End of March - beginning of April.

The final week of March brought a couple of unusual little events. Firstly, several of us sold daffoldils in aid of Cancer Research. A friend and I sold ours at the school and around Ralston village (the children had been warned to bring in money) and all the bunches went like hot cakes - they were really popular. Other wives went to the Base to sell theirs (again, rather a captive audience!) and we raised a good amount for the charity.

The following day I had been looking forward to for quite some time. SAAFA had organised for some of its members to be taken across the prairie to be shown what it is the chaps do out there - how they train and so on. It was really a most interesting and informative day. I had absolutely no idea at all just how large the prairie is. The guys when they are taken out there to train are driven for hours and hours to get where they need to be. We travelled 45 minutes until we saw the first building, where we were given a briefing, shown some of the techy stuff they use and viewed a VT showing how the prairie is used to train the guys.

We were then driven further in (another 45 mins) to the nearest of the mock villages on the outskirts of the training area. We were all astonished at the amount of detail employed to make the experience of training as life like as possible for the men. Some of the stuff we were told and saw was of a sensitive nature, but it was fine to take photographs:



Like my super-camoflauged coat?!




At the fruit market.....



Mmmmmm, lovely Army packed lunch! (Actually they were pretty good - fresh fruit and everything!).




Noo and Clare taking things very seriously!



The long and (not so winding) road home. This land mark is named, most inventively, "Lone Tree". What can I say?!