Day 13 Thur 19th May 2011
Stellenbosch Day!!
Well we have arrived in Stellenbosch & checked into our first official hostel called the Stumble Inn. We can't actually get into our room until 2pm so we check our bags into a lock up & go & get some breakfast at a nearby place called the Trumpet Tree. We head back & grab a quick freshen up & some bits then get a shuttle bus to the Spier. It looks like such a huge place we haven't a clue where to start, so we ask for a lift on a golf buggy cart to the other end of the property. This is where the cheetah sanctuary is so we have a stroll around & decide to go in, as we get through the gate they are just about to close for lunch on the cheetah stroking so spur of the moment us & another couple manage to squeeze in. It was an absolutely amazing experience stroking a wild cat (Joseph) which at the time was fast asleep; he was so soft & gorgeous. All of a sudden while one of the guides is taking pictures Joseph wakes up to face us. Fortunately there was a keeper standing near its head & he reassured us that it was ok & if we could move around to the back of him slowly so that we could keep stroking him, though it scared the *?!* out of us, he then started purring it was fantastic. After this we had a tour of the small wild animal park where we saw 2 really funny meerkats & learnt a little about the history of the cheetah sanctuary.
Next stop was the Spier Winery where we bought a taster session for R30 each, here we got to try 5 wines each, so we decided to buy a cheese platter to help soak up some of the alcohol. It was really good fun & even Dan found a wine that he enjoyed even if it was only a little bit. Well 1 out of 10 can't be bad for a wine hater can it!! After this we went for a long walk around the grounds & found ourselves walking into the middle of a big conference. After a few canopies we realized we shouldn't be there and headed to the Spier Hotel bar, here we had a cocktail each & relaxed.
Last stop was the Moyo Restaurant, 1 word…WOW I've never seen such a huge outdoors restaurant & so much food on offer in my life. We had booked a table for up in the treetops and it was a really good viewing though they were having problems with some of their lighting so we moved downstairs to the main area. The starter was a salad with a raspberry drizzle & Turkish style flat bread smothered with coriander & salt but it was tasty. Then came the buffet style food all meat cooked fresh in front of you just too how you like it. Plenty of salad's, rice, potato & so much more you can't even imagine, so 2 plates later & onto the desert it was, with so much food you really were spoilt for choice, though I have to say the lemon tart & vanilla custard was amazing, of course Dan went for the chocolate. All in all a fantastic day & so we headed off back to our hostel for our first night sleep which wasn't very difficult. Not before managing to Skype both families back home so that we could share our adventures so far.