Cookout @ Sembawang Park

June 2025

A day in the wild with Sticks and Stones

J had been asking to go camping for the longest time—but honestly, we weren’t sure she could survive the ordeal of public beach toilets (haha!). So we went for the next best thing: a cookout at Sembawang Park.

We joined the June holiday programme by Sticks and Stones, a forest school that runs outdoor sessions for kids, and it turned out to be such a wonderful experience for her. The cookout took place at a shady BBQ pit just a few steps from the sea.

The kids were completely hands-on from the start. They went around collecting firewood—branches, twigs, dried leaves—and then helped chop up vegetables (with close supervision!). After that, they set up the fire, added ingredients into mess tins, and stirred their pots over the open flame like little pros. On the menu: good old instant noodles, but with added ingredients like mushrooms, sausages, crabsticks and veggies. J also brought a can of baked beans to share.

After lunch, it was marshmallow time! Nothing fancy, just the pure joy of watching a marshmallow puff and caramelise over real firewood, then gobbling it up while it was still gooey and hot.

The half-day programme was just right. She had so much just running around in the hot sun and learning new skills like slicing and setting up a camp fire. All that activity tired her out so much that she took a long nap in the car on the way home!

Here’s to more noodle pots, more campfire smells, and more childhood days like this!