Let’s start by saying it was a bad hair day!

It can be pretty windy when you’re riding on the top of an open sided wine tram.  Today was all about wine, its history in the region, how the grapes are grown and produced but mostly about how it tastes.

We left Cape Town early by taxi and drove the 50 miles east to Franschhoek. It is flanked by the Drakenstein mountains on 3 sides and was established formally in 1860, 200 years after the French Huguenot refugees settled.  It is a lovely place of French Heritage and Cape Dutch architecture but what mostly attracts the tourists is the wine. This area is famous as the Cape Winelands housing over 500 wineries.  The first vines were planted by the French in 1688. The Wine Estates are vast and now 30% are foreign owned – Richard Branson has an estate here.

Transported by tram, bus and tractor we visited 3 estates, Rickety Bridge, La Bri and Grand Provence.

There were vineyard and cellar tours plus a delicious lunch. It was, at times, a little beyond our understanding, ( where were you Ed?..) as they explained the art, craft and science and the technical processes with incredible machinery.

We learnt about grapes, harvesting, fermentation, stabilisation, filtration – we could go on!!

However,  it was about the tasting and we managed 12 ‘glasses’ – one on the tram, 3 at each estate and 2 at lunch.  We were with 2 others and between the 4 of us we often preferred different wines. Such a personal choice. 

The last tasting was about wine pairing – red with red meat, white with fish/ chicken etc – we’re sure no one ever wondered about which wine would go with nougat.

It was all very fascinating and for those of you thinking we must have staggered back to our hotel, well what happens in the wine lands stays in the winelands. Hic!