Wine Country

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Finally we entered South Africa, the final country in our tour. Our first stop was this amazing little vineyard called Highlanders, which is located in a small area called Trawal. It is so beautiful. I LOVE WINE COUNTRY!!! Sparky was our wine guide for the tasting and the wine here was very good. South Africa is supposed to be famous for the pinot age grapes; however, so far I have not found one that I have liked enough to buy. I did buy a bottle of their Merlot after the tasting. This night was also the last night that we had to sleep in our tent. I was very sad in the morning, to pack the tent up for the last time but I was also pretty happy. Before we took the tent down Jen and I shared our last breakfast in the tent. It was a very nice good bye to lion.

That morning we headed to Stellenbosch, the true wine country in South Africa. This town was the first place that we stopped that gave a distinct feeling that I was no longer in Africa. Stellenbosch is a university town, but also very chic because it is located in wine country. Jen and I enjoyed a great lunch and I ate my first fish in a long time.

On August 17th, we went for a wine tasting with Easy Rider wine touring company. Our driver Tete was a stoner that really didn’t focus too well. At one point in the tour a song came on the radio that he turned up full blast, proclaiming his love for it and then told us that we were not allowed to leave the van until the song was over.

The first winery that we visited was Simonsig. This was a very nice winery and I saw a cork tree for the first time in my life; the bark feels just like cork, if you can believe that. From this winery I bought a bottle of their Tiara Bordeaux Blend, which was one of their flagship wines, it was also one of their expensive wines which was 126 Rand or $15US. If I lived here I would for sure become a wino. The second winery that we went to was Fairview. This is the winery that makes Goats do Roam, which is sold in the states. This winery was awesome because we also got to do a cheese tasting, yummy. The third winery was Dieu Donne and it was horrible. The final winery that we visited is one the oldest wineries in South Africa called Boschendal, this winery has been around since 1685. I didn’t spend much time in this winery because Brigette, a lady in our group had been cut off. I tried to take her for a walk around the grounds to try to distract her. After our wine tour we went back to the hostel and had a great bbq and smoked some hookah, I never knew tobacco could taste good.

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