Wine route / Stellenbosch, Cape Town

Spier is a community / winery / estate in Stellenbosch complete with restaurants, shops, a hotel, golf, a spa, horseback riding, a cheetah park and much more. Great for families or couples. Ideally, you could spend two days (including an overnight) here. Among the highlights:

- There are several restaurants at Spier, but we fell in love with Moyo. Moyo is an outdoor dining experience. It's very cozy and surrounded by trees. We sat on couches, and Moyo supplies blankets to wrap yourself in while you eat and relax. There are decks built up into the trees, so effectively you are able to dine in the trees filled with lights. There are also live performers (native dancers, music and drums) to watch while you eat. It's quite an amazing experience!
- Amazing wines! We tasted several reds and whites. The Pinotage (a red) was one of our favorites. We bought several wines which we carried home with us.
- Shopping at Spier is great. There are lots of arts and crafts made by local artisans. I bought a beautiful, hand-woven bag for myself, and a beaded fish mobile for my new niece and nephew. We also saw woven rugs, wood carved bowl, animals and much more.
- At the Cheetah Park you can get up close with the animals, about a foot away, and even feed them. We were in awe of how powerful and graceful they were. You can have a similar experience with eagles in that part of the estate.

Getting to Stellenbosch: Stellenbosch is about 35 minutes from Cape Town. We took a taxi to Spier from Cape Town which was very easy. We simply asked our taxi driver to come back and pick us up and he was back on time. Roundtrip cost us $75 (US) for 3 people.

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This is a very nice and relaxing place on the wine route. They got some nice restaurants here and the thing I like about this place is you can buy all frankfritters , polony ,pastrami and so on and buy your rolls and sauces and drinks from the Deli and just got out side and sit by the lake and have a picnic which is really cool with your family. They have Moyo`s and Eight at Spier which is really nice restaurants. I enjoyed eating at Eight at Spier as the food is nice. Inside the place is decorated with all recycled material including a ceilling made of milk bottle tops and chandeliers made of bleach bottles. They also have cheetah outreach and eagle encounter sections which is great especially for the kids. Also a nice place to do some wine tasting and they have some nice arts and crafts to buy here.

We spent one day touring the wine region.....I was disappointed, with the type of "tour" we took.....it was billed as a winery tour...and it was really a tasting tour....we were taken to various wineries and given several samples of wines and then asked if we wanted to buy some....the prices are so low that we ended up buying some, but we decided that we would drink up since it was bascially a chaffuer service. The wine region is naturally beautiful, with rolling hills and spectucular scenery. I would recommed to do it on your own.....as long as you have some one not drinking drive......The wineries let you try there wines for R10 about $1.25 US for 5 or 6 glasses of wine. Don't expect them to let you try the high end wine's...those are only for sale and for the US traveler it is not worth buying them here...they have the same prices as in the US and you don't have to deal with carrying them or risking the chance of them breaking in your luggage. If you never been to a wine region then come....but if you been to the Hunter Valley, Napa, Loire in France....don't bother there all the same !!!! but otherwise make a trip here !!!!!

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I like wine. And I like to drink wine, not taste it and spit it out. So, the best plan was to take a guided wine tour.

After much research on many topics, my friend booked a wine tour with Glen Christie, the owner of Vineyard Ventures. I can't tell you how satisfied we were with Glen, who has completed multiple Sommelier classes, and sometimes could tell us things about the wines that the people in the tasting rooms didn't share. Not that they were incompetent, she is just a wealth of info. Knows the wine makers, and seems to know everyone else. She even got us a window seat for lunch at Ernie Ells winery at the last minute!

But, even without Glenn, I would still recommend a wine tour. The old farms (some from the 1600's) are beautiful, and, of course, there's the wine.

My favorite wines were at Rust en Vrede.
We also visited:
Morganster (included Olive Oil tasting!)
Vergalegen (Beautiful grounds & where Nelson Mandela hosted the Clintons in 1998)
Meerlust (cool, small winery)
Delaire (newly remolded, beautiful, great outdoor overlook)

G'day Sandi

Just back from 6 1/2 weeks there with my family, 3 kids, and loved every bit driving from Cape Town to Kruger with side trips to the Drakensburg.

We spent 8 full days in Cape Town travelling most days and still there was so much we didn't see. Plus I only got to visit two wineries out of about the 200+ around Cape Town, "Bugger".

If you wanted a recommendation of places to visit, "Spiers Winery", they have cheetah breeding program (kids loved touching the twin cheetah cubs)and birds of prey display, plus stay for dinner, buffet with lots of African dishes, including game meat, with local entertainment with an african theme. We all loved it.

JJ

South Africa's main wine region is located within a 45-90 minute drive west from Cape Town. The primary town in the wine region are Stellenbosch, Franschoek, and Paarl. Many of the wineries offer tastings. Some also have restaurants and other attractions for families. We drove around the Stellenbosch area, and stopped at one of the wineries, the Spier Winery, which also had an animal exhibit with cheetahs for the kids to see. We also spent some time walking around the town of Stellenbosch, which is full of historic buildings that you can tour, as well as good restaurants.

[photo to come]

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South Africa produces some extraordinary wines. There are several wineries one can visit in the course of a day. Most will provide tours explaining the wine-producing process, offer wine tastings and, of course, offer special prices for purchasing their vintage. Do try South African wines, they among the best.

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It is part of the Stellenbosch Wine Route. Zevenwacht literally meaning Seven Expectations, the name Zevenwacht exemplifies the abundant delights which await visitors to the Farm.

"The wines of Zevenwacht are distinguished by their classic style and finely crafted elegance. Winemaker Jacques Viljoen honours century-old wine-making traditions, yet is boldly innovative, welcoming the contribution that modern technology makes to the vinification of premier wines.

Covering 200 hectares of the 450 hectare property, the vineyards are ideally situated for the growing of quality grapes. Zevenwacht is characterized by good quality, varied soils and the vineyards have been selectively planted with red and white noble varietals" quoted from their web-site

It is a fantastic place to go for the day, have a picnic and just relax.

They also have a cooking school on the farm.