Last Word Franschhoek

We had a later breakfast than normal and then packed up and vacated the room by 11 am. After that we stayed on at this hotel, so that we did not arrive too early to check in at the next one. We sat on the terrace near the restaurant for an hour reading. Then a 2 1/2 our journey to Franschhoek through vast corn growing area, seeing vast grain silos and grain lories. The GPS went a bit berserk at one time, but we survived, arriving at Franschhoek around 2:30 pm.

We eventually located the entrance to our hotel., The Last Word. This was a nine bedroom bed and breakfast of superior quality. Our room, number four had a small garden to it of which the reception staff were very proud, or, at least, pretended to be. But it was indeed a very pleasant room, but nothing special as regards to views from the outside sitting area. There was a small pool which was actually quite pleasant to swim in as long as there was nobody else in it. But there were not really enough sun beds around it and there was an upstairs area also for basking. But only two sets of sun beds on this and they were occupied. We had a snack lunch and then discovered that our flight home was not on the 16th, but on the 15th, at 4 pm. David investigated the possibilities of another way back but this would’ve been over €1000 which really was not worth it for the extra day involved. So we will just curtailed the holiday by one day and flew back as planned.

Interestingly, the cheapest way home if we were to travel on the 16th as we thought we were, would be by Qatar Airways which is operating at the moment at roughly one sixth of the cost of other Airways due to the unreliability of Doha airport caused by the Trump stupidity. We went out to buy ourselves a ticket for the tram to the vineyards for tomorrow but by this time it was almost 5 pm when we realised that the kiosk that sold tickets did not take cash and we wanted to pay by the cash that we still had remaining in Rands. So, we will go to the main departure point tomorrow morning at 9 am where they do accept cash and hope they still have some tickets for 9.30 or 10 am departures.

Back in the hotel Chris went for a swim. The pool was in fact very pleasant to swim despite having two sets of water jets into it. Then later on we sat in the lounge area with a free bar and had a couple of glasses of pleasant red wine and followed this by eating some snacks of biltong, dried mango and nuts for supper. And ended with a very pleasant coffee with some amaretto in it and some chocolates that we had. Then Chris decided to have another swim and this was very pleasant, but there were no towels around by this time, Back in the room we found we had two tiny crème brûlée on our beds to eat and listened to the news before retiring to bed for an early start to be at breakfast prompt at 8 am.


Our bedroom		It had a little garden of its own	A bath as all South African hotels do

A breakfast that the bean counters had cut back	A small pool, but not enough loungers	..but Chris though it better at night	The upstairs sun area was also light on loungers

Breakfast room	The free bar	and nice wall decorations	Relaxing with tapas and a drink

After a prompt breakfast at 8 am, we walked up to the tram station from where the vineyard tours departed. Here we purchased a ticket on their pink tram route: but in fact, all the trams were just about the same and it was only the stations they stopped that differentiated the routes. So at 9:30 am we departed for three vineyards. The first one, Rickety Bridge, had a bus transportation from the tram stop to it. But the bus was almost like a tram. At the vineyard we found that they would not accept cash and David wanted to get rid of the cash he had before we left the country on the morrow. So we filled the time till on onward tram departed by walking around it’s very pleasant gardens and up to its manor house.

Once back on the tram we then stopped at Grand Provence Vineyard and here although they were seemingly cashless they did decide that they could accept our cash. We had a very pleasant premium tasting: a waitress was actually a sommelier, aged only 23, she was full of passion for her job and actually knew quite a lot about wine. She had ambitions for her future and this made out tasting more agreeable.. We tasted a Sauvignon Blanc and a Chenin Blanc much preferring the former. She then brought us a superior Chenin Blanc for us to compare, and indeed it was much better. Then we had a Shiraz and a Cabernet Sauvignon. She also gave me some biscuits to enable me to stay sober.

Back on the tram, we went to another vineyard where we just stayed on the tram and went back to the tram's town base. Here we were transferred to the bus which was going to take us to 3 vineyards. We got out at Atlas Swift, which was an owner run can and indeed the lady there was the the owner. Here we tasted five oaked Chardonnays, which all had delightful individual designed labels on them. The labels were designed by a Ukrainian. We also had a Buratta to eat and then David ordered two Cabernets from different Vineyards of theirs. Well satisfied with them, we went back into town and stayed on the bus for a 30 minute ride through three different vineyards but decided we had no wish for more tastings.

Back in town again, we walked along the High Street to see if there were any clothes shops to spend the remainder of our Rands but the shops that were there were of the Paris variety with exorbitant prices. I then went for a swim before we had a coffee and a snack lunch. Around six we went up to the lounge, a delightful area, and had some wine, this been included in our room rate. We stayed there for a couple of hours, chatting to the manager and then having another snack. I then had another swim but this took a lot of doing as they had locked the door to the swimming pool even though they knew that I wanted a night swim: it probably took about 20 minutes for them to find the key to unlock it for me and then I had a delightful swim, somehow far more enjoyable than the daytime ones. Then another coffee with almost the remains of our bottle of Amaretto.


The tram only goes up and down a short bit of track	..but it is a real tram, just like I took to school	A nice seat at the front of the tram	..a truly dreadful sample of wine

We had a tasting at Grand Provence	..with a very keen young sommelier	..waiting for our wine to arrive	Vineyards everywhere

..and Art Galleries	South Africa seems very keen on Art Galleries	Two blokes jumped off the tram when we crossed a road	The end of the track

Well maintained vineyard, but they would not take cash	A tractor ride to one vineyard, from the tram		We wait for the next tram at a poor stop

	Another enjoyable stop at Atlas Swift,		We then got the bus for a ride round more vineyards

We had a late breakfast at around nine and then went for a walk through the town to the Huguenot Memorial Museum. It was easy to find the Memorial Gardens, but there was no way to get into them. Eventually we found a gate that said entrance but wasn’t. So we went all the way back the way we came and found another map which showed us that the ticket entry was further down the road. Here we bought the tickets and watched a video which was quite informative. But the original museum part of it was rather muddled up and impossible to follow. We crossed the road and went to the modern museum and through this to the memorial garden itself, which was very peaceful. We then had to retrace our steps in a long detour, before being able to reach the High Street and get back to the hotel to check out


The Huguenot Memorial in easy to find ..	..but difficult to find the entrance. A modern museum has been ..	..added recently.	..and the Memorial is very well kept

We left the hotel around noon and got to the airport within about an hour. Check in and security were fairly painless and we then waited for almost 2 hours for our flight. We had some Rands to spend and Chris found this very painful as there was nothing to buy at the airport other than junk. Eventually we were up and away by about 4:30 pm and had a 11 hour flight on Turkish airlines to Istanbul. A very average meal but edible and then some sleep during the night before landing at Istanbul at 4:30 am local time.

Here we had about an hour in the Turkish Airways lounge as we were Business Class to Valencia from here. We dug in to some breads and juices. Then a long walk to the departure gate, where we got processed in the priority queue, but then had to wait for over 20 minutes just standing before we were allowed on the plane. Business Class on this offered very pleasant breakfast and then we slept most of the three hours that it took us to get to Valencia.

Here we found the both phones were out of battery but then Victoria a parking van arrived with some outgoing passengers so we were in luck. Home then well before 1 pm and everything was in order there.