On Tuesday, September 9th, Michael’s 32nd birthday, Michael and I drove from Cape Town to wine country! There are two neighboring wine regions: Stellenbosch and Franschhoek. We were going to be staying in Franschhoek but Stellenbosch was kind of on our way so we made an early afternoon stop at one of the best vineyards there, Rust en Vrede, just to take in the views, the vino and the vibe of Stellenbosh.

Our next stop, again in Stellenbosch, was to the restaurant at Delaire Graff Estate. This is an absolute MUST visit for lunch where you can sit outside and enjoy the amazing setting, views, food, service…everything was just perfect. It was definitely my favorite vineyard but I really loved it for a lunch stop as the restaurant was so special.

After the long, amazing lunch we headed to our fabulous B&B, the Avondrood Guest House. The Avondrood came as a recommendation from friends who stayed there and I cannot say enough about how great it is. It’s a small, 4 room guest house and the grounds are so charming, the service was awesome, we just loved everything about it.

For Michael’s birthday, the manager set us up with a bottle of champagne on ice in the garden and we promptly canceled our late afternoon plans to visit a vineyard and instead laid out on the lawn chairs and just enjoyed the sunset.

After the most perfect and relaxing afternoon, we went strolling down Franschhoek’s main street, just a 2 minute walk from where we were staying. We walked up and down the entire street (which took all of 30 minutes) and eventually decided that what we really wanted for dinner was just good pizza so we stopped at Col’Cacchoi Pizza. It was some of the best pizza I’ve ever had and was the perfect way to close the day.

When we got back to the Avondrood, we enjoyed their “honesty bar” and curled up with a couple of good books in front of a fire until we were ready for bed.

Other posts in this series: Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4.