The flying sommelier, part 3

By Olivier Gasselin

Barto's vineyards

We’re excited to publish a series of extracts from Olivier’s wine rambling in South Africa. This time he visits Franschhoek & Hermanus. Olivier is  the Head Sommelier at the Bluebird in Chelsea.

Next destination: Franschhoek (the French Quarter in Afrikaan). This is where French protestant immigrants arrived after leaving their country during the religious war.

Our first stop was Cape Chamonix. The estate’s wines offer immense value, complexity and poise. Again,we were welcomed in very kindly by Goettfried the winemaker, despite showing up in mid-harvest. We sampled many wines but didn’t get a chance to sample the fantastic Chardonnay, as the production is tiny and only sold on allocation. To compensate we enjoyed the Cape Method Sparkling wine in generous quantities.

The same evening we decided to try the most exclusive restaurant in the country, Le Quartier Francais, and were in such generous mood that the tasting menu was chosen. Even though the food was great and complex, it went a bit too far to our taste, as flavours were clashing with each other and we remained disappointed by the whole experience. The wine side was brilliant and we enjoyed the Estate Pinot Noir 2006 from Bouchard Finlayson.

The following morning, and just before leaving Franschhoek we decided to visit Boekenhoutskloof, one of the largest wineries of the country.  We tried some great value bottles at very soft prices from the Porcupine Ridge range followed by the one of my customers’ favourites Chocolate Block. This is a stunning Syrah, Grenache Noir, Cabernet & Viogner blend. As the name might suggest the palate shows strong chocolate flavours as if a piece or two of it found their way into the vats.  We finished that tasting with the very prestigious Boekenhoutskloof Collection Semillon 2005 and Syrah 2005, both absolutely mind blowing. Sophie and I then had a stroll in the vineyards surrounding the winery, in the hope of seeing the famous porcupines but neither saw nor caught any to bring back home. Just another wine myth?

On the road again, this time heading towards Hermanus, a town with 49,000 inhabitants on the southern coast of the Western Cape province of South Africa. It is famous as a place to watch whales during the southern winter and spring and is a popular retirement town. On the way down we drove through some of the most dramatic and most beautiful sceneries we have seen during our trip, down-casted a bit by wildfires which seem common place in those arid areas.

We entered Hermanus looking forward to meet up one of my favourite winemakers, Bartho Eksteen, formerly of the Eponymous winery. Bartho has recently started his new Hermanuspietersfontein venture with his business partner Johan Pretorius, making premium wines from a single estate where he has full control on quality. He came to introduce his wines in London a few months earlier and as we had a good first contact I told him of my intention to come to South Africa, and possibly to come to Hermanus, which at the time still felt like distant dream. I still remember his genuine and warm invite to come and see him, hence my visit. I was excited to see a familiar face and was very moved when he offered us to stay at his home.

Barto & I

Entering the winery, we were slightly overwhelmed by the busy, hectic and speedy movements…I thought the moment was surely not the best to announce ourselves. Asking for Bartho, I was a bit concerned that his good intentions would be long forgotten. Luckily I was wrong.  Bartho did expect us and we straight away started a tour round the state of the art shiny new winery. That being done Bartho offered to go to eat at his local steak house, sampling the most delicious meats while sipping his great Die Arnoldus. My favourite wine from him has always been Hermanuspietersfontein Sauvignon Blanc No7, as it excels in all the vintages I have tried, as well as the Die Bartho (Semillon-Sauvignon) and Die Arnoldus (Cabernet blend), without forgetting Kleinboet (Bordeaux blend) and Die Martha (Shiraz, Cabernet and Merlot).

Going back to their place we chatted until very late and drank a bit more. We then somehow agreed to wake up before dawn and go watch the sunrise on Hermanus beach. In return we were promised to witness one of the most exclusive views of SA.

Few hours of sleep and we were in Bartho’s car again on our way to the Hermanus beach. It is hard to express how beautiful it all looked. Back in bed for a few more hours sleep we felt very tired but extremely rewarded. A few hours later and it’s goodbye time to Bartho and everyone at HPF, promising to come back soon.

If you missed out you can check Olivier’s visits to Stellenbosch and Cape town.

Tags: Olivier Gasselin, sommeliers, south africa, Travel

This entry was posted on Monday, March 8th, 2010 at 8:00 am and is filed under Sommeliers Corner, Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.