Map Reading Exercise

When I joined the army, during our six week basic training we were required to undertake a map reading exercise, so on one fine summer afternoon, after having been issued with the appropriate kit, combats (it was unusual in those days for nurses, even Army Nurses, to be issued with camouflage equipment as standard), black boots, a compass, a plastic covered map, chinagraph pencils and I seem to remember having an orange woolly hat.  We certainly looked the part and had spent an hour or so learning how to read the maps so we were all ready.

We set off from Royal Pavilion, the picturesque setting for the training centre and headed into the outskirts of Aldershot in a military vehicle and were dumped at a position on some fields from the back of a lorry.  We had been given map references for our intended destination and were put into groups of two or three.  Huddled over our map, I felt quite confident in my map reading skills ... as I, of course, had an exceptional guiding career to hold me in good stead. We worked out where we were meant to be heading with the aid of our compass and my colleague and I set off (I think her name was Pat). It wasn't a hard walk, probably some vast training ground as Aldershot was primarily taken up with military pursuits, and the walk was interspersed with breaks where we referred back to our map, made notes with our chinagraph pencils and checked the compass to ensure that we were heading in broadly the right direction.  We chatted all the way and it was a pleasant way to escape from other parts of our training and at least we weren't getting shouted at.  We only began to worry slightly when we were still walking after a couple of hours, the impression imparted by our squad Sgts was that it wouldn't take us much more than the two hours we had already been involved in.  Perhaps I should have taken more notice of the butterflies that were starting to flutter as the terrain became more undulating and less grassy, we climbed the now sandy mounds and even after checking our co-ordinates struggled over a few hedges.  Although we only made fleeting references to the unexpected length of time it was taking, I'm sure Pat joined me when I took a large gulp of air swallowing my concerns as we assisted each other dealing with a barbed wire fence, but we hadn't yet reached the collection point and our map reading was instructing us to carry on.  But as we moved towards our fourth hour, we heard a slight rumbling ... it was a vaguely familiar sound and comforting to know that we weren't completely detached from civilisation.  I shared my thoughts that the noise resembled childhood memories of tractors.  The rumbling got louder as we stood in the centre of a giant sandpit and finally turned around to find a large Chieftan tank grinding to a halt in front of us.  The top opened slowly and a head popped out .... and although difficult to pick out the gist of his message from the Mancunian accent and the selection of obscenities punctuating it my overall impression was that we weren't meant to be there. As Pat and I gazed upwards at the driver ... is that what they're called, we waved our compasses and attempted to explain why two inept women soldiers were in the middle of a restricted area.  We were instructed to move to a safe position nearer the fence and not to move, which not unsurprisingly, we did. Shortly, although it seemed like an age, a Military Police vehicle arrived and the Mancunian tank driver left in his Chieftan.  The MP indicated that we should get in the back of his landrover and we were driven in silence back to our barracks to be met by the Regimental Sergant Major and QM who shook their heads silently before subjecting us to an 'interview without coffee' and a telling off directly proportionate to the strength of their embarrassment in having us returned to the barracks under those circumstances.  

And to add insult to injury ... we could the see the hillock that we were meant to travel to from our starting point ... if only we'd known eh?