Rugby Tour of South Africa
18th July to 2nd August
The senior rugby and hockey players from St. Bees School have had an exciting summer. On Monday 18th July, a party of 29 players and 5 staff set off from the school to Manchester Airport and onwards to Johannesburg.
Over the two weeks the party visited Umhlanga Rocks, Durban, Dumazulu Visitors Centre, Hluhluwe Game Reserve, St. Lucia Wetlands Game Reserve, Swaziland, Pretoria, Cape Town, Langa Township, Cape Point Nature Reserve and Table Mountain.
The players had 4 matches per team spread out over the trip, to add to the stunning opportunities of sightseeing and cultural experiences.
Tour Manager and organiser Huw Lewis, who is the Director of Sport at St. Bees, says of the tour, 'South Africa is a wonderful venue for a trip such as this, and it gave the players a great deal to think about and see, as well as testing their limits on the sports field. This is the fourth time that we have visited the country since 1999, and previous trips have given the players, staff and supporters lasting memories of theirexperiences.'
The players had been training hard throughout their very busy exam period, as well as helping to raise funds for good causes related to the tour. They raised money from a sponsored triathlon to provide equipment to supply a freshwater borehole in one of the outlying villages in Swaziland through a donation to the charity 'Wateraid.
Huw Lewis would like to thank the parents and staff who gave such invaluable support to the tour, and also the sponsors and companies who donated equipment. These include Canterbury of New Zealand Sportswear, Day-Cummings Architects Cockermouth and Walkingshaw's VW showrooms in Lillyhall.
To view photos from the trip please click here
Stratford upon Avon Trip
The Drama and English Departments are organising a trip to Stratford upon Avon from 30th August to 3rd September 2011. They will be seeing six productions in all. Three of these will be performed in the recently refurbished Memorial Theatre, which is reopening this year. These are all well known Shakespearean plays: 'A Midsummer Night's Dream', 'Macbeth' and 'The Merchant of Venice'. The beautiful Swan Theatre is also reopening this year, and there the group will see performances of Philip Massinger's 'The City Wife', the late Harold Pinter's 'The Homecoming' and 'Cardenio', Shakespeare's lost play, recreated by Greg Doran.