12. Relay sports and Birt safari

On Thursday afternoon, after our lessons, there was relay sports. It started at four at the sports field. Relay sports is kind of like a sports day. During relay sports, the houses battle each other with running, shot-put, and javelin-throwing. Bishops' has eight houses: Ogilvie, Birt, Mallett, White, School, Founders, Kidd, and Gray. The entire school was watching. We sat in the sun all afternoon so we had to put lots of sunscreen on. Everyone was cheering for their houses and it was really cool! :) In the end, White house won relay sports. 

On Friday, at four in the afternoon, we went to Clifton 4th Beach with the entire Birt House. Birt House does this every year and the event is called Birt Safari. It basically is a Birt House bonding afternoon on the beach where the grade eights (new boys) are being introduced to the house. During Birt Safari, the grade eights have to do lots of funny things. 
We were driven to Clifton in two big buses. It was great fun at the beach and we played some touch rugby which I never played before and was really cool! Pizzas were delivered on the beach at six and we could enjoy a beautiful sunset on the beach. We were driven back to Bishops at nine in the evening.

Here are some pictures of relay sports, I'll add the Birt Safari photos later.

11. Herschel and museums

Today we went on an outing with all the exchangees from Herschel and Bishops and the Herschel exchange coordinator. We had to be at Herschel at eight in the morning. When I arrived at Herschel we had to go to prefects assembly, it was funny seeing all the girls in their blue uniforms. The assembly was quite funny as the matrics were presenting their clubs and societies.

After the assembly, we walked to Claremont train station and took the train to Cape Town Station. The train was quite an experience on its own, the train was full of graffiti and you had to push the doors apart by yourself. On the doors was a note advising you not to open the doors while the train was moving as this apparently happens all the time.

We arrived in central Cape Town and walked to Green Market Square, we went into an old museum with lots of old Dutch and Flemish paintings. Fortunately, we didn't stay there for long. After that, we went to the National Gallery which had a lot of modern 'art'. Then we went to the Holocaust Museum which was impressive.

We had lunch in a place called the Eastern Bazaar. You could choose your food from a wide range of Asian dishes. After lunch we went back on the train and walked to Herschel.

Some pictures:

Green Market Square

Museum at Green Market Square 

Presidential residence

Houses of parliament

10. Beach, fish 'n chips & penguins

Friday evening, we moved to my host family's holiday house at Kommetjie near the beach. After a half an hour drive, we arrived at the house. We had delicious hamburgers for supper! :) As I was really tired after my hike, I went to bed early.

The next day (Saturday) we went to Muizenberg Beach. We met up with some Herschell exchangees and hosts and walked to Kalk Bay. This walk took about 45 minutes and was very cool because we were walking along the beach in the sun. We were all hungry when we arrived in Kalk Bay so we had fish 'n chips in a place called Kalky's. Kalky's restaurant was near Kalk Bay's harbor and there were lots of seals there! :)

After lunch, we were picked up and driven to Boulders Beach. This beach has lots of South African penguins. They were everywhere! We took lots of pictures! 

We were picked up from Boulders in my host family's car, which is a convertible, and we drove back to Kommetjie via Cape Point. It was a beautiful scenic route and I took lots of pictures. We drove past an ostrich farm so I also captured an ostrich on camera! :)

Here are Saturday's pictures:

Muizenberg

Seal at Kalk Bay harbor 

Penguins at Boulders Beach

Penguins 

The drive back to Kommetjie

Ostrich

Cape Point

Misty Cliffs

Kommetjie Beach

Kommetjie

9. Elandspad river hike

Today we went on a hike. We gathered at school in front of the chapel at 7.15 and got on the buses together with the post-matrics, Mr. Court (Bishops' exchange coordinator) and the Herschel exchange girls. 

We drove for about one hour to the west to get to Elandspad River. We stopped next to the highway and got out of the buses. We walked down to the river and followed it upstream. After about 50 minutes, we stopped for a little break. We left our bags at that place, because we had to climb a lot after that point and it's not handy to climb with a big backpack on your back. 

After the break we continued our hike further upstream. Eventually, we got to a high cliff that we could jump off, this was really cool! :) After everybody jumped a few times, we continued to walk upstream, but this time there was no path at all, so we just hopped from rock to rock through the river. We got to another point where we could jump off cliffs and we got to a point where there was an underwater rock which had a hole in it that you could dive through, this was really cool! Then, everybody got hungry so we returned to where we left our bags.

After we had had lunch, we walked upstream along a side branch of the river. This time we were heading for a waterfall. We were walking through the water in a gorge. The gorge ended in a waterfall which was really beautiful. We swam through the waterfall to the other side. It was very cold, because there was no sunshine in the gorge.

When we had all seen the waterfall, we went back downstream. We walked all the way back to where we left the buses. On our way back we saw some baboons. :) We were all very tired and got on the bus. We drove for another hour and returned at Bishops at 18.15. 

8. Bishops

Monday was my first proper school day. As usual we had to be at school at 7:30 and the day started with chapel. The entire school has to go to chapel and as Domas and I are not used to going to chapel, we just did everything our neighbors did. When they got their hymn book out, we did, and when they kneeled, we did. As soon as chapel ends, everybody returns to their houses. But be careful: don't step on the grass! Only the matrics (oldest grade) are allowed to walk on the grass. Apparently this is a long-running tradition at Bishops... 
If you're interested in the school, here's the website: www.bishops.org.za.

My subjects have slightly changed: I only do Maths, Afrikaans, Life Sciences (Biology), and Geography. I also have some free periods in my schedule which I'm supposed to spend in the library. 

Tuesday was the first day of the early morning running. This means you're expected to be at school at 6:30 in the morning and run until 7:30, then you shower and get changed into your school uniform after which you just do the rest of your school day. This early morning running is two times a week for the first two weeks of the school year. It is meant to get the Bishops students fit again after their summer holidays.

Domas and I had our first social tennis session on Wednesday afternoon. It was fun! At Bishops you can practice lots of different sports. At first I was planning on doing hockey, but that wasn't possible as it's a winter sport and it's summer at the moment. So that's why I decided to do tennis and I joined the social tennis group together with Domas. It's called social tennis because the level is not very high and it's more a social thing than an active thing, it was fun!

Today was another day with early morning runs, so I'm quite tired now. Tomorrow, we are going on a hike at Elandspad River, it's going to be really cool and we need to be at school at 7:15 so I better go to bed early tonight! :)

Bishops Diocesan College with the front of the chapel (left)

Bishops' main entrance

7. Table Mountain, Green Market Square, Camps Bay

As I was sick, I didn't go to school on Thursday and Friday. I was lying in bed and sleeping all day so that's why there's no blog updates for those two days, but here's my blog message for Saturday:

Yesterday we went on the hop-on hop-off bus. We met up with the Dutch exchangees plus the South American Herschell (Girl's School) exchangees and of course all their hosts. We bought our bus tickets at the aquarium and got on the bus. The bus was a read double-decker and the upper deck was open, this was really cool because we could sit outside in the sun. 

The bus took us on a tour through the entire city and we saw lots of cool things. We got off the bus at Green Market Square, which is a touristic, little market square. We walked around the stalls and looked at what they were selling, mainly handmade wooden stuff and souvenirs made out of soda cans. After we finished looking around the market, we had some cold drinks at a restaurant.

Then, we got back on to the bus. The bus drove us to the cableway station, where we exited and went up with the cable car. It was really cool because the floor inside the cable car turns, so that everyone can enjoy the different views. Once on top of the mountain, we enjoyed amazing views over Cape Town, its suburbs and its beaches. We saw these little rodents between the rocks, that really looked like big guinea pigs, apparently these are called "dassies" and their closest relative is the African Elephant which is hard to believe as dassies are really small and furry creatures and don't look like elephants at all! As we all got hungry, we decided to have lunch at the Table Mountain Café. I had a hamburger with French fries and salad, it was really good! :) 

After we took the cableway down, we got on the bus again. We got off at Camps Bay, which is a really nice beach that looks very cool because of the mountains in the background. We were all very warm and decided to feel the ocean's temperature. It was very very very cold!!! So swimming was not an option. :( The wind was very strong and we decided to take the bus again and get out at Clifton which is another beach that's less windy because the mountains shield the wind off. We went to a cool restaurant and had some cold drinks again and just talked a bit. Then, we were brought back home. 

That's it for Saturday! Here are some pictures:

Upper deck of the hop-on hop-off bus

Caps made out of soda cans

Lions Head

Cape Town from the lower cableway station

One of the views from Table Mountain

Table Mountain Cableway