We are lucky enough to have awesome friends who gifts us such amazing gifts for our, well my, birthday…tickets to the Franschhoek Wine Tram. A few days ago I shared some pictures of our little trip. I don’t think any amount of pictures does it any justice. The excitement and feeling of adventure on this trip is something everyone should experience…even if you aren’t a wine drinker.
Accommodation
First of all please ensure that you have a DD (designated driver) or that you arrange a place to stay because I can assure you after the third wine farm it would be quite an accomplishment to keep your balance. I would suggest to plan in advance as my fiancé and I decided to look for accommodation the week before our little adventure. Most of the B&B’s and hotels were fully booked OR cost more than three trips on the wine tram.
Booking
I would recommend booking online, perhaps a week before your trip, to avoid getting to the Wine Tram tour offices only to find out that there is no space on the tour you would have liked.
Farms
There are 6 different lines to choose from, differentiated by colours, and each line offers a tour to different wine farms. A friend of mine recommended the Red Line which we chose to do and I am so glad because I absolutely loved Leopard’s Leap, a stunning farm that I would love to return to. More about that later. We had decided to do some pre-drinks at Solms Delta which isn’t included on the Red line but we had to make a pit-stop for their delicious Astor Premium Cider which is a pear cider. Unfortunately we found out on the same day that they will be discontinuing that specific wine. Extremely disappointing but never the less, it is a lovely farm with excellent service.
We then embarked on our Wine Tram tour. Please remember that you need to be at the Wine Tram offices before the departure time as you would have to check in and then get on the bus which covers the first parts of the tour. This bus leaves promptly and waits for no late comers. Another tip that I learnt from a friend is to choose which farms you would really like to go to because it can be quite challenging making it to all the farms in one day.
Off we went to our first wine farm, Eikehof. This is a very homely farm and is run by a family. Their Cape Ruby, which was made by their 16 year old daughter, was one of my favourites. It was lovely and sweet and a perfect dessert wine.
Our second farm was Leopard’s Leap. This was my favourite farm out of the three we had visited for the day. We loved it so much that we ended up staying there for most of the day and was unfortunately our last stop. It has a very sophisticated look and feel. They offer seating at a bar section where the wine tasting is done as well as seating where they supply an awesome buffet. We opted to first do the wine tasting at the bar. Five wines for R25! We couldn’t believe it. My favourite has to be the Sparkling Leopard’s Leap Chardonnay Pinot Noir. If you see this in the local supermarkets please let me know! We then moved over to the buffet section where there was a variety of warm vegetables, salads and meat as well as desserts. The two things that really stood out were the friendly service received by all staff as well as the beautiful green grounds. I would definitely go back.
Wine Tram
After Leopard’s Leap we had decided we had enough wine for the day. Then we discovered that in order to get to the last two farms you would need to take the tram and not the bus. Not wanting to miss out on the full experience we had decided to jump on the tram just for the ride without getting off at any farm. This was the icing on the cake. Riding past stretches and stretches of greenery, wine farms and B&B’s, it was breathtakingly beautiful. One of the things on our bucket list is to go back to Franschhoek just to explore.
I would definitely love to go back to visit more farms and to experience this adventure again. It was really one for the books!
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