An adventurous Team Day out at Go Ape Wendover woods

Not many teams can say that they had an adventurous team building day out at their workplace. But that is exactly what the Go Ape Marketing team set out to do at Go Ape Wendover.

For a day, the laptops were set aside and work clothes were swapped for active gear with enough stretch for climbing, leaping and zip lining. In a time of Teams communication, it was strange but wonderful to meet up in person and share a day of fun, thrills and learning.

When you work in such an adventurous job (I also work one day a week as an instructor at Go Ape Moors Valley) and in such picturesque settings, you begin to take it for granted. Visiting another site allows you to compare, to contrast and to appreciate how amazing our forests are. Wendover Woods was in full summer glory and the views began at the park entrance, with a meandering driveway through the forest which really made it feel like you were stepping into nature.

Back to the day out. After a catch up with our lovely new Wendover Site Manager, Laura Sweetman, we were ready to take the day to the next level. Literally.

Well-seasoned adventures we opted for the adult-sized Go Ape adventure, were harnessed up and were ready to go. However, just because many of us had done Go Ape courses before, didn’t mean that every obstacle was a breeze.

In fact, some of the team, were not too fond of heights and the Tarzan Swings brought on more than a little anxiety. The idea with Tarzans Swings is that you leap from a platform before swinging, tarzan-style into a suspended cargo net – Tarzan noise optional. There were two ‘Tarzans’ at Wendover, a small one to get into the swing of things and a larger one with quite a sizable drop! Everyone easily cleared the first one, but some people respected their adventurous limits and elected for the alternative route which avoided the larger one.

Experiencing a team building adventure at our work-place together, I realised again the value of Go Ape’s ethos of living life adventurously and challenging yourself to take on new experiences – as well as just how cool our company is! We all took part in the same course, but different elements tested each of us, whether that was conquering our fears, battling through a tricky crossing or mastering our zip landings – our Head of Marketing, Jo O’Boyle looked particularly serene as she sped towards the woodchip and came to a perfect halt.

At the end of the day, we were able to talk through and laugh at our experience (and the pictures) together as we re-fuelled for our journeys home. Sometimes remote working makes you feel isolated from your team, but days and adventures like this created valuable memories without a screen between us.