A Lovely Way to Spend a Sunday Morning

During the years that we have been visiting South Africa, an activity on Sunday has become a firm favourite of ours notably a visit to the family market at Blaauklippen Vineyard.  It's held every Sunday and appears to be very popular with locals and visitors alike attracting large numbers during the opening times of 10am until 3pm.

This is one of the oldest wine estates in the whole of South Africa and was established in1682 on the side of the Stellenbosch Mountain which provides quite a spectacular backdrop.  The name of the estate comes from a Dutch word meaning Blue Rocks although I can't shed any light onto why so called?

It's a delightful place to spend a couple of hours.  Families getting together for picnics under the magnificent trees, live music to listen to, lots of stalls selling home made crafts and then an incredible array of foods being cooked and consumed on site.  In addition you can taste the Blaauklippen wines and artisan beers or indeed buy a bottle or two and sit consuming it while people watching, a favourite of ours.  That's people watching, not drinking!  We introduced my big brother to the experience last year and are looking to do the same next week when our friends Ann and Paul arrive.

Every time we have visited, it has been under beautiful clear blue skies and today was no exception.  In fact the  mercury climbed north of 35 degrees today and we were grateful for the cover that the trees provided. The weather does add rather a lot to the occasion.

And so our stay at The NH Lord Charles ends in the morning and we move to our home for the next five weeks which is actually only a stones throw away.  Bags are packed and from tomorrow we start catering for ourselves instead of having our every need looked after by the hotel staff.  This has been a lovely four days allowing us to reacquaint ourselves with the hotel but more importantly  the ever smiling staff and I hope that it won't be the last time that we stay here.