Muratie's Harvest Festival - family fun under the Simonsberg

Muratie opens its doors each year for their Harvest celebration and have a relaxed day in the garden with food, good music, lots of wine and fun. We saw the new Art Gallery, passed on the opportunity to stomp some grapes (much enjoyed by the youngsters), tasted their new fermenting wines, took a tractor ride through the vineyards and chilled under the trees with a huge box full of grapes, figs, cheese, bread and other delights accompanied by their wines. It was "Cool bananas" as the chilled Capetonians say

The fun begins with the grape stomping

We preferred to venture into the cellar for the tasting of the juice and fermenting wine

Supervised by winemaker Hattingh de Villiers, here pouring some wine for us to taste

It was a good, interested crowd

Carefully sipping the fermenting young wine. Sensational flavours of fresh fruit like nectarines and plums. But you don’t want to swallow too much or you will start to ferment. Next to Lynne is broadcaster Jon Meinking, tweeting

Rijk Melck discussing the harvest and the wine

Time to taste a tank sample of the Pinot noir

Peter Kampmeinert tastes a little

You could buy hamburgers, boerewors rolls, smoked salmon sandwiches, samoosas and other delectables for lunch

We had a few of these delicacies on the media table to share. Freshly baked bread, a selection of cheeses, ripe figs and grapes, humus, tapenade and pesto with koeksisters and chocolate brownies

Busy cooks

Under the umbrellas enjoying the day

We drank the Laurens Campher, an inspired blend of Chenin, Sauvignon Blanc Verdelho and Viognier. It was so much enjoyed. Stone fruit, nuts, a little smoke and richness from the Viognier

Magnums of it on our table

A colourful Greg Landman of Country Life enjoying the day

Tractor rides through the vineyards every half hour

No, “we are not drinking coals from Newcastle”, say Yvonne and Peter from Holland, it’s wine for us today

Our skilful tractor driver, Paul

On the way up the hill

Smile! He's a Hashim Amla fan

Enjoying the ride together

In the far distance the Peninsula and Table Mountain

Strange cloud patterns, hinting of rain. It never came, just more heat and wind. The vines were laden with grapes awaiting harvest

Sentinel pines at the farm entrance

The band is always good

A happy day

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2017

The new MOK Gallery of modern South African art at Muratie

MOK is run by Cecile Blevi, a relative of Muratie's owner, Rijk Melck. Rijk took us to have a look and we were very impressed. It is in an historic 300 year old house on the property, where freed slave Ansela van de Kaap lived with her German husband Lourens Campher from 1695

Rijk showed us the way to the gallery, which is across the road from his wine cellar

The gardens are full of these large bronze figures

Cecile has a very good eye for art and exhibits the works of many, varied South African artists

Amusing pottery from Ayanda Mji, a ceramic artist from the Eastern Cape

Admiring the works. The plaster has been removed to show the way the walls were made from mud bricks

Sometimes Art is the window

Gallery owner Cecile Blevi, The current exhibition is of charcoal drawings by Rentia Retief and oil and watercolour paintings by Johan Coetzee

If you are interested, MOK gallery and Diane Victor offer two advanced drawing workshops in June at Muratie wine estate in Stellenbosch from 26th to 30th June 2017 (Fee: R4100 excluding food and accommodation) and at Cape St. Martin, Britannia Bay from 3rd to 7th July. Check out the details on the MOK Facebook page

Woodcuts by Theo Paul Vorster and ceramics by Lisa Walker

Striking oil on canvas by Thembalethu Manqunyana, and some of his other powerful work

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2017

Sign the petition! Stop sand mining in the Swartland. PLEASE!

The South African wine community is in a state of shock. An application for sand mining rights in the Paardeberg area of the Swartland has been approved by the Malmesbury municipality. If this is allowed to go ahead, some of the country's best wine producers will be very badly affected, if not ruined. These include Eben Sadie, the Mullineuxs, Adi Badenhorst, Vondeling, David and Nadia and Lammershoek. 

PLEASE go to http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/protect-the-paardeberg and sign the petition against this travesty

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2017