About

My name is Julie but my Brownies call me Bumblebee*. I’m a paddlesport assistant at my not-so-local Girlguiding division boathouse, building my skills and working my way slowly towards my Instructor award. I’ve been getting into paddlesport, especially kayaking, over the last decade, taking advantage of relatively sheltered waters ripe for adventure only half an hour from home.

I’m a Brownie & Ranger leader (also qualified with Guides but not currently working directly with them), county leadership mentor, archery instructor and fencing coach, as well as being a bit of an uncontrollable blogging machine – I need to write, hence the telling of my paddling story in this blog. I’ve also been documenting my adventures “in real time” over the summer in between that, to give you a taste of what we’ve been able to offer 120-150 local Girlguiding members this season.

As you can see, I do lean towards the “adventure leader” end of the Girlguiding spectrum. As an organisation, we can offer girls so many opportunities and it’s really exciting for me to get to be one of the people who get to be right at the forefront of it. It’s always amazing to watch one of the girls find her confidence, whether that’s with the bow and arrow or with a paddle. I’ve seen them go from being unable to hit the target to winning the evening’s tournament, and from being wary of getting in the kayak at all to splashing furiously after a bobbing tennis ball to win a game and the way their faces light up when they realise “I can do this!” is the absolute best.

In the summer of 2023, while driving around Iceland’s Ring Road (big fan of travelling, the frozen north and Iceland too), I discovered I had the time and opportunity to go out on Jökulsárlón, the famous glacier lagoon, not on one of the amphibian duck boats or on one of the roaring Zodiacs but in a kayak and I snapped that up. It’s one of my top three Iceland experiences of all time (and I’ve had a few!) and our guide took a great photo of me which I am of course splashing absolutely everywhere. The Dorset coast is a good-looking place, what with those chalk cliffs and features that appear in geography textbooks, but it’s not quite the same as kayaking among icebergs broken off a glacier after being locked up on the mountain for a thousand years and now floating in a turquoise lagoon 250m deep.

Training & qualifications:

  • British Canoeing Discover Award (July 2021)
  • British Canoeing Explore Award (July 2021)
  • Fore/Adventure half day introduction to sea kayaking (September 2021)
  • Wimbleball Lake Activity Centre – Have a go SUP (June 2022)
  • Wareham Boat Hire basic canoeing lesson (September 2022)
  • Sea Kayak Award training (April 2023)
  • Paddlesport Safety & Rescue training (October 2023)
  • Paddlesport Leader Award training (June 2025)

* When I left Guides and became a Young Leader, the unit chose my leader name. The rules of that unit at the time was an animal name beginning with B. We already had Bear, Badger and Beaver. I rejected Buffalo and Bison but Bumblebee sounded nice. Since then, I alternate between Julie and Bumblebee, depending on the unit and the age of the girls. I was Brown Owl for a while but when I joined my new Brownies, I wasn’t expecting to be suddenly asked “What’s your leader name?” in front of all the girls. The correct answer should have been “I was Brown Owl last term but if all went to plan, I was going to be Snowy Owl this term” but then I panicked, reverted several years and blurted out “Bumblebee!”. I love being Bumblebee but it does sound odd next to Brown Owl, Tawny Owl and Barn Owl.