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Overcast in the morning... so we decided to stay close by going to KWV (South Africa's largest wine producers with an office just across the street from our B&B) for a tour before having a picnic at the Nederburg winery.
The KWV tour was interesting... the place is huge! There was a seven-minute video intro to the very slick tour. Lots of huge barrels with intricate carvings filled with lee wine so the wood wouldn't dry out. The wine tasting at KWV was good - although it was a bit early in the day (the tour started at 10am) and the guide took the tasting very seriously. The size and scope of the KWV tour was quite a contrast to the smaller, more intimate setting of Lanzerac the previous day.
We went to Nederburg (www.nederburg.co.za) after KWV for what we expected to be a lunch where we learnt about wine pairings... it was actually a picnic in a very romantic setting. Beautiful estate, a lovely colonial-furnished room that smelled of old wood and wax polish (at this point it had started raining heavily... so there was no way the picnic was going to be outside!) and strange musak that featured classics like House of the Rising Sun on the accordion.
Lunch was very filling and afterwards we wandered the estate a bit and saw the Nederburg museum. The whole experience was pretty absurd and there was a lot of laughter.
Then it was on to the Fairview Winery (www.fairview.co.za) and the goats! Four goats in total... and they actually were hanging out on the tower like the picture on the wine bottles. We did a tasting, but didn't buy anything as they have pretty good distribution and Fairview wines are pretty easy to get in Vancouver/London.
After a quick stop at the B&B, where John had a nap, we went for a walk through an orchard towards a Paarl nature reserve and the Africaans language monument.
We had visited the Taal Africaans (the only language monument I'd ever been to) the previous day. What a strange place. It's on the top of a hill looking over wine country and the views were astonishing... the actual monument is a series of concrete shapes that are somehow supposed to represent the origins of the Africaans language.
The Cape Winelands are an amazing place.
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