in particular there's quite a lot going on, there's probably eight or nine activities, something like that.
Chris: I'll tell you about a few of my favorite ones. The top one, and I wasn't expecting this to be the top one actually, but is the laser tag. So. At this center, it's got this indoor laser tag thing in this room. It's over two or three floors. And everyone gets sort of handed out with like, you know, your laser gun and kind of this body armor, which has got a detector on.
Chris: And it was just so much fun how people got very competitive very quickly. But it was all sort of good humored and good hearted. Yeah, I think we could have spent a lot longer. Doing that laser tag than we did. So that's sort of the headline activity now, as I see it. But there's some other cool [00:02:00] things we do probably haven't got time to chat through them all, but one of the ones that's quite different is aeroball.
Chris: Have you ever done aeroball Nat?
Nat: No, never. I don't know. What is it?
Chris: Yeah, exactly. So it's outdoors and there's these trampolines. Imagine sort of four square trampolines put next to each other. But then it's sort of fenced off, if you will, like there's netting around it and between them, between each of the four quarters.
Chris: And so you sort of crawl in to your little quarter and then there's a couple of balls, volleyball type things, and you're basically trying to score in each other's nets. So you're bouncing up and
Nat: down and trying to shoot. Yeah. So it's kind of between trampolining and sort of dodgeball and basketball.
Chris: Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. So yeah, that's aero ball. So there's a few more just briefly mentioned. One is the climbing wall. So there's an outdoor climbing wall. I'm not great with heights actually, but again, it's really nice to see each other, you know, people support each other and whether you get [00:03:00] just like one or two meters off, or if we managed to go all the way to the top, there's different sorts of tracks you can go up as well.
Chris: So sort of. Easier, medium and hard. So it's nice to see people encourage each other. We do a thing called a crate stack, which it's a load of crates and basically you have to stack them as high as possible with someone on top without them sort of falling over, obviously everyone's harnessed up and stuff, but it's nice to see people working together as a team, we do a bit of an abseil off a building as well, actually.
Chris: Which is quite nice again, testing people's boundaries and limits, but it's nice to see everyone encouraging each other. And then there's other activities running through the weekend. A couple at the top of my head one is a zip line. So quite a long zip line people can try. And another one is we're going to be trying this buggy build.
Chris: So I think it's a little bit like scrap heap challenge, if you remember the TV program. So almost split into two teams, you've got to assemble your buggy and then we'll do a few races. So that should be interesting to see how that goes. And the final one to mention is probably, there's this thing called the [00:04:00] Jacob's ladder, which is kind of this huge wooden climbing frame.
Chris: Like, I'm not sure how high you'd say is maybe 20 meters, something like that. And again, you sort of go up in pairs almost and try and get a group gathered at the top. So there's all these different activities that test people in different way. It's meant to get people sort of at the edge of their comfort zone.
Chris: And it's really nice just seeing what people can achieve and what people want to do whilst they're having a good time.
Nat: Sounds good fun the weekend. So people just turn up, don't, what do they need to bring with them?
Chris: Yeah, not too much really. Basically some, you know, a pair of old trainers, a few layers of warm outdoor clothing and ideally a waterproof jacket.
Chris: If you have waterproof trousers as well, bring them along, but yeah, just some warm clothing really, that you're happy to get a bit dirty and scruffy in. It's probably a good point to mention as well that everyone gets a guide. So we call it a pre adventure guide. So when you sign up and buy your ticket, you get sent an email and that email has a link in it.
Chris: And if you follow that link, that's where you can [00:05:00] join a WhatsApp group for everyone attending the event. But also there's a load of information including this PDF. So document attached which has just information on, you know, what you should bring along, what to expect, timings, all of the usual stuff that you'd want to.
Chris: to know. And it's an
Nat: adventure weekend. What type of people are invited to come along or sign up to the event?
Chris: Yeah, so all adventure solos, weekends and events are aimed or designed for people in their thirties, forties and fifties. The solos bit is to do with people booking on by themselves. So it's nothing to do with relationship status.
Chris: It's just that you don't have to find a whole load of people who come with you. You don't have to convince a friend. You don't have to convince your other half. Basically you can just be like, yeah, like the look of that, the sound of that. I'll go along and meet some new people. And what's really nice is everyone's in the same boat.
Chris: Everyone's turned up by themselves as well. And everyone's there for the same sort of reasons. They just want to have a good time and meet some new people. So that's the sort of people that [00:06:00] go along and the adventure side of it. The activities are all beginner friendly, so you don't have to be, in fact, people are not hardcore outdoorsy people.
Chris: These are just people that are interested in sort of challenging themselves, doing something a little bit different and coming along and giving it a shot. Sounds
Nat: great. And it's in South Yorkshire's Dearne Valley. Tell me more about
Chris: that. Yeah, that's right. So our events are dotted around the UK and people do travel.
Chris: We get people probably about 15, 20 percent of people maybe coming down from Scotland for the events. We get probably 25%, maybe 30 percent of people coming. Up from London. And everyone else is kind of, yeah, dotted around, I guess the Midlands and North of England, really. This particular event, yeah.
Chris: South Yorkshire, there's a train station, literally opposite called Conisborough, so yeah, if people are traveling by public transport, that's possible, and what we also do is once people are booked onto an event, there's a WhatsApp group that they [00:07:00] can join straight away. And so then that's quite often good for people to be like, Oh, I'm on this train from wherever is anyone else on that one, or I'm driving from here.
Chris: Would anyone like a lift kind of thing? So yeah, that all helps with people getting to know each other and some of the logistics and stuff like that.
Nat: And the accommodation and the meals are all provided. You're not cooking, are
Chris: you? I do get my hands a little bit dirty sometimes. On the Friday, we just have a Thanks.
Chris: You're not meant to find that quite so amusing, that. That's more my question. Yeah. So, so dinner on the Friday is kind of a pasta based meal. We have a bit of cake and stuff after as well. Other than that, it's all catered for. So yeah, there's, there's meals provided throughout the weekend and If obviously people have dietary requirements as well, then you can fill that in at the time of booking and that's all taken care of too.
Chris: And accommodations provided for the Friday and the Saturday night. It's quite modern accommodation. The standard setup is that people are [00:08:00] sharing, but there's always, or we try and always offer options for people to upgrade to solo rooms if they prefer to do that. So for the Dearne Valley Weekend there's loads of rooms available, so there's no particular sort of urgency or anything to get that booked in.
Chris: If generally if people want it, then we can accommodate it. So yeah, nice, nice modern accommodation for the Friday and the Saturday night. Great.
Nat: And what's the main focus of the weekend or when you've run these before, what's been your favorite part of it?
Chris: I think it's just bringing people together. It, it sort of happens so naturally, as I say, everyone's in the same boat, but then there's that activities to focus on.
Chris: And it's just so nice to see how quickly people bond. And I think that's, that's the most rewarding bit for it. Really. People doing new things, even today, I got a message from a lady who said, like, you know, she's been on a couple of events and she's kind of said it's inspired and she's taken a new job and she's working a bit more in the outdoors.
Chris: And so, you know, that's not going to happen for everyone and that's fine, but it just, you know, kind of goes to show [00:09:00] that. It is helping, it's kind of building a community, it's helping people. It's people can just chat really openly. And quite often people have been through a bit of life change as well.
Chris: Maybe their kids are a bit older, or maybe they've been through a relationship breakdown, or maybe they just want to be a bit more focused on themselves and self care, all this sort of stuff. So yeah, people have sometimes been through a bit of change and they're just looking to do something new and different and looking for a nice group of people to do it with.
Chris: So that's the most rewarding bit for me. Sounds
Nat: good. And February is often a month where there's not a huge amount going on, so I'd expect it's a great pick up weekend in the middle of what can be a bit of a bleak month. So, yeah, I'm sure people will enjoy getting out and doing something a bit different.
Chris: Yeah, exactly. I think once Christmas and New Year's out of the way, it's still a bit dark and cold and people are just waiting for spring and thinking about the holidays and the summer and stuff. So yeah, I think having, as you say, something in February to look forward to [00:10:00] is just yeah, keeps people, keeps people going.
Chris: Should we say it's a nice. Pleasant thing to look forward to in the middle of winter. One final point that I think is worth mentioning that before you head off is that obviously all the information for each event is on the website, which is adventuresolos. com, but if people have any questions, then they're very welcome.
Chris: Give me a call and I'm really accessible. So the number's on the website, but I can give it to you now as well. So it's 08001123411, so the number again is 08001123411. As I say, 90 odd percent of the time it'll be me that answers that. And yeah, if people just wanna chat things through, you know, whether they've got particular questions or they just wanna have a bit of a chat before booking, then that's not a problem at all.
Chris: So yeah, if you wanna find that, then head on over to venture solos.com and the numbers on the website as well. So. Happy to do that.
Chris: Hey, it's Chris here from Adventure [00:11:00] Solos where we help people in their thirties, forties, and fifties to rediscover themselves and meet new people. If you'd like to find out more about adventure solos events, visit AdventureSolos.com . That's AdventureSolos.com where you're very welcome to stay in touch by joining the mailing list, so adventure solos.com and enter your details to sign up to the mailing list.
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