83 ACADEMIC Review As par t of our 90th anniversary celebrations it was decided to link Old Kearsney with Botha’s Hill in a symbolic way by cycling the most direct route between the two chapels. This ‘most direct’ route of 140km was completed in 3 days and followed the back roads of Glendale, Compensation, Hazelmere Dam, Buffelsdraai, Osindiswini, Inanda Dam and KwaNyuswa – very undulating indeed! The group consisted of 14 grade 9 boys namely: Jeremy Maarschalk, Hilton Marais, Devlin Frohlich, James Marshall, Patrick Zietkiewicz, Joshua Arde, Gareth Brown, Peter Hudson, Alistair King, Kean McClure,Tristan Schroder, James Weyer, Stephen Maritz and Shaun Powell.The adults on the trip included Keith Decker, Kevin Smith, Peter Kirsten,Trevor Maarschalk, Craig Legg and myself. With back-up vehicles flashing lights, flags flying and bright T-shir ts to adver tise our presence on the road we set off from the Old Kearsney Chapel at about 10am on Monday 29th August. Dr Shuker, who was instrumental in setting up the trip, was there to see us off. The first day (44km) was fine, with only one serious hill at Glendale to challenge us. The ride through the plantations was pleasant and quick. We arrived at our overnight stop called “By theWay”, owned by Gary and Denny Bremner, at 3pm and enjoyed a thoroughly enter taining evening on the wooden deck. Day two (50km) was a real challenge as there were some serious hills to negotiate along the way and it was hot and dry! The killer hill towards the end reduced most of us to a ‘get off and push’ status, although a few hard core chaps did ride the whole way. This placed them in the ‘A’ team. The final day (46km) saw us racing down into the Inanda Dam valley, over the bridge and then up and up and up to KwaNyuswa and eventually Kearsney. This final 8km mega hill really sor ted the men from the boys. We had lunch near Valley Trust and then cycled into Kearsney as a group, ending symbolically at the Kearsney Chapel at 2pm. Mission accomplished! A great trip with a great bunch of guys! Rod de Villiers Chapel to Chapel cycle challenge As par t of our 90th anniversary celebrations it was decided to link Old Kearsney with Botha’s Hill in a symbolic way by cycling the most direct route between the two chapels
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