National Guide Day 2025

National Guide day 2025 was held in Castlecomer Discovery Park in Kilkenny on November 1st. Girls and Leaders started arriving bright and early for registration from 10:00 - 10:30 and then they were split into their groups for the day's activities. Despite most people having been busy with Halloween the night before everyone was ready to go and excited to see what the day had in store! Thankfully after having horrible weather the previous night, we were blessed with a clear and dry day for the activities!

Once everyone had arrived, the organizing team handed badges and coloured wristbands to all of the Leaders for their girls. The different groups were denoted by the different coloured wristbands, there was pink, peach, orange, grey, black and purple. The girls put on their wristbands and organised themselves into their groups before heading off to their first activities.

The girls got to do a range of different activities throughout the day, such as; the skywalk, the zipline, team challenges, canoeing, archery and the octagon. Each group had a different set of activities with only the pink and grey groups doing the zipline as the girls had to be at least 12 years old to partake in this.

Each activity that the girls did had a unique challenge and everyone had a blast doing them! Castlecomer is home to Ireland’s longest zipline so the pink and grey groups had a great time zipping through the trees. The team challenges meant that girls from different units and regions got to work together and make new friends which is always great to see at any event! The octagon was a high ropes

course, where the girls had to traverse through a series of obstacles. The skywalk was similar, with a variety of different challenges to complete, the girls had to learn how to clip themselves onto and off of the ropes to move from section to section too! A lot of girls even faced their fear of heights to take part in these activities so well done girls!

The canoeing saw the girls getting a bit wet, some wetter than others as we did have a few people take a dip, but thankfully a Guide is always prepared and there were spare clothes and towels at the ready! Some of the girls also got to try archery and as it turns out we have some very skilled archers in our midst!

Castlecomer had placed one of their staff members with each of the groups to run the activities and to help the girls along the way. This meant that the Leaders could stay with their groups or have a wander around and explore the park a bit. A favourite place for many was the main reception building as it housed a little cafe, an Asian street food restaurant called Tuk Tuk, and an Offbeat Donut counter, which was especially popular among the girls. I’m sure they probably didn’t have much stock left by the time everyone had headed home!

After a long day of amazing activities the girls made their way back to the reception building, tired and a bit wet and mucky but with massive smiles on their faces, eager to tell everyone what their group had gotten up to during the day! The girls had a few minutes to regroup and say goodbye to new and old friends, and some even had time for a quick donut break, before making their way to the buses and heading home after an exhausting but fun packed day!

Before the girls got onto the buses we were able to get some feedback from them, everyone loved the activities, especially the zipline and the canoes and many of the girls said that they would love to come back again some day for another event or even just with their own unit. Here are some quotes from the girls about the day!

“The canoeing was very fun, although there was a lot of splashing going on but thankfully we stayed fairly dry!”

“I loved canoeing, I was worried I would fall in but luckily I didn’t!”

“The zipline was amazing, I was so scared before but as soon as I started going down the zipline I wasn't scared anymore because it was so cool and the view was beautiful!”

“I thought I wouldn’t be able to do the zipline or the octagon course because I don't like heights but I went up with a few friends from my group and it was actually really fun. I’m really happy and proud that I was able to do it!”

"I really liked archery because you could shoot the arrow into whatever and it didn’t matter how good at it you were, so that was fun!”

To hear some more feedback on Guide Day from both our Guides and the Chief Commissioner, you can check out videos from the event that were posted to our social media pages!

I think after all of the amazing feedback from everyone who attended it goes without saying that Guide Day 2025 was a major success! These events wouldn’t happen without all of the hard work and dedication from the staff in the office and from the organizing team so a massive thank you to them. Another massive thank you to Castlecomer Discovery Park for having us and to their staff for facilitating a fabulous day. Lastly, a massive thank you to the girls who attended but especially to their Leaders, events like this wouldn't be possible without you all giving up your time to bring the girls so thank you all! Now we can look forward to Guide Day 2026, although it seems as though we’ll have a tough act to follow!

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