A visit to Tulbagh - The houses, museums and gardens of Church Street

On Tuesday, we at last managed to book this historic tour. You meet at the church that gives Kerk Straat its name. Built for the population after the arrival of the Rev. Arnoldus Mauritius Meiring in 1743, it turned a sleepy hollow into a town. The minister had the presence of mind to sell off land in Church Street to wealthy people and soon a vibrant community was in occupation, attracting business and people to the town. In 1969, Tulbagh suffered a devastating earthquake (6.3 on the Richter scale) which destroyed many of the houses and seriously damaged others. Thanks to the Fagan brothers, architects and builders, much of this was restored and Church Street is now the jewel of the town. You can walk the length of the street with a guide and hear the history of the town

The church is now a museum filled with interesting antiques

One of our guides, Henrilene Links, who works for the tourist board

Jason Clark, who owns an accommodation establishment in the street, is the main guide and is training Henrilene to take some of the pressure off himself

The scallop and frog gable

Peaceful Church Street

It's a lovely gentle walk of about an hour and a half, learning about the street and Tulbagh

A sleepy local bandit, one of the Readers Restaurant cats

A view of the mountains behind Tulbagh. So many of these houses were damaged or destroyed. It is a triumph of reconstruction

Looking back towards the church

Many of the houses are museums, some are privately owned, some are bed and breakfasts, this is a health clinic

The house that was the famous Paddagang restaurant. It is now a Belgian café

A beautiful example of Cape Dutch gabled architecture

This is a museum

Some are restaurants

In the middle of the road, there is now an organic kitchen garden project which is open to the public to come and pick their own vegetables. Much of this produce currently goes to the Neighbourhood market in the Waterfront, held every Saturday. Jason was so inspired by the gardens at Babylonstoren wine farm that he started this for the people of Tulbagh. We went back the following day and picked ourselves a bunch of asparagus, which we had for supper on Thursday night. It was superb and the prices are very good

Readers restaurant sponsors their own patch

Jason runs this Guest House, which is opposite the house in which he lives when he is in Tulbagh

The hillside was covered in carpets of white spring daisies

The garden is laid out in a geometric pattern and they have lots of plans to expand and plant different crops

Inside one of the historic houses is a colourful shop selling local handicrafts

This historic very early photograph, taken in the 1860s, shows what the town looked like in the mid 19th Century. It was used to reconstruct the buildings damaged or destroyed in the 1969 earthquake

Several of the houses are now museums which you can visit. Sadly, they were closed when we did our walk on the public holiday. We returned on Wednesday morning but, other than the Tourist board offices, most were still closed. We did have a very quick tour of the old church

The interior of the church, still with its pulpit and choir stalls can be used for weddings and other functions

The curator of the Church, Annelien Fredericks, kindly showed us around and played this Symphonium for us. They have many extra discs for more tunes

There is some magnificent old Cape Dutch furniture

And a very old interesting map of the Cape in the 18th century

A beautiful drum table, on which Governor Sir Lord Charles Somerset signed the document declaring the Cape a British colony in 1805

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2016

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A visit to Tulbagh - Saronsberg farm

A Tour of Saronsberg Farm with winemaker Dewaldt Heyns

Dewaldt is a competent cook and, on Women's Day, he made us breakfast with lovely eggs and bacon, croissants and great Chilean black coffee in his house. This feast set us up for a tour of the farm in his twin cab bakkie (utility vehicle). It is a very beautiful, fruitful valley, not only with wine but fruit, some of which is in full blossom at the moment

Our walk to the farmhouse took us past the pasture filled with Nguni cattle, mostly mothers with their newborn calves. This pasture is next to the cottages and we heard the gentle lowing of the cattle in the evening and early morning.

They have such interesting markings, this calf a completely different coloured coat from his mother. They are an ancient African breed, well suited to the warm and dry conditions

Saronsberg has two separate farms, with vineyards that are above on the slopes of this mountain and below on the farm in the alluvial valley

A huge stand of blue gum trees hides the farmhouse

Early morning mist in the valley

Aloes, rather than roses, planted alongside the vines

Aloes flower profusely in winter and are a mainstay food for birds like the sunbirds

The Tulbagh Drostdy or old town hall from 1804. This was destroyed in the 1969 earthquake and has been beautifully restored. It is now part of the KWV vineyards

Up on the mountain, the vineyards are a mixture of bush vine and trellis. They are currently being pruned

The bush vine Grenache is making a bolt with early bud break

We then drove down the valley to the alluvial parts of the farm, where most of the red wines are grown. Saronsberg has over 550 hectares on their two farms combined

Tulbagh has suffered drought, as have most of the West Coast areas this year, but they are lucky to have a lot of water from the mountains and, with the recent rains, lots of the dams are refilling well

Saronsberg vineyards going right up the mountainside

A baby cow taking a break

The mothers watching us carefully. You have to watch out for those horns

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2016

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A visit to Tulbagh - Saronsberg winery

Dewaldt Heyns, the cellarmaster, had the same dreadful cold John was not enjoying, so he was pleased to sit with us in the sun for a while on the terrace and talk about the wines, while we tasted. He is a member of the Cape Winemakers Guild and has wine in this year’s auction

The outside of the winery with the iconic Saronsberg lady of the lake

The tasting room with the art gallery above

The picture on the chimney breast is also used on the Provenance range of wines

Dewaldt pours us a generous glass of their MCC Brut 2011 which has 100% Chardonnay and was on the lees for three years. It is fruity and crisp with a good mousse. It will continue to age beautifully

One of the many pieces of art in the gardens of Saronsberg; many are witty conversation pieces

You will find this statue of a lady on the bottles of Saronsberg wines. The mountain view across the lake is wonderful

Her body emblazoned with a star

Inside the white wine cellar with its many tanks and barrels stacked high

Showing us how high they have to go. They are in the process of building a function centre and Dewaldt has had to make plan for storage of the barrels that were in that space previously.

Pupitres with the bottles of MCC which get riddled (turned and raised a little) on a daily basis by the valued member of staff who has the most experience and ability

There is a lovely soft aroma of oak wood as well as maturing wine

Outside, a statue of leaping impala

And who should we meet checking out after a deserved break over the long weekend but the Mount Nelson Hotel's Executive Chef, Rudi Liebenberg, fwith his wife. They had spent a relaxing time, with the children staying at home with carers

Late afternoon view of the winery with the oaks in front. They are Turkish oaks and they do not lose their leaves in winter

The building on the right hand side is where the function venue is being installed

A lovely place to spend an afternoon by the lake

We love the Saronsberg Rose, so fresh and fruity, dry but full of strawberries and so very like those from Provence

We absolutely loved the 2014 Grenache and Dewaldt let us take it back to the cottage with us. More about this next week

And to finish off a lovely tasting, Dewaldt brought us a bottle of his own 2011 Weathered Hands Chenin Blanc, made from 40 year old Swartland bush vines. It’s full of golden gooseberries and conference pears on the nose, with a full mouth of sweet dried pears with almond notes and good acidity. It has elegant, slightly chalky tannins and will last so well. But it is drinking perfectly now

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2016

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A visit to Tulbagh - The cottages at Saronsberg

To tranquil Tulbagh

We had been invited to visit several places in or near Tulbagh and some of the invitations were more than a year old; we just struggle to cram the many places and invitations we receive into our agenda. We had a reasonably clear week, so we accepted as many as we could. Car problems set us back and the original 5 days planned turned into three, but we had an amazing time with lovely sunny days and chilly late winter nights. Our hired car was great. What follows are various chapters of our lovely three days with the hospitable people of Tulbagh. Besides tasting great wines, it was also rather an eating marathon. Tulbagh is a small historic town nestled up a quiet and beautiful valley one and a half hours drive from Cape Town. You do need to plan a visit, you will love it

We began at Saronsberg

They have several commodious self catering cottages on the farm which they let out all year round and they kindly offered us accommodation there for the two nights we were in Tulbagh. We arrived on Monday morning, settled in and then made for the tasting room.

Our cottage was a two bedroom - one double bedded room and one single. You park outside and all the cottages have outdoor braai areas and terraces

The open fire in the lounge area was welcome and the small self catering kitchen is adequately supplied with both a microwave and a small oven grill

They had provided us with a bottle of Saronsberg 2014 Viognier and a bottle of the much lauded 2014 Shiraz

Our bedroom had both air conditioning, a ceiling fan and an electric fire; the latter worked so well to warm up the room on the cold nights.

The single bedroom

We had stopped off at a Wellington farm stall to buy two pepper steak pies for lunch and we enjoyed these enormous pies (one would probably have been sufficient for both of us!) with the floral Saronsberg Viognier, full of peaches and apricots but fresh and textured. It is wooded but subtly so. The views are magnificent.

Sitting under the vine pergola when it is in leaf in the summer must be lovely

And on Tuesday we had a light lunch on the terrace and an opportunity to taste their superb 2014 Grenache, with slightly wild notes on this robust and friendly red wine that sings of the south. More on that wine next week

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2016

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