We arrived in Capetown on Thursday 8th February, the famous cloud of Table Mountain sat over the city for 3 days and disrupted our general schedule, nets and Robin Island had to be cancelled and we arrived at our first game on Sunday 11th slightly under prepared. The game was against the Langa Township, we had a tour around the streets before the game and we were all amazed at the conditions of the houses and especially the meat market.

Langa won the toss and decided to bat, Luke Cross removed their opener early and wickets fell on a regular basis, Langa were eventually bowled out for 123, Luke Ward 2-31, Ruairi Bowen 2-35, John Terry 2-15 and Tom Austwick 2-14 After an aggressive start and the loss of 2 early wickets we settled down and reached our target for the loss of 6 wickets, Tom Austwick finishing on 73 not out.

The day was an incredible experience, we had lunch in ‘Sheila’s House’ with local African music being played and we all made many friends during the day.

The second match was against Hermanus High School, a 2 hour drive along the coast. HCS batted first and scored 193-8, Tom Austwick scoring 71, John Terry 23 Jeremy Knight 25 and Danny Barling 25 NO. Hermanus reached 179-7 off there 40 overs, John Terry 4-25 and Tom Austwick 3-43 were the main wicket takers.

We then moved onto Parell Valley School on a day when the temperature reached 38 degrees. HCS batted first on a low slow wicket and only scored 103, Nick Frith top scoring on 16, in reply Parrell Valley managed to scrape home by 2 wickets, Ben Stebbings taking 5-6 to make the match very nervous in the last 3 overs.

The next game was against one of South Africa’s renowned schools, SACS, recent old boys include Percy Montgomorie and Gary Kirsten, with Table Mountain providing a perfect backdrop SACS proved too strong for us, we were bowled out for 85, Ben Stebbings and Danny Barling scoring 18 each and SACS reached the total for the loss of 4 wickets.

The final game of the trip was against Goudini High School in Snake Valley, following a visit to a winery to watch how the grape was harvested and turned into wine we bowled first on another very hot day and restricted Goudini to 132, Matt Hall 3-25 and Tom Austwick 2-32 but in reply we could only reach 90 runs for the loss of all 10 wickets, only Andy Aston with 19 making a reasonable contribution.

The tour was a fantastic experience for all involved, we witnessed the poverty of a Township to the other end of the spectrum of SACS, we visited Robin Island, where Nelson Mandella was imprisoned for 18 years, we went up Table Mountain, some of the boys went into the ice cold sea of the famous Clifton Beach, we stayed in Hermanus, locally known as the Whales playground and witnessed the hustle and bustle of the city of Capetown, truly a ‘trip of a lifetime’

Richard Skyrme.

Director of Games