Game Day - The Quagmire

This is an initiative that can be adapted in many different ways.  I will give the simplest version here and you can let your creativity run wild.  Enjoy! 

The Quagmire

How You Do It:

Journeys are often exciting, but if not carefully planned can contain a significant element of risk.  How about walking through a quagmire with a blindfold on?

This activity allows for the creation of a relatively benevolent quagmire using fleece balls, rubber chickens, chairs, sprung mousetraps, plastic squids and other creatures, hanging Cray paper, and any other non lethal objects you might have handy in your bag of tricks.   Mark off a large boundary area, rectangular in shape, say 20 feet wide and 40 feet long.  The dimensions of the Mine Field can be varied to increase or reduce the challenge or adjust to group size.  Now take your explosive items and scatter them about the Field, making a straight line path through the exploding debris impossible to negotiate. 

Get your group divided into pairs, using the usual assortment of uniquely adventure methods for doing so. One member of each pair loses her sight either by keeping eyes tightly squeezed shut or with the use of a blindfold.  The partner must guide her through the obstacles you’ve created while remaining outside of the boundary area.  Completion may mean reaching the other side, only stepping on a predetermined number of mines, or any other definition of success that the group wishes to establish. 

Sending more than one explorer into the field at a time from different directions adds to the incendiary potential.  Switching guides mid field is another delightfully sadistic variation.   Ask the group to think metaphorically about the exploding objects.  What might they represent as obstacles to reaching individual and group goals?  Label them using the group’s ideas.