Meerkats, Wine and Beaches

Before leaving Plettenberg Bay we visited Robberg Nature Reserve on the peninsula at the end of the Bay. This is where we had snorkelled with seals the previous day. There is a lovely hike here which takes you high on the cliffs above the colony and then back along the other coast where there is a “whale’s tail” island that you can climb. It was super windy and the top of the Tail was really precarious as the wind was strong and gusty but it’s an incredibly pretty place and definitely worth visiting.

Just 30km down the road from Plettenberg Bay is Knysna, another well known town on the Garden Route. There is a very nice viewpoint of the area called Knysna Heads that looks back across the lagoon towards the town. We also checked out Leisure Island – a small island which looks like a lovely place to have a house, and Knysna Waterfront with its pretty harbour and shopping.

However Knysna was really just a stop over for us before heading inland to explore the Oudtshoorn area. We stayed at an inexpensive backpackers hostel and enjoyed a great meal out at Freshline Fisheries, a seafood restaurant attached to a fisheries warehouse at the edge of town. The tables were set out in a rustic tent on an artificial beach. It had a lovely atmosphere and the seafood was excellent, just note this is a BYO restaurant so don’t forget to take a nice bottle of wine with you to enjoy with your meal.

On our way through to Oudstshoorn, which is off the Garden route and inland, we decided to check out some of the beaches along the coast. These South African beaches are big, long, wild and mostly deserted. They would be perfect if it wasn’t for the sharks, strong currents and rip tides making you think twice before going in for a dip!

We visited Breton on Sea, Buffel’s Bay and Gerricke’s Point where Sarah had a rush of blood to the head and purchased a small plate from a beachside vendor – the selling point being that it can be used to grate garlic easily!

The last beach stop was probably the most beautiful at the small town of Wilderness. The beach here is as big and wild as any of them and seems to go on forever.

Above the town, down a gravel track is the launching point for paragliders as well as a viewpoint of a local attraction called The Map of Africa.

After retracing our steps down the gravel track we headed back out onto the main road to Oudtshoorn (a town whose name we really struggle to say – best we can figure is it’s pronounced Oats-warren?!). As we headed inland the temperature started to rise and by the time we arrived it was nudging 40c. Luckily for us our accommodation had a small but cool swimming pool to take the edge off.

The first thing we had arranged to do here was a trip to see Meerkats in the wild. This involved getting up very early as we had to be at the meeting point before sunrise.  When we arrived, we picked up a camp chair at the meeting point and walked around 800m through the scrub to a burrow where a family of meerkats had slept the night before.

A meerkat family (called a mob) usually varies between 10 and 15 individuals in size and they move around between different burrows in their territory so that predators don’t learn where they are.

We set down our chairs in a rough semi-circle, at a good distance away so as not to disturb them (there were about 14 people in the group) and waited for the Meerkats to emerge. It didn’t take long before the first one appeared and sat back on his tail to survey the world.

Meerkats like to warm up in the morning before starting their day and they stand up, resting on their hinged tails, with their bellies pointed to the sun to warm themselves for up to an hour before starting their day foraging for food.

It wasn’t long until the whole family of 13 meerkats were up and about and sunning themselves.

We had a great view of their morning routine and we sat and watched them until they started to move off to forage. This group had set up home next to an Alfalfa field which hosts loads of the insects that they like to eat.

The very early start gave us plenty of time for other activities that day so after finishing with the Meerkats we drove to the Cango Wildlife Ranch, which is a cross between a zoo and a rescue centre for animals.

On arrival we had an hour long tour of the place with a knowledgeable guide who told us something about the animals including pygmy hippos (critically endangered), crocodiles and big cats.

The main reason we decided to visit this place was because the ticket included an animal experience. I opted to meet the Cheetahs and Sarah opted for the Lemurs.

Sarah was up first and she was led into the Lemur enclosure where she got to sit with a couple of Lemurs for around 10 minutes while they were fed.

After that, I was led into the Cheetah pen and was allowed to stroke one of the cheetahs while it was occupied licking a popsicle made from blood! It was an amazing experience to be so close to such a beautiful predator and it is so sad that these lovely creatures are so endangered.

After finishing up at the Wildlife Ranch we headed off for a drive over Swarzberg Pass, a mountain pass on a gravel road. We were a bit dubious as to whether we had the right car for the job but as it turned out the road wasn’t too bad and the little Starlet did a great job. The scenery on this drive between Oudtshoorn and Prince Albert was stunning and if you are in the area we highly recommend it. You can do this as a loop drive and 5km from Prince Albert the road is paved all the way back to Oudtshoorn. There was also some much needed relief from the baking heat on the loop back with a cooling swim at Meiringspoort Waterfall, which was a quick climb up from the road and set in a beautiful canyon that felt like a real oasis.

After a long hot day we were happy to get back to our accommodation and sit in our pool with a nice cold beer.

The next morning we were up fairly early again as we had a long distance to cover. First up however was a visit to Safari Ostrich Farm just outside Outdshoorn. The town itself was actually built on ostrich wealth and there are several large old houses in town, known as ostrich palaces, that were built on wealth from ostrich farming when ostrich feathers and skins were highly prized in high society.

The tour itself started off on a tractor pulled trailer taking us through the pens of ostrich while our guide explained the differences between the different types of ostrich.  Basically the original South African Ostrich is called the Southern Variety and it was cross bred with the Zimbabwe Blue Ostrich to create the South African Black Ostrich which had better plumage for the international market.

While we were driving past we could feed the ostriches with some kibble that we had bought earlier. Although we needed to keep a strong grip on the containers, as you can imagine there is a lot of force behind those big beaks!

After a tour of the pens we then alighted from the trailer and walked around the areas where the young and baby ostriches were housed. There was one particular newly born ostrich that was determined to escape his pen and actually managed to get out twice while we were there.

Overall it was an informative and interesting tour and gave us a good insight into the animals themselves and the trade that built the wealth of the area.

After learning all about ostriches our destination for the day was the town of Robertson, which is known as a wine producing town. This meant driving along Route 62 which is promoted by the tourism industry as the South African equivalent of route 66 in the USA. Think lots of restaurants and small towns trying to cash in.

A small section of the route is pretty and the road passes through a high pass which is attractive but overall the route was a bit disappointing. I guess we had high expectations after the stunning scenery of the Swarzberg Pass drive the previous day.

One stop that did stand out though was Ronnie’s Sex Shop. This is a bar in the middle of nowhere that started out as a shop. It was set up by the eponymous Ronnie, and as a joke, his friends later added the Sex moniker to the sign, which stuck.

The bar itself is quite small and the walls are plastered with graffiti, bank notes and other things, and from the ceiling hang hundreds of signed bras donated by patrons. We stopped off for a drink and met the characterful Ronnie, his wife and son (who was behind the bar) before getting back on the road and continuing on our way.

We stopped off at a couple of towns on route but none that particularly enamoured us and ended the day in the town of Robertson where we arranged to go on a wine tour the following day.

We were picked up by our driver at 10am and whisked to our first winery (which also turned out to be our favourite), Springfield. The winery is in an attractive lakeside setting with tables set out under shady trees. They were well set up for tastings and we were given a paper sheet where we could select 5 wines each for only 70 Rand (around £3). They also provide you with a carafe of water, crackers and some olives.

We were slightly surprised at the first glass which was about half a glass of wine and realised that planning four wineries might have been more than we could manage!

The Springfield wines were great, I think the reds were slightly better than the whites but the Cap Classique which is the South African Champagne was actually very tasty and definitely rivals some of the French Champagnes.

Our next winery was Excelsior which also had a beautiful lakeside setting. After tasting three wines which were ok but not as nice as the Springfield wines, we decided to have a go at blending our own wine. This involved tasting three more wines and then deciding how to mix them to create our own bespoke wine.

Taking a bottle we filled it with a mix of shiraz, cabernet and merlot to make our own blend, then we corked it using a corking machine and printed up a label to make our very own bottle – “Starfish Juice” – an in-joke with some friends of ours.

Our third and, as we were running out of time and feeling a bit squiffy, last winery of the day was Van Lovren, where we decided it would be a good idea to have a late lunch before carrying on with more tasting.

After lining our stomachs we went to the bar for another tasting selection of four wines. The Van Lovren wines were very good and we particularly enjoyed the reds.

Luckily the wineries close by 4pm, there’s only so much wine you can drink in a day and by that time we were definitely ready to be driven back to our guesthouse where we crashed for the rest of the evening!