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It has been a weekend for our cadets! This weekend saw cadets take part in a shooting course, Junior Monopoly Day and the Trafalgar Day Parade, while in the week on 21st Trafalgar Day and the anniversary of HMS Belfast coming to London took place. 

Cadets Jamie, Ronnie and Reuben represented City of London unit at the Lima Company Shooting weekend and course having all completed their Weapons Handling Test a few weeks ago. (NB Cadet training with weapons is undertaken under close supervision in controlled conditions following a safe system of training.)

Meanwhile, on Saturday 23rd, Junior Cadet Constance attended the London Area Junior Sea Cadets Monopoly Day which saw the Juniors go out and about around the city visiting landmarks ranging from Covent Garden to New Scotland Yard! 

Sunday 24th saw Able Cadets Max and Tariq represent City of London and London Northern District at the London Area Trafalgar Day Parade at the Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich. The Able Cadets formed part of the Guard, marching in their No1 uniforms alongside other cadets from around the area with many CFAVs attending to facilitate the event including Islington unit's PO Harden!

Trafalgar Day is celebrated on 21st October every year with the parade usually taking place in Trafalgar Square on the closest weekend, however, due to COVID restrictions this was not possible this year and smaller parades took place within districts and areas. This year's Trafalgar Day also marked the 50th anniversary of HMS Belfast arriving in London and opening as a museum ship before becoming City of London units' base! 

BZ to all the cadets and staff mentioned and to all who are taking part in further Sea Cadet activities this week in the half-term holidays! 

We were lucky enough to be invited by the Royal Naval Reserve to run a stall at the Classic Boat Festival at St Katherine's Docks. 
At the festival, the cadets ran a 1-minute rowing machine challenge and a knots board as well as chatting to the public about Sea Cadets and what they get up to. We have already had a lot of enquiries from prospective new entries so your hard work was worth it! 
Before the festival opened to the public, we were invited onboard HMS Example, a P2000/Archer Class Royal Navy patrol vessel. Thank you to the ships' company for showing us around and letting the cadets helm up and down the river! 
The cadets also got the chance to look around the festival, visiting HMS Exploit, the Metropolitan Police's Marine 1, the Lifeboat 52-02 Museum Ship and HRH The Queen's rowing barge, Gloriana! They even got free ice cream from the kind vendors at Sed's Ices! 
BZ to Able Cadet Max, Able Cadet Tariq, New Entry Cadet Agnes, New Entry Cadet Brandon, and Junior Cadet Vincent for coming along on the day! We would not have been able to run the stall without you!

We were thrilled to return to parading on board HMS Belfast last Friday following her revamp!

The evening was spent with an introduction to the ship, a health and safety talk and a fire drill with some boating theory also taking place! 

For many of the cadets it was their first time on board the ship as we have many New Entries and since returning to face-to-face activity we had been parading at St Michael's Paternoster Royal Church and the Royal Docks.

We are hugely grateful to the church for enabling us to parade there for the last few months while HMS Belfast was undergoing work. 

Also, huge congratulations to former cadet PPO Zanardelli on completing her Safeguarding and Core Drill modules, and to the cadets who have completed their RYA Stage 1 or 2 courses over the last few weeks!

After over a year of parading via Zoom we were thrilled to return to a face-to-face unit night on Tuesday 4^th May!

A great deal of work was required by staff and committee to make this possible and we would like to thank St Michael’s Paternoster Royal Church for allowing us to use their space while the Imperial War Museums works are ongoing onboard HMS Belfast.

The cadets enjoyed a relaxed first night back performing some initiative tasks, playing Sea Cadet themed charades and discussing their hopes and goals for the year ahead. This included activities and courses they would like to see the unit host, as well as suggestions on how to make our new space feel more like a Sea Cadet unit.

We returned to outdoor activity a few weeks ago and intend to continue to provide outdoor opportunities for the Cadets to participate and gain qualifications in. This will soon include unit boating opportunities at the Sea cadet’s Royal docks boat station.

There will be a recruitment night in the coming weeks as we have had a lot of interest from parents and prospective cadets throughout lockdown. Also, our unit review will be in a few weeks so once we have eased back into the routine of parading we will be preparing for this.

We look forward to seeing everyone again tomorrow, Tuesday, 11^th May!

Although we are unable to parade in person due to Covid-19 our unit has not stopped functioning. We have been running online Parade Nights so our cadets can continue to learn and to complete modules. Our cadets have also been attending the virtual sessions delivered by London Northern District and virtual courses including catering and RYA Essential Navigation and Seamanship. Meanwhile, our adult volunteers have been continuing to enhance their knowledge and expertise by attending virtual CPD sessions. 

We are still accepting enquiries from prospective Juniors, Cadets and adult volunteers so please do get in touch if you are interested or would like some more information about the unit! 

Check out our social media profiles to see what we've been up to so far in lockdown and to keep up to date with what will be happening in the future. We are on Facebook and Instagram with the handle @CityofLondonSCC so go give us a like or follow! 

(NB: image is from the National Football Competition in February so before lockdown)