Wine Country - Franschhoek

 

Franschhoek is a small town in South Africa's Western Cape settled by the French Huguenots around 1688 fleeing religious persecution in Europe. It's located in a river valley surrounded by Swiss Alp style hills and was once inhabited by elephants who brought their calves there for safety. The Hugenots brought viniculture with them and it's now famous for its wine production. Most of the wineries have wine tasting for a small fee, like usd$5.00 or less. It is usually a heavily visited tourist area, but in Covid Season the crowds were light and it was really pleasant. There are dozens of wineries in this valley and in surrounding areas of the Western Cape.

The winery buildings are impressive with their Cape-Dutch architecture, including thatched roofs and couple of hundred year old histories

 

My favorite winery was Eiekhof Winery, as it was focused on this rusty stuff. A 1942 right-hand drive flatbed Ford truck was parked under the oak trees in the backyard where the wine tastings were held at picnic tables . The right-hand drive export models were mostly manufactured in Canada. The winery's owner told us this was his grandfather's truck and he remembers driving it as a kid.

You can see the truck on the label of this bottle of port. They don't use the word Port here as that is supposed to be limited to Portuguese wines. In South Africa they call it Cape Ruby. 

Here I am proudly displaying one of my newly purchased bottles of port.

To keep everyone somewhat sober, they offer some nice mixed plates to help the wine go down.

You gotta keep these guys out of the vines.

The valley is surrounded by these cloud covered peaks.

California dreaming.

If I understand correctly, all the vineyards are started with a generic grape. Then when the vine gets older than a toddler, they put signs into the fields to encourage it to morph into the type of grape needed for the wine they wish to produce.

Massey Ferguson 35X, probably a 1960's model that has hauled a lot of grapes.

We visited the Huguenot Museum, but decided not to enter this room. 

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After we got back from playing in the wine gardens, we went to work on Georgia. Hauled on the slipway in the Royal Cape Yacht Club. Dropped the rudder for inspection, changed out a through hull valve, painted the bottom and waxed the hull. Out on Monday, back in on Friday. We're happy with that. Now tucked back in the V&A Waterfront marina with the seals and otters and other cruisers. 

 

Paul