By Olivier Gasselin
View from Graceland
We are happy to publish a series of extracts from Olivier’s wine rambling in South Africa. This time he visits Stellenbosch. Olivier is currently the Head Sommelier at the Bluebird in Chelsea.
We now headed to our next destination: Stellenbosch, one of the most important wine districts in South Africa After about an hour drive east of Cape Town, our first stop there was Graceland, a boutique winery situated in the middle of the district. The road made our car scream and sweat and we miraculously managed to spot the small path in the wood leading to the estate.
We were greeted by Susan MacNaughton, owner and winemaker at Graceland. Susan produces only red wines of which my favourite has always been her Merlot. As we have met before, and were looking for accommodation, Susan offered the rental of their attic. And what an attic that was! Spacious airy and well decorated this surely was the nicest attic we have ever climbed to.
Back down from our attic we sampled her delicious and complex wines, Merlot, Shiraz, Cabernet Sauvignon, and their flagship The Three Graces. All in good humour and relaxed, followed by a dip in the swimming pool and a pat on the back for their dogs.
New morning and we were on our way to visit Vergelegen, one of the most acclaimed estates in the region, which is situated to the south of the district in the posh area of Somerset West. Vergelegen proved to be one of the biggest estates I have ever visited and instead of doing the tourist tour, we strolled around the huge parks, gardens and had a light lunch in one of their restaurant, sampling their fresh and delicious Chardonnay.
I thought that finding the Graceland winery was hard and was about to be surprised. Finding the De Trafford estate was a real challenge. The Fiesta struggled once more on the bumpy road leading to Graceland. Once we passed Graceland the road gradually changed to a narrow and stony path up to the foot of the mountain. It was at the end of that very road that we found David Trafford. Slightly stressed and very busy he very kindly accepted to show us around and let us sample his wines. Despite all our hosts kindness and patience planning a wine trip in the middle of harvest might not be a concept we’ll repeat in the future.
Road to De Trafford
We tried most of the range, of which the Merlot, the mind-blowing Chenin Blanc, and the Straw Wine were my favourites. David’s wife is an artist; she paints the pictures of all their wine labels, with a different expression for every new vintage. We liked them so much we couldn’t resists. We bought some of the original pictures of recent vintages of the Straw Wine, which now sit proudly in our bedroom.
We thoroughly enjoyed Stellenbosch and its inhabitants. We were quite surprised of how popular and full of tourists the region was and how powerful and organized the wine trade is, even though prior to 1994 (end of Apartheid) the industry sold only locally with a strong ban on all export.
If you missed Olivier’s visit to cape town you can catch with his travels here
Tags: Olivier Gasselin, sommeliers, south africa, Travel