Wine and Cheese

17^th July-23^rd July – Days 290-296 – Franschhoek and Stellenbosch, South Africa

Bastille Day!!!! Well, not really – the South Africans do like to celebrate all things French with a bottle of wine or 3 and so the celebrations were put off to the weekend. Through a few misunderstandings on both Dixon's and Mav's part, we were sort of invited to come and join the festivities in Franschhoek (Afrikaans for “French Corner”) with some of their friends (who they knew through the South African cyclists we all met in Sudan and with which Dixon and Mav had spent two weeks in Mozambique partying while we missed the party due to my parents being over for a visit).

A respectable pair sampling a respectable bottle of wine

Thus we yet again put our lives in Dixon's hands and rode up to Frenchyland in the infamous rustmobile. As usual when Dixon is driving, the journey itself was half the fun, even if the actual driving bit of it is getting better and better. To give some idea of what happens when riding with Dixon: a vuvuzela was blown from out of the driver's window with two hands a few times whilst driving, a poor minibus driver received some Tarantino-inspired abuse (“You talking to me, you fat fuck??”), absolutely every signpost or billboard that can be pronounced in a funny way was be read out, and many a fit lady walking on the street got the horn honked at her. And in the end, Dixon shook behind his steering wheel finding a free parking spot and fitting the vehicle in it.

We'd already been to Franschhoek briefly with my parents, but the town offered much more than the pretty surrounding mountain scenery to us this time. We got to walk around in the sunshine with all the people around us dressed in themed outfits, mostly colourful berets, and stinking of sweet, sweet wine – red, white or both. There were farmers' markets selling all things French or just agricultural in general and boerewors stalls steaming, reminding us of the true South African side of the French heritage. After a tour around town we bought a lump of delicious cheese for R76 (I had a weak moment!), met up with Dixon's and Mav's friends, joined in on the wine picnic and sipped away in the afternoon sun.

Self-explanatory picture related to above text.

We all stayed the night at the house of Jess' (one of the said friends) parents where also a big table dinner was served for everyone. So we socialised with the older generation and got to meet some great characters with interesting stories, T received some parent-style advice on the next turns in his life, and Dixon questioned all the married ladies in the house about the meaning of their wedding dresses to them (“If it got ripped or broken on the wedding night, have you or would you restore it to its original condition?” , and the same scenario hypothetically for the rest of us unmarried ones. At some point late in the evening the whole jolly crowd hiked to the pub and, slightly later, back from there.

Bastille Day gets the ugliest it's been at any point since 1789 as M and Mav do battle for the remaining cheese

The next day most of the younger generation wandered back into town to the wine marquee, but us two and Dixon didn't really want to pay the somewhat high entrance fee so we decided to do some wine tasting around the area instead. We spent another nice afternoon getting happily tipsy on the scenic hills before driving back into Stellenbosch.

"Hmm... a strong nose and a solid body... the wine's not bad either..."

Generic Stellenbosch shot #992827276 feat. students sitting on the lawn doing what students do best (i.e. not much)

Back in the Bosch and at iKhaya we didn't do much nothing at all for the next few days. As Mav had started his job at the bar downstairs we were more than happy to keep him some company in the evenings while the days were spent sleeping late, getting laundry sorted, blog updated and plans for future destinations reconfigured. We also took some leisurely walks around town just to say we'd seen it. We duly appreciated the calm before the next storm – scheduled to hit us over the weekend coming up.

Chillin' with Leone and Eurice, Stellenboschers who we'd met in the Strand, the centre of the universe