Tag Archives: Argentina

Restaurant Review: Batavia Café proudly Cape Town; a French, Spanish, and Cape Malay mélange!

Batavia Cafe exterior Whale CottageI drive down Rose Street in Bo-Kaap almost every day, and have been watching the slow progress made in a restaurant opening in what was one of my favourite coffee stops.  After about six months of Haas having moved out, Batavia Café opened two weeks ago.

Old Haas fans may be disappointed with the lightweight decor, and design items for sale, following a similar concept as Haas in promoting not only its food at the Batavia Café, but also design in the Batavia section, by CapeBatavia Cafe Clothes and art Whale Cottage Town designers such as Issa leo (menswear), Lazuli (womenswear), BO.NE nature made (African animal skulls), work by artists Annette Visser and Ina Grobbelaar, Gruparte (graphic posters and prints), and Oh dear Megan (jewellery designer). The first floor which housed the Haas ad agency has been let. The seating area in the little courtyard offers the most privacy.  Many mixed-colour bunches of flowers, or a single stem in  a Continue reading →

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 10 March

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

*   Edelweiss Air will offer two return flights per week between Cape Town and Zürich during the Cape’s next summer season, in new-look interior aircraft.  New seat configurations and an in-flight entertainment system with touch screens will be available.

*   Cape Town has the potential to become a tourism link to Antarctica, an opportunity which is not being utilised at all by our tourism authorities, shows research conducted at the University of Western Cape. The 6 hour flight from Cape Town has few seats reserved for tourists, the bulk of the 35000 tourists per year arriving by ship from Argentina.  Tourism facilities are minimal on the island, and the flights are expensive, not favouring the development of tourism currently.   Cruise tourism to Antarctica via Cape Town could also be encouraged.

Continue reading →

Cape Winelands dominates 2015 Drinks International Wine Tourism Awards!

La Motte pairingI had a lovely chat with South African Drinks International‘s Rick Beaumont earlier this week, about the devastating fires in Cape Town, and the latest results of the 2015 Drinks International Wine Tourism Awards, which had not yet been posted on their website.

The Cape Winelands dominated the Awards, winning four out of eight category Awards, against the UK, the USA, Spain, Italy, Greece,  Argentina, Chile, and Portugal.

South Africa won:  Continue reading →

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 19 September

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines 

*   Distell has created a wine marketing subsidiary in the UK, called Distell Vineyards & Estates, which is also marketing its wines in Germany, Holland, and Finland.  UK sales are £ 32 million. CEO Carina Gouws emphasised the importance of the UK market: ‘The UK remains the most important market globally in terms of positioning premium brands.  Wines that perform well in there are noticed by the rest of the world’.   The company is planning to aggressively increase its market share four fold, focusing more on independent retailers and the on-trade in the UK.

*   A review of the MyCiTi Bus performance has shown that the service surpassed its target by over 2 million ‘passenger journeys‘, reaching 7,4 million in the past financial year. The recent introduction of the N2 Express to Khayelitsha and Mitchells Plain has boosted the passenger numbers to over 1 million per month.  Changes to be made to routes include culling the Waterfront Silo extension from the Civic Centre on the Camps Bay route (which we criticised from the outset when launched a year ago).  Route 113 along Ocean View Drive from Three Anchor Bay to Fresnaye will be cancelled on 6 October, due to low demand.  One wonders why market research was not conducted to check demand for the service.

*   World Travel Market Africa will be held at the Cape Town International Convention Centre from 15 – 17 April next year, Continue reading →