For our second day Jen had booked us on a wine tour to the Stellenbosch area. We were collected by our guide, Rodney, who contracts to the tour companies and enjoys wines and wine tours. Also on the trip were a Singaporean couple and their adult daughter who is in her final year at university and spent 6 months studying in Wisconsin. The husband, Richard, has a company that supplies lasers for technical use and isn’t remotely interested in wine. He was a nice guy but would have been happier at the hotel working on his computer. However, happy wife, happy life. His wife, Connie wants to learn about everything including wine. She is a nurse who works for a large pharmaceutical company running clinical drug trials. She was lovely company and very chatty. The daughter, Chris was quieter, like her dad, but also very nice. She is finishing a degree in digital marketing. 
First we travelled to an area just out of Stellenbosch to a winery (they call them wine farms), called Anura.

It is a reasonably small vineyard but sources grapes from other farms and produces one million bottles annually. They provided a tour of the cellar and production with explanation about the process and then a tasting with their own cheeses. Both the wines and cheeses were lovely. 
The next stop was a vineyard in Franshoek which means French corner. The winery is up on the side of a mountain and has a lovely view out over the town and the valley to the mountain ranges beyond. It has evidently been voted by some magazine as best vineyard view in the world. Don’t know that there aren’t some equally fantastic views in Otago and probably France and Italy. However, it is a lovely view and was warm and sunny and they had a nice lawn area where you can sample their wares.

It was called Dieu Donne and had a number of award winning white wines. 
Following the tasting we headed down into Franshoek which is a town a bit like Havelock North. It is a popular place for people to retire to, has lovely restaurants and is very arty. It reminded us both of Parnell.

 We had a couple of starters at a restaurant and then a wander down the street. You can purchase a 4 bedroom mansion on a quarter acre for about $800,000NZ and that is evidently very expensive for Capetown. For NZ$2M you get something that could be a hotel. 
After that we headed to Stellenbosch which is a historic German settlement that has a big university and lots of private schools. It’s an interesting looking place and we got out and walked around an historic house in the centre of town that is open to the public. It is stacked with beautiful Victorian furniture. 

The vineyard near Stellenbosch was called Jordan and also has a lovely view over a water storage reserve and across the valley to the mountains. It was an excellent choice and would make a great lunch venue for the locals. 
Rodney gave an interesting commentary about the various sights as we went along and we both learned a lot. 
We were shocked at the extent of the ‘townships’ outside Capetown, one of which houses over one and a half million people, many of whom live in appalling squalor. Each ‘street’ is supplied with porta-loos and many homes have satellite dishes on the roofs. The government is building houses but as fast as people move out and into a house other people move into the shacks. The houses are small and basic, but luxury in comparison. The motorway cuts between 2 of those townships, which are also close to the airport and next door to a golf course. All along the motorway on the grass bits and between the on and off ramps people were grazing animals and kids were playing football. It would be unthinkable in New Zealand. 
We arrived back at the hotel just after 5.30 to find that we couldn’t get a reservation at one of Sofia’s recommendations (the banker from Angola) but Tamryn at reception booked us into a place called Beluga which was a short taxi ride away. It turned out to be a huge restaurant that was packed with locals and served excellent food. Despite its size it was silver service and people were all well dressed. We thoroughly enjoyed our meal there. 
What wasn’t good was the smell that greeted us when we returned to our room from the wine tour. It was an overpowering chemical smell that turned out to be due to floor sealing being carried out by new tenants to the ground floor offices below. Reception offered to move us and took Mike upstairs to an apartment on the third floor. He couldn’t smell anything so we quickly packed up and moved. I was surprised we were just going 2 floors higher as the smell must rise but it seemed ok. 

The apartment had a separate lounge/kitchen and a washing machine and faced in the opposite direction out over the port. It was a lot noisier from vehicles at the port.We moved prior to going to dinner. 
On our return from dinner, the smell was evident but we were tired and thought we’d make the best of it. At 2am Mike shook me awake. “We are moving”. The smell was awful plus there is construction happening at the port and they were going for it. Mike had been down to reception and we packed up again and were moved to the third floor facing our original direction but at the far end of the building. The room was otherwise the same as our original. Evidently they had to move 5 other guests and were completely unaware the tenants would be carrying out that work. We were offered, and accepted the use of our new room until 5pm on the day we left, which was handy as that is when we were collected by Emirates. 

Not the best, but the hotel staff were very helpful and I would still recommend the hotel as an excellent venue close to the waterfront. Just specify that you want a room facing Table Mountain and not the port!