For our 11th grade educational trip, my school took my grade to Mount Abu, a hill station in Rajasthan, India. This was a trekking trip of five days where we stayed at a campsite. During the trip we did many activities like trekking, rappelling, rock climbing, valley crossing, and caving. During this trip, I developed LO1, LO2, and LO5.

LO1 and LO2:

During this trip, I realized that one of my biggest strengths was my stamina in uphill climbing. I have never thought of myself as someone who could be good at sports or exercising simply because I was never fast enough as others. While climbing, stamina mattered more than speed and I realized that when I exercise without being rushed, I can climb for long durations without having to stop for breaks. Once, I even climbed the entire trail without feeling tired or going out of breath even though my peers needed to stop to catch their breaths. However, a weakness of mine is and always has been balancing. I’m a very clumsy person so, in a place where I need to constantly watch my step and where there are many obstacles, I had no option but to challenge myself and improve this quality of mine. In the beginning, there wasn’t a track where I did not trip or fall. Thankfully I did not get any injuries from these but, they made me be more careful as I became more used to trekking. I remember that in my last trek in our trip, I did not even trip once and that was a big accomplishment for me. Even in the caving activity, where some rocks were quite slippery, I managed to learn to balance myself. I would not have been able to improve on this if it wouldn’t have been for this CAS experience.

LO4:

This trip really challenged me to get out of my comfort zone. I have a very low tolerance to cold weather and at night, the weather there almost always froze me. Despite of wearing multiple layers of thermals, I felt very uncomfortable and cold at night. However, this did not stop me from having a good time. I still got to make very fun memories with my friends while sitting on the bonfire and in our tents.

Another time that I felt like giving up was when we were trekking in the afternoon and the sun was out. We were covering an especially longer track and I felt extremely dehydrated and tired during that time. My legs were constantly hurting and I wanted to stop and just sit down. But, since we were climbing a mountain, I got to see an amazing view the higher we climbed. The motivation that I would get to see a good view once the climb ended kept me going. I was extremely proud of myself and in contempt when I reached the top. It was an incredible feeling.