Azerbaijan, Politics and Copious Amounts of Sweat

I have been accused a few times recently of being a Scout Nerd and I quite happily confess it to be true.
Back in 2015 I was honoured to be chosen as a representative for Scouts New Zealand to the Asia Pacific Regional Scout Youth Forum and Conference, which opened up my eyes to the strategic elements of scouting at a global level.

Since then I’ve taken on a bunch more challenges in this space, including most recently the World Scout Youth Forum and Conference in Azerbaijan!

I left from Manchester airport, after visiting my grandfather and due to some fun scheduling I had to spend the night in the airport (budget travel is luxurious!) So we were off to an interesting start already!

Iceland – Horses, Scouts, and Lots of Hiking

Iceland has really been the foundation of my whole 3 month trip, and my gosh it didn’t disappoint! The landscapes are breathtaking, the people are charming and the weather was spectacular. I hope you’re sitting comfortably, because this is going to be a big one!

From the moment we jumped on the bus from Keflavik airport I was absolutely spellbound by the otherworldly landscapes and plant life. The lava fields sprawl almost to the horizon until you tumble into the city of Reykjavik. We learned that the lack of vegetation was due to the comparative youthfulness of the top layer of  rocks and soil after they were thrown out of various volcanoes. The first vegetation that can settle is moss, so that’s all you’ll see!

The next morning at some inhumane hour we were up and out into the wilderness to see more of the scenery from the bouncy backs of some icelandic horses! Icelandic horses are one of the only breeds in the world to include a pace called the tolt in their repertoire and it definitely is the smoothest gait I’ve felt… if you can convince the horse to stay there and not trot!