The Journey to South Africa 60 years ago

Kevin Skinner. File Picture

Some of the All Blacks who leave tomorrow for their tour to Europe will be home in less time than it took their 1949 predecessors to get to South Africa.

Managing the players has become a well-worn theme in rugbyspeak since the sport went professional a decade ago.

Players get the best care with their nutrition, training and preparation while their travel, clothing, hotel, security and entertainment needs are all sorted.

The emphasis is on creating the right conditions off the field to allow the players to respond on the paddock.

Almost 60 years ago, it was a vastly different scenario when the All Blacks made their trek to South Africa. This was an exercise in resilience and self-sufficiency.

The tour involved 24 matches in 3 months and if that schedule was not daunting enough, players had to endure marathon travel schedules.

Otago prop Kevin Skinner boarded a train from his Dunedin homebase to Christchurch, connected with the inter-island ferry from Lyttelton to Wellington and then had to deal with an overnight train trip to Auckland to make the start of the tour.

"There was no air-travel in my day so we caught the steamship Tamaroa across the Tasman to Sydney, then Melbourne I think and Perth before we went across the Indian Ocean to Cape Town," he said.

That sea journey took a month with little opportunity to complete any proper training.

"What fitness we had before we left had gone by the time we arrived," Skinner said.

"I had a ball-bearing skipping rope from my boxing days which I used but we couldn't do much running."

Players had to do their own laundry although they did get the luxury of a baggage man, supplied by the South African Rugby Union, when they arrived in Cape Town. They also got a daily allowance of "five bob".

Just in case those All Blacks got too comfortable though they were dispatched to play two games in Rhodesia before the second test. They spent nine days out of that 12-day excursion on trains and were involved in an accident on the way back to Johannesburg which killed the train driver and injured lock Charlie Willocks.

"I think we had about five nights sleeping on the trains," Skinner said, "and we were lucky when we had a head-on with another train.

"It was about 2am on a dead-straight piece of rail and a number of our team got turfed out of bed."

Two high-speed TGV train trips for the All Blacks in France and short-hop return flights from Britain to France will be the tourists' extra travel burden next month.

They will be kitted out in all the playing, training and casual gear that adidas can get into the baggage allowance for the players on their return business-class tickets to Europe.

When Skinner and his mates rocked up for the 1949 tour they were given two blazers, two pairs of slacks and two white shirts.

"I had a decent suitcase with my clothes and a canvas black-stringed bag for my gear and in those days we even bought our boots," he said.

Otago lock James Ryan who has returned for this end of season trip brought a few favourite casual clothes, some books, laptop and toiletries up from Dunedin.

On arrival in Auckland he was directed to a conference room at the Heritage Hotel where adidas and Rodd & Gunn completed his dress, casual and sporting wardrobe.

"It is a single man's dream for five weeks, no cooking, cleaning and washing," he laughed, "but there is a price, you've gotta perform, nothing's free is it?"

Skinner, who will turn 79 next month, acknowledged how different the current rugby climate is from the amateur world he grafted in.

"I had to pay guys to work for me and sometimes you had to think hard about whether you could afford to accept selection for a tour."