Cape Town, South Africa

We got up early, checked out of the hotel (with tears in our eyes) and hired a cab to take us to the pristine white surfer’s paradise called Nordhoek Beach. We were hoping to get a bit more practice in with the drone and try to get what I am sure would have been amazing shots. Unfortunately when we got there, we could not get a GPS lock. (This means that a lot of the built-in safety features were not available). After waiting for what felt like hours I decided to take a shot at flying in manual mode. Definitely not smart!!! As soon as the drone was in the air the wind caught it and it took off across the beach. As I was having so much trouble controlling it, I brought it down quite quickly and it flipped over breaking the propellers (as they are supposed to.). Lesson learned: don’t fly in hurricane force winds.

After lunch, the tour officially began. We were picked up at the hotel by Dan, Sidney and Alison (and the rest of our fellow travellers) and headed out to the Zevenwacht winery where we will spend the next few days. The grounds are beautiful. The accommodations are on the top of a hill overlooking the vineyard and the town nestled in the valley. The rooms felt like suites with both a sitting area and a patio overlooking the sights below. Sidney and Alison cracked open a bottle of bubbly and we had a little meet and greet session with the other Totos (what I will call the other Toto Tours tourists). We have not previously traveled with anyone on this tour so it will be nice getting to know a while new group of people.

We headed down to the winery where the young and upcoming vintner started us off with a tour of the facilities and led us in a wine tasting. Everyone seemed to hang on every word that was said. I am not sure if this is because he is incredibly knowledgable and passionate about wine or because he was rather fit looking. The highlight of the evening was the South African barbecue known as an braai, by the winery’s pond. Sidney built this area himself when the winery was in its early days. The selection of grilled meats and South African desserts were delicious……and several bottles of wine certainly helped everyone get to know each other.