Spier
After breakfast at Aquila we drove into the winelands to the east of Cape Town. We arrived at Spier in the afternoon after lunch at Franschoek. Although we had heard that Spier was more of a village than a resort, we were still surprised that the hotel part was like a little village with the houses grouped so that they border a shared garden and swimming pool. We had three adjacent rooms which worked fine.

The first night we decided to eat out, which was a bit ambitious, but we had booked a babysitter and it worked fine. We had some great steaks at a restaurant called 96 Winery Road and a really good bottle of Meerlust red.

Spier had a fantastic picnic area with rocks, trees and a stream for the kids to play with. Erik and Daniel played spaceships for hours, especially with the Star Wars Transformers they got for Christmas. Mathilde loved the ducklings in the stream and once she had done a pony ride, she always wanted to follow the pony about. Next to the picnic area was a delicatessen with a great selection of picnic food. On Boxing day we booked a hamper.

On Christmas day we ate at the African restaurant, "Mojo" at Spier - a very different experience. We got our faces painted when we were shown to our seats, which Erik & Daniel loved. Mathilde was a bit bemused. The seating was in the open air or under tents amongst the trees. Some of the tables were even up on platforms in the trees! They had live African music and dancing all around and a big buffet.

The highlight of our stay at Spier was for Erik and Daniel to pet the Cheetahs they have at the Cheetah sanctuary. First they stroked two adult Cheetahs and then they went in to stroke the three juveniles. Erik has always loved wild cats, especially the Cheetah, so for him it was a dream come true.

On boxing day, my father and I played 9 holes at the De Zalze Golf Club nearby. I hadn't played for 10 years, so all my bad habits had disappeared! The young guy who played with us put us both to shame, though! Still it was a lovely course and nice to have some time to talk with my Dad and have a beer at the 19th hole.



The following day, we left Spier but before driving south to a hotel on the coast at Gordon's Bay, we drove to a Lion Sanctuary, called Drakenstein. All of these lions had been rescued from zoos, circuses, etc. The picnic area was surrounded by the lion's cages, so it was a bit like us being in the cage and the lions looking hungrily in!

Jeremy