CapeTown, Day 2 – Wine Country!

(Written by Jess, posted by TJ)

The breakfast we started our day with at the Acorn House is deserving of its own blog post, but there are more African experiences yet to be had, so a picture will have to take the place of those thousand words.

 Our Afrikaans friends – along with everyone else in South Africa – had sworn that no trip to Cape Town was complete without a visit to wine country. We grudgingly heeded their vaguely ominous advice and resigned ourselves to a day meandering through picturesque wine country, tasting some of the country’s best wines. (How we suffer!)

We’re often struck by the difference in how folks perceive distance in South Africa, and Cape Town was no different. The “very long drive” to an area that a person “couldn’t possibly visit in less than one day” took about 30 minutes and wound along some of the most beautiful road we’ve seen in South Africa.

We tried to stick with boutique vineyards, or any vineyard that was supposed to have a remarkable view. The views were stunning and the experience was great, but in my opinion none of the wines we tasted compared to a brand of grocery-store pinotage we bought our first week in country and which I have apparently fallen blind-head-over-heels in love with. [1]

An attempt to have a charming lunch in the Afrikaans town of Stallenbosch was slightly foiled by a general lack of non-chain restaurants (at least that we could find) so our exploration of the actual town at the heart of wine country was limited. [2] We finally found a crowded restaurant which oddly was filled and staffed completely with white folks, and where I made the funny mistake of asking the waiter what he recommended between a salad and a steak. Have we mentioned how much meat they eat here?  That said, I left with no regrets, as my green-fig-and-blue-cheese smothered steak was delicious.

After a bit more wine tasting we meandered our way back to the city, watched the sun set at yet another beach, and then enjoyed a quiet night at the Acorn House. [3]

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1. TJ:  I continue to be impressed with the quality of the wines we’ve had here, which have been among the best I’ve ever tasted.  The prices aren’t bad either: only 5 Rand ($0.52) would get us a tasting of six wines, all poured with heavy hands. 

2. TJ:  Although the wines were as good as back in Sonoma Valley and many of the wineries almost as chic, the town looked like any other suburb we’ve seen so far.  It was a bit surprising given the draw of the region, the extensive history of the town (second colony after Cape Town) and the importance of the region to the Afrikaner culture.  I think I’ve become so used to seeing one jaw-dropping sight after another that a strip mall just does not impress.

3. TJ:  With complementary port in the evenings!