Stellenbosch: Wine is Life

I spent this past weekend in the lovely town of Stellenbosch. My good friend from back home in Evanston, Eric, is at Stellenbosch University for the semester, so I hung out with him for the weekend. Friday after class I took the train from Cape Town to Stellenbosch. It reminded me of taking the Metro to visit my favorite Sconnie in Brookfield. The ride was about an hour, and Eric met me at the station. After touring the university (which is very beautiful), we had dinner at this great Lebanese restaurant called Manoushe. We had a really good bottle of white wine from none other than Stellebosch. The restaurant has one chef, who is amazing, and all the flat breads are made at the restaurant rather than store bought and heated up. These flat breads were AMAZING. We had a hummus appetizer and I could have just eaten that, it was so good. For dinner we had these really good wraps made with the flat bread and filled with whatever filling you wanted. We couldn't decide on a dessert, so we got cheese cake and this one specialty dessert, which turned out to be a mountain of fruit and two flat breads with nutella in the middle. We barely ate any of it because we were so totally full. That night we went out with a bunch of Eric's friends, all of who are really fun and friendly peeps. We went to this one really entertaining bar that played very eclectic songs, making for a really fun night.

Our eyes were bigger than our stomachs

On day two we woke up early and went out to breakfast at Java Cafe before hitting the town. We walked all over Stellenbosch and went into probably every single store. Stellenbosh is a really pretty town, with lots of tree-lined streets with beautiful fall colors. There are a ton of little galleries and shops hidden in tiny alleyways and tons of cafes and restaurants. Stellenbosch is also full of old buildings that date back to the beginning of Dutch occupation in South Africa. For lunch we stopped at this little organic cafe that had a delicious a la carte menu and served the only legitimate iced latte I've had in this country. After lunch we went back to Eric's res and rested for a bit. My friends were coming into town that afternoon, so we needed to get our energy back. Earlier in the week I had scheduled a ninety-minute massage for myself in Stellenbosch, so I headed over there and left Eric to rest. This massage was awesome. I had needed one since before coming to South Africa, and it felt so good. The massage I ordered was the 'Super Deluxe Massage' and it was so intense. It even included a hot stone massage. Afterwards, with my hair all messed up and my eyes unable to focus properly, I wandered back to Eric's to grab my stuff and meet my friends at the backpackers.

Beautiful Stellebosch

One of the cheetah statues that are scattered throughout Stellenbosch

We stayed at a backpackers in town that was a little janky but nice none the less. After a quick rest we met Eric at Rustenvelt 5 for dinner. The restaurant is known for it's unusual gourmet burgers. We first ordered a bottle of wine, then scoured the menu. There were so many delicious-sounding burgers to choose from! I ordered the 'trio of cheeses', which had goat, camembert and mozzarella cheese. It was sooooo good. I think everyone loved their choices. We had a yummy brownie for dessert and another bottle of wine and set off for the night.

The crew at dinner

Early the next morning we set off for our whole-day wine tasting extravaganza. First we went to the J.C.LeRoux vineyard, which is the largest maker of the bubbly in South Africa. We tasted five different sparkling wines, which unless you are in France cannot call it Champagne, and for each one had a completely full glass. We were all a little giddy by the end. The guy leading our tasting was fabulous, and was really really funny and eccentric. The second vineyard had such delicious wine. I sent a case home with my favorites. We drove a ways out to the third vineyard, called Fairview, and it was so awesome. At this point we were all pretty drunk and ready to eat. Luckily for us, this place sold cheese and bread along with wine! We even got to do a cheese tasting. Fairview is a fun relaxed vineyard that has the 'Goats do Roam' line of wines. Everything was sooooo good. The last vineyard was ok. We were all so tired and drunk by then that we weren't really tasting the wine anymore. They had this one wine with a name that translated to 'Bird Shit' and it really tasted terrible.

Early morning bubbly at the House of LeRoux

The wine shop of the second vineyard, where I bought my case of wine

Fairview

Final vineyard, so beautiful

They fed us bird shit

After wine tasting it was around four in the afternoon, and we stopped for a bite in an Indian restaurant. It took a little longer than we thought and it was starting to get dark when we got on the train. Little did we know in our daze that we did not get on a train to Cape Town but to the Cape Flats. This was a bad mistake. The Cape Flats is where black South Africans were displaced to during the Apartheid. Though it's an interesting area worth visiting to see the modern-day effects of the Apartheid, it's no place to be at night. It's all informal settlements and the crime rates run high. By the time our train stopped there, it was almost dark. It's never safe to take the train at night, especially not in this area. We hopped on the next train going to Cape Town, which was luckily already at the station, and sat in this compartment that had no windows. There were a few really nice people who could tell we were out of our element and told us where we were and how far we had till Cape Town. It really helped. Eventually we arrived in Cape Town and the cab took forever to pick us up. Erin and I were so thirsty it was like torture. Finally we made it home and I drank five glasses of water and fell asleep. Except for the train detour to the Flats, the weekend was great.

-Sarah

Check out Picasa for more Stellenbosch pictures! http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahcaldwell9/Stellenbosch#