Prince William says Kate ‘wishes she was here’ on his final day of South African tour while flanked by Winnie Harlow and Heidi Klum

The Prince of Wales enjoyed a braai lunch with A-list supermodels in South Africa today, as he spoke of his love of Cape Town and revealed his wife would ‘love to have been there’.

William, 42, rubbed shoulders with Heidi Klum, Winnie Harlow and Billie Porter as he told the crowd: ‘I love Cape Town, I’ve had the most amazing week here, I’ve really enjoyed it. I don’t want to go!’

He added: ‘My children would love to be here, so would Catherine.’  

Earlier, he received a jar of jam months after his sister-in-law Meghan began gifting her friends with exactly the same item.

William gratefully accepted the jar of sour fig jam while meeting fishermen in Kalk Bay Harbour, Cape Town, the morning after his Earthshot Awards ceremony.

Beaming while he took the jam in his hand, William inadvertently made a nod to the Duchess of Sussex‘s American Riviera Orchard lifestyle brand, which was first unveiled via jars of strawberry jam Meghan gifted to her glamorous Montecito friends.

However, amid trademark battles as the Duchess, 42, struggles to get the brand off the ground, American Riviera Orchard and its sweet products have gone quiet since the launch in March.

William said he woke up feeling ’emotional’ the day after the Earthshot awards ceremony and ‘excited’ about how well it had gone.

Joining presenters Heidi Klum, Winnie Harlow, Billy Porter and Tobe Nwigwe for a traditional South African Braai, or barbecue, at Kalk Bay in Cape Town, William told them: ‘I really appreciate all your support,’ to which Winnie relied: ‘It was an honour.’

William said: ‘I woke up this morning feeling quite emotional and excited.’

Heidi Klum, who presented one of the Earthshot awards the night before, said: ‘I was emotional on the stage.’

William had travelled by boat to picturesque fishing village of Kalk Bay on the final day of his four day visit to Cape Town to see the work of Abalobi, a 2023 Earthshot prize finalist which works with local fishermen to categorise and track their hauls.

He was met with shouts of ‘We love you, William’ and met Abalobi co-founder Serge Raemaekers who introduced the Prince to local fishermen and a team of fisherwomen involved in the Abalobi monitoring programme.

Fisherwoman and lead in Abalobi’s monitoring programme Casha de Vos told the Prince that they measure and weigh the fish before cataloguing the details on the Abalobi database.

William held a yellow tail fish and told the fishermen: ‘You’re the trail blazers. You’re the leaders.’

He then walked back down the harbour wall to where several Abalobi staff were barbecuing fish for William to try while a guitarist played for him.

At one point locals swimming in the bay shouted up ‘hello Prince William’ and he waved back to them.

However a small group of protestors shouted ‘Our people, our bones’ and one held a banner which read: ‘William, you have no sovereignty here.’

Others shouted loudly: ‘You are welcome, we love you.’

Sarah Niemond from the fishing community of Buffeljagsbaai told him that a pot of her jam had once been taken back to Buckingham Palace.

She said: ‘Seven years ago someone from your country bought this South African jam and they bought it and took it back to England and they gave it to your grandmother and that jam was standing in the picture.’

She said it was an honour to meet the Prince ‘face to face’.

William then sat down to try the fish with his fellow Earthshot presenters.

Speaking afterwards, Heidi Klum said: ‘He has been so amazing, so welcoming to all of us and quite normal in a way.’

Winnie Harlow said that what William was doing reminded her of the work carried out by his late mother, Princesss Diana.

The model said: ‘I’ve heard so much about Diana and her charity work and being with him really felt like an extension of her. It really was a beautiful moment to see him following on her footsteps.’

After the engagement, Abalobi executives addressed the small protest.

Serge Raemaekers, the co-founder of Abalobi, said: ‘I have a feeling that the noise in the background was very much around the fact that we haven’t reached these fishing communities yet. We’re still a relatively small programme trying to scale and as you can see here there are quite a lot of boats with fishermen and fisherwomen that come from a lot of different areas. Through apartheid and post-apartheid there’s no fishing community here anymore. There’s a whole bunch of fishers who are able to have their boat here but they live far and wide. We haven’t been able to reach them all but we’ve started working with the cooperatives from Kalk Bay.

‘I’m imagining that this fishery felt ‘Hey, I’m being left out here’ and I understand. In the last couple of years small scale fishers have had a tricky engagement with obtaining fishing rights.’

Meanwhile William, who has been flanked by A-listers Winnie Harlow and Heidi Klum during his tour of Cape Town as part of his Earthshot project, gladly accepted his jar of conserve as he appeared to share a joke with the fishermen. However, he was greeted by protests later in the visit from others in the fishing community who felt they had been excluded from the visit.

Earlier in the morning, the Prince of Wales admitted he ‘missed this life’ as he took to the seas with a lifeboat crew.

He met volunteers working for the National Seas Rescue Institute (NSRI) to hear about their lifesaving work and asking what inspired them to get involved.

Before donning a life jacket and heading out with the crew, he asked how choppy the water was and joked that he should possibly be wearing more kit so he did not get wet.

He also revealed that he was trying to teach his three children about rip tides and admitted he wished his family was with him on the trip.

Asked by one member of the crew if he had ever done search and rescue work, he replied: ‘I miss this life. Any chance to get back, I’ll take.’

The Prince trained as a search and rescue helicopter pilot at RAF Valley in Anglesey, North Wales before working as a pilot with the East Anglian Air Ambulance from March 2015 until July 2017.

He was greeted on arrival by Mike Vonk, CEO of NSRI, and was given a short tour of the base before chatting with members of the team about mental health support for first responders, an issue about which he feels particularly strongly.

‘Nice windy day today,’ he joked. ‘How are the seas today? It’s quite choppy!’

In the operations room, the Prince was shown the various pieces of equipment and technology that they use to monitor the waters.

He appeared impressed, saying he had never seen such kit before, and joked that he would have to download the app at home so he could track them.

‘We are trying to teach the children to understand currents,’ he said.

‘The problem with rips is that you don’t know where they are going to appear.’

The Prince asked if riptides occurred on every beach in Cape Town. ‘Driving down the road here, if you look out you can see so much silt being taken out,’ he said. ‘It’s good to use those apps to inform your work.’

Captain Andrew Dekock told him: ‘It’s changed our lives;’ to which William replied: ‘I bet it has.’

He asked about the gaps between each lifeboat station and how many miles each crew covered. He also asked if it was predominantly tourists who got into trouble as locals were more informed of the dangers.

Capt Dekock asked him about his efforts to promote access to swimming lessons through his Royal Foundation.

‘Bearing in mind the UK is an island, we should all know how to swim,’ the Prince said. ‘It’s a life skill that might save your life one day.’

The Prince then donned a red waterproof coat and life jacket before the boat slowly made its way out of the base headed for Kalk Bay, where he met the fishermen.

There, he was met by huge adoring crowds waving South African flags, as he took part in an impromptu walkabout.

He was given some beaded key rings to take home for his family.

Kate Wardle, 46, from Kalk Bay revealed she had had them especially made- handing him two in the shape of a W and a C and three in animal shapes for the children.

‘Thank you very much, they’ll love those. Never go home empty handed, that’s important,’ he said.

 

 

However, despite receiving a warm reception from the adoring crowds, William’s walkabout inadvertently caused some upset among some in the fishing community who were protesting over the loss of rights for fishermen in the area.

Rifiek Isaac, deputy chair of a small scale fishing organisation, said he was angry that Abalobi had been chosen as they don’t represent the local fishermen.

‘We would have loved to meet the Prince, it’s not about him. We don’t like that company using our Harbour. We fish here.,’ he said.

Duwayne Baulse, 29, who has been a fisherman for 15 years since he left school, shouted angrily from his fish stall kept apart from William by the medal cordon.

The independent fishermen and women said they all were angry because they were not included in the engagement.

William was meeting 2023 Earthshot Finalist, Abalobi, Kalk Bay Harbour.

Duwayne said afterwards: ‘They aren’t based here and they don’t buy our fish.

‘People only come here when it is sunny. We are here in the rain and storms.

‘They have excluded us. William has not come to look at our fish.

‘No one told us the Prince was coming.

‘Afalobi don’t support us. This is our harbour.

‘We are not angry with him (William). We want people to come here more often. Not this set up.

‘It’s like a stage they put on in North Korea.’

There was also a lone protestor holding a sign saying: ‘William you have no sovereignty in our country.’

Nicholette De Mink said: ‘He needs to leave. He has no jurisdiction here. We have ordered him to leave. He is not acknowledging us but we will shout it anyway.’