As the end of 2022 draws near, we would like to take the opportunity to thank everyone for an amazing year and look back at some of our highlights from the past 12 months.
2022 was a huge year for XUK. We were absolutely delighted to see the return of our residential camp, and settled into our stunning new home at Dauntsey’s School in the picturesque Vale of Pewsey. Over 5 weeks we welcomed 548 campers from 48 countries, with our furthest camper travelling just over 6056 miles to join us!
Days packed with activities need fuelling with lots of delicious food, and that’s just what the catering team at Dauntsey’s provided for us! During our residential camp we ate 3600 croissants, 500 battered cod fillets, 350kg of baked beans, 630 chocolate eclairs, 1008 free-range eggs, 145kg of bacon, and we roasted 2404 marshmallows on campfires.
We continued to run our day camps from our beautiful home, Brookland School in Northwest London, for the 26th consecutive year with 636 campers joining the fun over 2 weeks at Easter and 4 weeks over Summer. Lionel didn’t want to miss out on waving hello to our happy campers arriving in the mornings and appeared at the Mini Minors gate 45 times!
One of the key factors determining the success of any of our camps is our amazing staff team. This year we were lucky enough to have an incredible and diverse team of 73 staff members at our residential camp made up of qualified teachers, sports coaches, first aiders, professional performers and many more.
The amazing team at our day camp was made up of 26 staff members over Easter, and 45 staff members over Summer and included qualified early years practitioners, drama and dance specialists, nurses, students, and more.
We were also lucky enough to have 9 ex-campers working with us this year, for some it was their first experience as staff and others have been with us for nearly a decade! Without these staff teams we would not have been able to provide our campers with such exciting, fulfilling, and varied activities and so cannot thank them enough!
Life-long memories were made by campers and staff alike and we were there to capture the moment. We took an incredible 3848 pictures at residential and 2315 pictures at day of the friendships that were made, the new activities we tried, the wonderful food, and the stunning facilities.
Finally, we’d like to invite you to look back on our ‘year in numbers’ in our newsletter and on our social media channels - @xukcamps.
That’s a wrap for 2022. We can’t wait to continue sharing what 2023 has in store for us, our staff team, our activities, and our valued campers and parents. Until then, we hope you have the happiest of New Years! Keep in touch with us over social media and we really look forward to seeing you in 2023.
Very best wishes,
Richard, Nick and the whole XUK team