CAPE PENINSULA, South Africa, October 3, 2005 — Wine was one of my reasons for coming to South Africa. Really I came to see my friends, especially Mags. But the WWW didn't hurt: wine, wildflowers and whales. Mags and I discussed all these nice things about this time of year when I was looking at trying to get a frequent flyer ticket for this trip late last year.

Our buddy Beattie (that has a nice ring to it) is up for driving us to the wine farms today. Mags is at least up for going, her illness having subsided a bit.

So we spent a day doing a few tastings, having lunch, getting a driving tour of Stellenbosch.

The highlight of my day, I think, was tasting wines at Simonsig where I had a great Pinotage [Redhill Pinotage] and a great Syrah. [Merindol Syrah] Although we also tasted at Fairview and their tasting is enhanced by trying a bunch of cheeses. Mags and Beattie bought a bunch of cheese. I bought two bottles of wine at each winery. [Ed. note: took the Syrah home and drank it with friends on October 30.] I bought a T-Shirt at Fairview touting their "Goats do Roam" label. I took a great picture of the goat tower with a goat on it in '97 but no goats were climbing this time. [Ed. note: I actually got that picture published in the Austin American-Statesman when they ask for pictures from Africa one time.]

When we were at Simonsig tasting, there was a guy there and Beattie recognized him as having been on (and won, I think) the South African version of "Big Brother." (See picture below.) She was quite 'chuffed' as the South Africans say (or is it the Scots...that's where Mags is from orginally) to get her picture made with him. In fact, he recommended we go to a new place for lunch and we did and he was there. It was a new winery, Skilpadviel, and it wasn't even on my wine map yet. The lunch was good.

We also went to a strawberry farm stand and bought strawberries.

Beattie knows a lot about Stellenbosch which is a University town. Her father went to school there. It is a cute town and lively with lots of historic buildings in the attractive Cape architecture.

It was a fun outing. We returned on the beach road. I looked for whales.