South Africa Wine Tours
Our South Africa wine tours are based out of Cape Town, a truly spectacular city offering easy access to wine country and so much more to boot! The South African wine scene is both old and new in many ways. Old, as they have been making wine here since 1659 and new, in its climate certainly, but also through the renaissance in winemaking it is experiencing after many difficult and complicated years under apartheid.
The country is making the best wines it has ever made at the moment. Blend this with beautiful mountain scenery, ocean views, and the lovely Cape Dutch architecture and you can see that South Africa is a must-visit for any wine enthusiast!
Arrival in Cape Town
When you arrive we will pick you up at the airport and drive you to your hotel in the center of Cape Town. You have many options on non-wine activities to enjoy such as touring historic landmarks, enjoying the waterfront and beaches, and of course the iconic Table Mountain. The night before you start your wine tours with us we highly recommend spending the evening at a specialist wine bar at the Victoria and Albert Waterfront development where you will be introduced to South African wine.
Our favorite venue for your introductory tasting is the Belthazar wine bar. This stylish restaurant and wine bar has a great location in the waterfront development and has 250 wines available by the glass, allowing you to choose a massive range of wines yourself or let the sommeliers help you choose. We will arrange for one of the sommeliers to receive you and guide you through a flight, thus giving you a great starting point for your coming wine adventures.
Our favorite wine bar, the Belthazar 
Enjoy the fantastic vistas while you taste
We are suggesting two days of wine-related excursions from Cape Town and we will give you an idea below of what they could include. Remember; Everything we do is custom-designed so if you want to include or exclude anything just let us know. All of our wine tours are private and customized to your desires and budget.
Day 1 | Visit Constantia – The First Wine Region
After a leisurely breakfast, we will pick you up and drive 25 minutes or so to the famous Constantia wine region. Our first visit could be Klein Constantia, one of the first estates in the country, hundreds of years old. We will enjoy a tour of the winery, visit the vineyards and the cellars, before enjoying a premium tasting. This winery is particularly famous for its centuries-old dessert wine, Vin de Constance, which is still made in the style of the Capes’s first wines.
After Klein Constantia, we will drive just around the corner to enjoy lunch at the Buitenverwachting restaurant, which is a national icon of classic Cape Dutch architecture which affords great views, wonderful food, and of course a wide range of delicious wines.
Our next stop will be a small boutique winery such as High Constantia. Visiting both large and boutique wineries in one day is a great way of showing contrasts and differences. High Constantia has a great range of quality, Bordeaux style wines featuring varieties such as Cab Sav, Merlot, Petit Verdot, and Cabernet Franc. Drink them now we will but given the structure designed into these wines, you could buy them to age a few years more. As usual, we can see as much of the production side of things as you like, vineyards, tanks, presses, cellars, etc. Then we will enjoy a premium tasting hosted by an expert, showing you the range of wines on offer and a range of styles.
Day 2 | Enjoy Stellenbosch and Franschhoek
Stellenbosch is probably the most famous wine region in South Africa among wine enthusiasts, so of course, we arrange for you to visit. Franschhoek is less well known outside the country but is such a close neighbor that visiting this wine region as a combo or splitting the two regions between two days is easily done.
Our first visit today will probably be at Hartenberg in Stellenbosch, a farm that dates right back to 1692. The estate has passed through a number of different families down the generations but is still and family-owned today. This winery is a very well-respected producer of some of the country’s finest Syrah amongst other great wines. As with nearly all of the wineries we visit, Hartenberg offers tours, lunches, and wine tastings at their facility but in addition, they have other activities to entertain guests; a walking trail with points of interest, birdwatching around the property, and a children’s play area allowing parents to fully relax while eating and sipping.
The vineyard views do not get much better than these in South Africa
We will try to fit in two more wineries today as they are fairly close together, we may need to reduce the visit time for the last winery as lunch will be enjoyed along the way. To be honest, by the time you get to the last winery you don’t need to tour the production areas, we usually have a look at the cellar and enjoy a premium tasting. Remember, you guys decide where you want to visit and taste unless you would like us to suggest with our local knowledge?
The second winery today may be the venue for lunch, or we may choose a restaurant such as the excellent Tokara restaurant in Stellenbosch, which is perched on the mountain pass above the wine region and offers stunning modern architecture, wines, and food. Wineries we can recommend are Kanonkop in Stellenbosch, a larger scale producer famous for its Pinotage. The Stony Brook winery in Franschhoek is another favorite of ours. This small family-owned operation creates some great premium Cabernet-based wines.
Classic Cape architecture at the historic Anthonij Rupert winery
Anthonij Rupert in Franschhoek is another place that is really worth a look and taste. The architecture alone will captivate you, traditional Cape Dutch tasting room dating back to 1833 plus some modern building styles too. Contrasts between old and new are a great feature of South Africa wine tours, so just get in touch, relax and let us show you.
