Irish Guards celebrate St Patrick's Day in the Kenyan Bush

There is a tradition in the British Army which dictates that any soldier with connections to the Irish Guards, no matter where they may be serving, should wear a sprig of shamrock on St Patrick's Day (17 March).

And while the 1,200 soldiers of the Irish Guards Battle Group were training in Kenya's Samburu District for the rigours of a tour in Helmand a large consignment of shamrock was winging its way across the African continent.

The soldiers of the 1st Battalion Irish Guards took a short break from their six-week training programme in Kenya to celebrate St Patrick's Day in true Celtic style.

Some 1,400 individual sprigs of shamrock were specially air-freighted in from Ireland, from where the regiment's essential 'greenery' has been provided for every St Patrick's Day for the past 110 years.

The 1,200 men and women of the Irish Guards Battle Group formed up for a St Patrick's Day parade in Kenya, the ranks of the Irish Guards swelled by units such as a Logistic Support Squadron, an artillery battery and a squadron of Royal Engineers.

Under the baking sun, and in front of two British Major Generals, the shamrocks were handed over by the wife of the Colonel of the Regiment, Lady Elizabeth Roberts, and ceremoniously issued to each soldier to place in their headdress.

The British Army has a long association with Kenya, using its vast open spaces and jungle terrain for training its troops.

Recently, however, there has been a shift in the way that the Army uses this facility. The level of training has now more than doubled and, under a new series of exercises called 'Askari Thunder', there has been a wholesale move towards reflecting current operational deployments, or, to put it simply, putting the soldier through as realistic an experience as he or she could expect from serving in Afghanistan.

And the hardest part is undoubtedly the heat, as one Guardsman quipped:

"It's not like being on holiday when you want a bit of sun. Having to cope with the heat is demanding and we keep drinking and drinking and drinking."

Depending on workload, a soldier can expect to have to down four to six litres of water per day.

Commenting on the training, the Irish Guards' Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Colonel Ben Farrell, said:

"Out here the punishing conditions reproduces the harsh experience in Helmand. The heat in northern Kenya during this exercise is equal to that you could expect in Helmand."

Many of the Guardsmen spoke of how they enjoyed the experience of training in Africa, most with tall tales of wildlife encounters.

Guardsman Carl Dodds explained how he had been out on a four-man reconnaissance patrol, when, in the middle of the night, they heard a loud growl from a nearby bush. Convinced it was a lion, they beat a hasty retreat only to look back and see thirty or so camels wander out! He said:

"It's good to get training in the heat instead of getting soaking wet all the time, usually in the Brecon Beacons."

Fellow Guardsman Ryan Thompson said:

"The St Patrick's Day parade marks a real milestone in the training. It means that the exercise is coming to a close and I can look forward to a beer."

At the end of the exercise, when the training is complete, the troops can look forward to a four-day in-country R&R (rest and recuperation) period. Numerous activities are available to choose from: adventurous training, going out on safari or spending time on the beaches of Mombasa.

Guardsman Dodds continued:

"We're all looking forward to the R&R; I'm going to be trying out lots of water sports in the Indian Ocean off Mombasa."

At 17 years old, Guardsman Richie Spence is one of the youngest of the Guards training in Kenya. He turns eighteen later this year before he is due to deploy to Helmand where he will be among the youngest of the British soldiers on operations. Speaking of Kenya he said:

"The people here are so friendly, my heart goes out to the kids I see running through the bush with nothing on their feet. The training has been very hard, but really good."

Amid the wild and harsh African Bush the Irish Guards were true to the British Army's traditions and celebrated St Patrick's Day with due ceremony. Their Commanding Officer said:

"It's these customs that add flair, colour and a sense of kinship within the battalion."

They may well have had to toast their patron saint with a bottle of 'Tusker' (the locally brewed lager) instead of a pint of Dublin's most famous export, but for one day at least they managed to turn a small part of Africa Celtic.