What a month!!!

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Oh my word.

Trying to renew your tourist visa in June proved very difficult.

Thursday from hell. Home Affairs not being able to renew my tourist visa, 9am, change my air ticket to leave the country 10:30am.

It had to be the worst day of my life! The poor car guard at home affairs didn't know how to deal with this blubbering wreck!! When all the help your receive from South African officials is 'you'll have to leave the country'! what the ... do you do!

On the plus side I was now thinking I was going home to see my family and defrost from the cold spell we were experiencing!!!

But until Sundays flight I had the Wacky Wine weekend to contend with.

Friday lunch time, after having taken sleeping tablets to calm me down! we headed off to Robertson and a weekend of wine tasting.

Our first winery was Kleinhoekkloof were we met up with our group. They had been at the festival all day so you can imagine what state they were in by the time we got there!! I discovered their White merlot and proceeded to buy three bottles.

The views from the winery were amazing, bean bags on the grass and live music, a defo visit if your in the area.

We then headed back to our accommodation. There were approx 25 people crampt into the kitchen which will happily house 13 people around the table!!!

The next day, with a few people nursing devastating hangovers we headed out, on todays list was Lords, platform 62, Springfield, Klip drift and Graham Beck on the night to watch Arno Carstens in an intimate concert.

For me the highlight was Graham Beck, not only is it famous for its MCC /Champagne (my favourite type of drink) but the decoration was awesome. we had a reserved seating area, couches and funky seating and lighting.

Shame one of our group fell over drunk with a glass in her hand, which had to have stitches!!!! Unfortunatly the first aiders didn't really have the kit to deal with her and after they first tried to put a plaster on the gushing finger, much to my disgust. we bandaged it up and she slept on the couch all through the concert!!!

Sunday saw me catching a late flight out of Cape Town and back to Birmingham.

Upon my return to South Africa, and the nervous passage through passport control I had a weekend of birthday celebrations ahead of me. Not mine!!

We headed up the coast towards Hermanus, where we were meeting at the venue. The birthday girl had booked a manor house at Stanford Hill winery.

All food and wine was included and we experienced an awesome venue. The accommodation was lovely, very rustic over looking the farm with deer, horses and cows. The wine tasting room was just like a small hut with a covered seating area for drinking and eating, log burning stove and amazing food and wine.

After most people had topped up the levels on Saturday and we had all enjoyed a Mezze lunch at the tasting room we headed off to Die Kelders to Coffee on the rocks. The weather was amazing and we sat enjoying coffees, hot chocs and beer whilst looking out over the sea. The warm winter sun had bought everyone out.

Some of us were watching Wales loose the rugby to South Africa by 1 point and the rest were watching the Whales frolic in the bay. The first sighting of the season we were told!!

The weekend was brilliant, everyone was really nice and we all had a fab time, drinking dancing and singing.

Thanks Gilly, the birthday girl.

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