Monday, August 22, 2022

Return to The Lab boutique hotel, near Robertson

We enjoyed our stay at The Lab last year and were invited back should we be in the area again,
in return for their use of our photographs
So we were delighted to be invited for one more night after the Cape Wine Masters induction at Van Loveren
(see our separate story)
The Lab is very green, powered by solar electricity and is very high tech, with room facilities accessed by voice commands
Their car is an electric BMW, charged by the sun, and they have electric bicycles for use by guests

It was rather horrible weather that night and intensely cold when the temperature dropped to 2 degrees, but our room was nice and warm, as we could ask Echo, the computer, to pull down the blinds and turn on the air conditioning

A fire in the grate might have been good, but then it might have been smoky.
John enjoyed a shower in the morning, which was lovely and hot; Lynne waited till we got home later that day

We had a large lunch at van Loveren but by 7.30 were in need of some sustenance, so we had dinner at the Lab restaurant
The menu is on the wall

and it was quite busy. We were thankful for the open fire

A bottle from the winery up the road, Kranskop 2021 Chenin Blanc, made by our friend Newald Marais
It is full of crisp fruit, and goes so well with food

A new way to do riempie (leather thong) lacing which we might copy on our antique stinkwood rocking chair
which does need re-doing

Lovely watching a roaring fire on a very cold night

John had more appetite than Lynne and ordered the Thai seafood curry which came with several prawns

Lynne had the starter of seafood risotto. Not sure about balsamic vinegar on risotto....

A freezing mist lay over the valley when we woke at 7am
and there was frost on the inside of the window and on the grass outside

and John managed to photograph the moon as she set

As we walked to breakfast, we passed this lovely flowering cherry in blossom, so spring is on the way
and, later, we did pass some orchards beginning to burst into bloom

So delicate, so pretty

we managed to get to breakfast early and sat in front of the fire

The breakfast is large and very satisfying. First a bowl of fresh fruit, crunchy granola and plain yogurt
Then a blueberry muffin and some orange juice

Rabbit rabbit?

and this was followed by a full English breakfast with toast, marmalade and jams


John just had scrambled egg, sausage, bacon and tomato

A horse farm next door

Time to head off home after a lovely comfortable stay

We called in at Kranskop to buy some more of that excellent Chenin Blanc
Newald had taken his wife up the West Coast to see the flowers and we missed him
but we look forward to seeing him on our next visit

All our stories can be seen in the Blog Archive near the top of the column on the right

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  1. martin2:39 pm

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