Girls tied in harnesses ? leaping through mid air and hoping to catch a trapeze bar were par for the course at the final Outward Bound Camp on Paget Island.

Eleven girls ranging in age between 13 and 14 said they had lots of fun as they donned harnesses and jumped off the top of a seemingly unsteady pole.

They said that they did an overnight camp in Dockyard near Westgate Prison and also abseiled off the old Casemates Prison.

The girls said they were having fun cooking, cleaning, calling each other pet names like Chocolate, canoeing, kayaking and climbing. In fact the only thing that they said that they did not like, was cold showers in the morning.

Otherwise, the camp saw only two new girls. The others had been coming for the last two or three years.

The exercise that they were doing when arrived was that they had to climb up a pole, leap off and try to grip onto a trapeze bar, swing for a few seconds and then be lowered down by ropes.

Outward Bound co-ordinator Mark Norman said: ?A little psychological illness helps for this one.?

Participant Anna Horsfield said she had been on another camp this summer and it was not as tough as this one.

?This pushes you a little more out of your comfort zone,? said the third time Outward Bounder, ?Although you are being pushed out of your comfort zone ? you are not terrified to be pushed.

?And if the coaches know you are uncomfortable doing it then they coach you to do it, but they compromise with you to some degree.?

Anna added the Outward Bound course was great because they did a range of activities.

?It is not like some camps were you are doing one thing everyday,? she said, ?Here there is something new to do everyday and for someone who is scared of heights facing the rope course is nerve wrecking, but at the same time it is so much fun because if you are up there ? you may not be comfortable being there, but you know you can do it.

?The instructors support you as well and you have to get up there.?

She said Ben Beasley and George Spurling hold the record for climbing the Jacobs ladder in one minute and 22 seconds.

?We watched them do it and they broke their own record of one minute and 44 seconds,? Anna said.

There is a pole which the girls had to walk across called the Cat Walk, and when on it they had to either sing ?I?m a little teapot? or ?Twinkle twinkle little star?, or do kung fu or jumping jacks.

The girls said they had to find their way out of an old fort on the Island after hearing a horror story.

?They took us through a maze of corridors and we had to find our way out,? she said. ?They left us at the other end of the fort and told us we had to go back.?

Grace Markham?s hands slipped off the trapeze bar after she leapt off the pole.

She said: ?It?s not hard, it is kind of scary when you get up because the pole is wiggly, but I am not afraid of heights. I touched the bar, but I didn?t really hold onto it for long, but it wasn?t long enough.?

Outward Bound co-ordinator Mr. Norman said he had hoped that all children could take part in the courses as they taught discipline and self-reliance.