Tag Archives: gourmet town

Corona Virus: Lockdown Journey Journal, Day 23 of Level 1, 23 March 2021

 

Tuesday 23 March 2021, Day 23 of Level 1, Day 362 of Lockdown. đŸ˜·

Corona Gratitude 🙏

#Grateful for a beautiful day at 28C and 31C in town, with two summer days to follow before the weather changes; for an organized writing morning; for my apartment being cool this afternoon when I did a little snooze; for an energetic walk through my little alleyways in Bakoven, not thinking that I would have the energy to do so in the heat, and gained 300 Discovery points; for a drive in the breeze at sunset to meet two German tourists at Utopia Cape Town, having a drink with them; and for being happy and healthy. 🙏💙 Continue reading →

Franschhoek: From Gourmet Town to ‘Ghost Town’?: the effect of the Corona Virus pandemic!

 

News 24 published an article this weekend about the plight of businesses in Franschhoek. It paints a horrific picture of the once famous Gourmet Town, known for its top Restaurants and boutique wineries, to what one business owner speculated could become a ‘Ghost Town’ if tourists do not return to it soon.

Franschhoek, like many other towns and cities in our country, has been hard hit by the Corona Virus pandemic, the South African one-year anniversary of its Lockdown to be ‘celebrated’ later this week. The new South African Virus mutation has made our country very unattractive to visit by international tourists, which probably are the type of tourists South African tourism businesses would love to see return. Continue reading →

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 22/23/24 August

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

*   The City of Cape Town is spending R3 million on the soccer match between Bafana Bafana and Nigeria for the Africa Confederation (AfCon) Cup qualifier at the Cape Town Stadium on 10 September. One wonders what benefit this would have for the tourism industry. In the past the soccer matches with international teams have not benefited our city and its tourism industry when former Councillor and Tourism Mayoral Committee member Grant Pascoe used this as his main strategy to try and boost tourism! (received via Twitter and Kfm)

*   UK wine writer Jancis Robinson praises Franschhoek as a gourmet and tourism town, but writes that there are few wineries. She describes it as a place ‘where the swallows make their own wine‘!  She highlights Boekenhoutskloof as the best known and Chamonix as the most consistently performing wineries in the village. She generally praises Franschhoek’s terroir as being ideally suited to SĂ©millon, and particularly winemaker Gottfried Mocke’s Sauvignon Blanc and SĂ©millon blend, the 2012 vintage in particular.

*   Tourism booking cancellations have led Cape Town Tourism to issue a statement about Ebola:‘Cape Town Tourism would like to remind would-be visitors that there have been no confirmed cases of Ebola in South Africa during the recent outbreak. In Continue reading →