Tag Archives: Mother City

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 9 January

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

*   ‘Cape Town’s most stylish hotels’ feature in the Telegraph Travel article, which focuses on more than just the Mother City’s hotels.  Given Cape Town’s status of World Design Capital 2014, Woodstock, Bree Street, and Long Street are recommended for arts, sculptures, jewellery, and crafts.  Hemelhuijs and The Pot Luck Club are recommended restaurants.  The Mount Nelson, One&Only Cape Town, Cape View, The Clarendon, and Ellerman House are recommended as accommodation establishments.

*   Six of Africa’s twelve top music festivals are hosted in South Africa, and include Oppikoppi (in Limpopo province, the largest local music festival); Up the Creek (in Swellendam); Cape Town International Jazz Festival; Splashy Fen (at Underberg); AfrikaBurn (in North Cape province); and Rocking the Daisies (in Darling).

*   National soccer team Bafana Bafana arrived in Cape Townlast weekend, in preparation for the African Nations Championship, which kicks off at Cape Town Stadium on Saturday.

*   James Romanow, writing in the New Mexico Leader Post, says that drinking a House of Mandela wine is a fitting tribute to the late Nelson Mandela.

*   A manual of information published by (£30 million a year budget) Visit Britain, which was targeted at accommodation establishments and tourism players in the UK to guide them in dealing with tourists from around the world, has been criticised for ‘racial stereotyping‘!   For example, the manual describes: Continue reading →

Cape Town overwhelmed by one of busiest Festive Seasons ever!

Cape Town Festive Season Cape Town PartnershipCape Town experienced one of its busiest Festive Seasons ever, so much so that the city can be said to have been out of control as far as access to its attractions, beaches, shopping malls, and roads was concerned.  Perfect weather and a weak Rand attracted locals to the Mother City.  Once again the Atlantic Seaboard was the most attractive location for tourists in terms of restaurants, beaches, and accommodation, with resultant chaos in this area in particular at all levels.

The Festive Season period was a very short ten day period, from 27 December – 5 January this year, and almost every accommodation establishment, especially those on the Atlantic Seaboard, was fully booked.  Guests were predominantly from Johannesburg, or living overseas with South African family connections, meeting up in the city.  At Whale Cottage Camps Bay our international visitors were Norwegian, British, and Dutch during this period.

While it felt fantastic that Cape Town was so popular, one felt that the city was doing itself a disservice in that tourists had to experience: Continue reading →

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 30 November/1 December

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

*  Restaurant news dominated the list of most read blogposts on our WhaleTales blog in November, the Eat Out Top 10 Restaurant Awards write-up being by far the most popular blogpost:

1.  Eat Out Top 10 Restaurant Awards: best event ever, some highs, some shocks!

2.  Mother Nature hits Mother City and the Winelands!

3.   South African hotelier slates TripAdvisor and its blackmail power!

4.   Mediclinic Vergelegen Sweet Service and Giorgio Nava Sour Service Awards!

5.   Restaurant Review: La Parada Bar de Tapas Bree Street is Espanol puro!

*   A new hospitality consulting company PMR Hospitality Partners has been created by industry stalwarts Tony Romer-Lee and Euan McGlashan.  Their newest venture is PMR Hospitality Partners.  The media release describes the company as a ‘ boutique African hospitality management company based in Cape Town, South Africa and Atlanta, USA, through its sister firm, Valor Hospitality Partners (www.valorhospitality.com)‘.  Romer-Lee has worked for McGrath Hotels, and before that both partners worked at the Cape Grace, and Halcyon Hotels, which previously owned the Bay Hotel.

The focus will be on quality customer service, driven by PMR’s on-time Continue reading →

Cape Town Tourism tries to market Cape Town via Bloggers yet again! Unlikely to be successful!

 Cape Town TourismCape Town Tourism is hosting three bloggers over a three week period, as a repeat of the 2012 Travel Blogger visit, attempting to reach international and domestic travelers and to encourage them to visit Cape Town.  This campaign failed to achieve its goal in 2012, and the new campaign could follow the same route!

We were very critical of the visit by the four bloggers last year, after the New York Times questioned the ethics of travel blogging, and focused its article on Keith Jenkins, the Velvet Escape blogger who led the Blogger team coming to Cape Town last year.  The Bloggers were seen to have blogged little before, during, and after their visit to Cape Town, and to have little credibility in not declaring that their visits were sponsored by Cape Town Tourism and its members, and that there was little that they paid for themselves.  This led to ‘advertorials’ written, mainly about their accommodation in Camps Bay.  Most of what was posted by the bloggers was ‘photoblogs’, a blogpost consisting of a photograph only!

Cape Town Tourism issued a very brief media release about the pending blogger visits, and claimed incorrectly that the ‘inaugural #lovecapetown blogger hosting programme contributed to Cape Town Tourism winning a Travel + Leisure SMITTY Awards (Social Media in Travel + Tourism Awards) in the category Best Overall Use of Social Media, CVB, Global‘.  The awards which were won by Cape Town Tourism (a Gold Loerie added on Continue reading →