Kontiki 2005 – Raft Building
For the uninitiated, Kontiki is a raft-building competition with a rich tradition in scouting. Scouts from all over Gauteng annually converge on Murray Park to show off their raft-building and camping skills. When the rafts are completed, they take to the water and only return 24 hours later.
Raft-building is clearly not a man-thing. Many teams of girl scouts competed in this competition.
Raft-building starts on Friday afternoon. Dozens of trucks arrive from all over heavily laden with poles, drums, planks, paddle wheels and other paraphernalia needed to build the perfect raft.
Boys and girls of all ages pitch in to help with the offloading and building of the raft. Construction carries on deep into the night with crews only taking a break to eat a well deserved meal.
The air is filled with an almost tangible vibe of excitement, festivity and competitiveness. Not all groups aim to compete, but many groups pull out all the stops and pay much attention to every little detail.
Building resumes Saturday morning and ends at 12 noon sharp when a gun shot announces that rafts must enter the water.
Raft building
- Parents play an important supporting role at Kontiki.
- The name of the game is getting the ropes as tight as possible. You don’t want to wake up in the middle of the night and find half your raft floating into the distance.
- Younger scouts learn much from the older and more experienced scouts
- Younger scouts learn much from the older and more experienced scouts
- Stephanie will use any excuse to rest a tired back
- Stephanie will use any excuse to rest a tired back
- Scouter Dave is always near to give advise, but the scouts must do as much as possible themselves.
- Powertools – the domain of the father
- The Raptors’ raft starting to take shape. It represents a stage for the famous Russian Bolshoi Ballet company
- We’ll, at least the fire extinguisher isn’t going overboard easily!
- It’s done! Exhauted girls and parents sit down wherever they can find a spot.
- The Bolshoi dancers perform a little number for the paparazzi in preparation of their 24 hour voyage