Archive for December, 2012

A Wine Tour to Stellenbosch

Thursday, December 27th, 2012

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About a week ago we went on a Wine tour. It was a great success and I would like to encourage anybody visiting Cape Town to do the same, even if you only have limited time and/or local knowledge at hand. One day is enough to visit at least three vineyards and it doesn’t have to be expensive. You only need to rent a car, get a map (or a navigator) and do some minor research. Or you can skip the research and just follow our route.

I don’t pretend to know much about wine in general, and my knowledge of South African wine in particular was very limited before we went on this trip. My only preparations, the evening before, included some browsing of an old edition of Frommer’s South Africa and studying and printing of some Google maps showing driving directions.

I had chosen three vineyards in Stellenbosch, based partly on the descriptions in the guide and partly based on their location with respect to each other and the distance to downtown Cape Town – we were staying at Royal Cape Town Yacht Club. Each of these vineyards is different from the other ones, with different architecture, settings and views. All of them were worth visiting and all produce great wine.

Our first stop was at Vergenoegd, only about a 50 km drive from Cape Town, less than an hour. Their main building is a magnificent old Dutch mansion, probably built in the late 1600s. We started the day with a taste of one of their white wines and then tasted three great red wines, rounding up with a port wine and finally bought a case of assorted reds for Christmas.

Our next stop was at Rust en Vrede, in a fantastic setting at the end of Annandale road. Their red wine (they don’t make whites) was chosen by Nelson Mandela to be served at the Nobel Peace Price dinner and one of their wines was nominated as the first South African red wine in the Top 100 Wines of the World. Their restaurant has also been nominated as one of the Top 100 Restaurants.

On the way to our last vineyard we made a stop in the centre of the charming town of Stellenbosch, where we recommend a visit to Oom Sami Se Winkel, a general dealer with an amazing inventory.

We chose our last vinyard Tokara because of the views from its restaurant. Their modern architecture and art exhibition also make for an intresting experience. Tokara produces red wines, white wines, brandy and olives.

From Tokara we could have driven on to Franschhoek, said to be the prettiest valley in the Winelands, but we decided we had experienced enough vineyards for one day.

All wines at all three estates were excellent, and very reasonably priced. It was a good day indeed.

The Longest Day – Christmas Memories

Monday, December 24th, 2012

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In Scandinavia, the most important moment of Christmas takes place around 18:00 on Christmas Eve, at least if you ask the children. This is usually the time Santa arrives and all the presents are delivered. In the rest of the world they have to wait until the morning of Christmas Day, December 25th, as Santa cannot be everywhere at the same time.

The day of Christmas Eve is the longest day of the year; you can ask anybody who has been a child in Scandinavia. It feels like it will never be evening, the time passes very slowly and you are likely suffering from a stomach disease. As a pastime our parents brought us along delivering flowers and gifts to friends and relatives and lighting candles on of the graves of our ancestors. Usually, as I remember, there used to be a lot of snow.

As a tradition, in our family, most Christmas Eves were celebrated at the home of my grandparents together with our cousins. Therefore, when all were present, there were quite a lot of people, 8 adults and 7 children. Usually the children were seated at a separate table, which was a relief, as in those days, if seated at the same table as the adults; children were not expected to speak if they weren’t expressly addressed by an adult.

When dinner was finally finished, everybody gathered in the drawing-room, except my father, who suddenly remembered that he had forgotten to lock the car. Unlucky for him, but Santa Claus happened to arrive when he was away. I think my father never met Santa during all those years.


Christmas Eve 1956


Christmas Eve 1961 – dress code: tuxedo

My grandmother was famous for giving great presents in generous amounts. I later learned that she used to buy them all year around, every time she happened to find something she thought would be a great Christmas gift. However, she tried to treat all children equally, and therefore the boys often got identical presents as did the girls. So when my cousins had unwrapped their Meccano sets, I instantly knew what was inside the same size parcel that had my name on it.

This photo is from around 1960 or 1961. Cousin Micce and I have just received those Meccano sets. But take a look at the style of our clothing, even for kids. Jacket and tie – and still buttoned although the party must have gone on for several hours already. Micce was probably only 7 years old and I must have been 11. They don’t make kids like this anymore, ha-ha. But Micce, those brown shoes …

Brompton Stupidity

Friday, December 21st, 2012

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Some time ago the inner tube of a tyre on one of our folding Brompton Bikes broke – the stiff valve broke off from the soft rubber, impossible to repair. I started to look for a replacement tyre, but the weels are of such a small size that it seemed impossible to find a tyre in South Africa. I looked at Bromptons home page (they are located in England) and found that they do not have a distributor in SA, so I sent them a mail, asking form a quotation for two inner tubes to be delivered in Cape Town. Their reply was astonishing:

– “We do not have a dealership in South Africa. We are unable to ship directly to you as we expect each Brompton to be checked by a qualified mechanic prior to being given to the customer to ensure it is of the highest safety and standard.”

We own two expensive Brompton Bikes. One of them is now useless because of a simple flat tyre. You would think that it would be in Brompton’s interest to keep their customers happy, when it would simply require sending a new tyre by mail. Instead they refuse because, in their opinion, the replacement of an inner tube needs to be checked by a qualified mechanic.

I have never heard of such nonsense before. Surely there cannot be a more simple service task on a bike than replacing a flat tyre! And adding insult to injury, they informed us, that we could contact their nearest distributor in South AMERICA! Thanks a lot, why not a dealer in Japan?

We have had these bikes on board for 12 years (photo above is from Nassau, Bahamas, 10 years ago) and they have been very useful. I have changed the tyres and inner tubes numerous times, but this time we didn’t have a spare on board.

This is apparently how Brompton rewards their loyal customers. Thanks for buying our bikes but we will not send you any spares.

I guess this must be a classic case, where the manufacturer turns down an opportunity to earn goodwill and instead caused a lot of bad will.