Another hot day...

Monday Jan 18th. Today is also a very hot day so we decided to start our day early. We all met up for breakfast at 8am and left for the Botanical Garden before 9am. It took us only 5 minutes to walk there from our B&B. We spent less than an hour there, and the temperature was rising by the minute.

We checked out of the B&B shortly after and took a drive out of town to Sugarbird Manor Vineyard. This is the start of the 4.3 km vineyard hike, which should take us pass 2 more wineries. On a hot day like today, we should all have brought a water bottle, but since we thought that we'd get hydrated in each of the wineries, we didn't bring any. Unfortunately, wine tasting in those wineries (Stone Hill and Meinert) are by appointment only because there's normally only one person looking after everything. So we had to do the entire hike without water.

The scenery is very nice. We tried some of the grapes on the vine. Some were nice but others not so much (good if you like them sour) Although 4.3 km sounds short, it was more difficult then it sounded because there were many hills to climb... and where there's up, there's down. The ground has lots of loose rocks and it made hiking down a bit slow going. I was fine with my hikers but poor Sandi wore a pair of flat trainers, so she was struggling a bit, trying to not slide. Lucky for her, she decided to change out of her flip flop / thongs before the hike. If you plan on doing the wine tasting on route, remember to book ahead. Don't forget to purchase your permit for the hike in Sugarbird Manor for R30pp.

We finished the hike in less than 2 hrs. Thank god for whoever that invented the cooler. We had nice cool drinks waiting for us in the car. After our re hydration, we took a short 2 minute drive to JC la Roux where everyone participated in the sparkling wine tasting. Well, almost everyone... I don't react well to those bubbles so I passed. Besides, I had to save myself for the next wine tasting.

After JC la Roux, we drove to a town call Paarl for our last wine tasting of the day in KWV Wine Emporium. We made it in time for the wine tour as well. KWV exports their wine and brandy to a number of locations, including Canada and UK. This winery is massive. It's capable of exporting millions of millions of litres of alcohol. It also has one of the largest storage oak barrels that's still in use today, which they bought used from Portugal in 1946. It was dismantled then reassembled in KWV. It took over 2 years to put all the pieces back together. Each one can hold over 200,000 litres and there are 5 in the room. So they're able to store oer 1 million litres in this single room.

Apparently, all of the brandy makers in SA uses the brandy from KWV in their mix. What's the difference between brandy and Cognac? Nothing except for the name. What's the difference between sparkling wine and champagne? If you said no difference except for the name, then you are correct. Give yourself a pat on the back. According to our guide, the method they used to make brandy and sparkling wine are the same as Cognac and champagne. What about the massive difference in price? It's all in the brand name. Next time you pay a massive premium for champagne or Cognac, they the sparkling wine or brandy and see if you can taste the difference.