*For guests that stayed overnight in the village of Franschhoek:
After a leisurely breakfast, your story telling guide will take you through Franschhoek village, sharing with you the fascinating history of the French Huguenots and the Huguenot Memorial Museum. Enjoy a wine tasting before continuing to Cape Town, where you’ll be rejoining the rest of the group.
Enjoy a full day at leisure. Perhaps join a sightseeing tour to Table Mountain (own account) or simply explore the city. Although a small city, Cape Town is packed with sightseeing attractions, excellent bars, cafes and restaurants as well as colourful craft markets. Alternatively relax on one of Cape Town’s many pristine beaches. Enjoy an evening of delicious Cape food, captivating theatre and entertaining tales and songs about the people of the Cape.
Overnight in Cape Town.
Optional: Table Mountain and City Day tour with Ticket included
With your ticket, take a cable car up to the summit of the legendary Table Mountain from where you may see the end of the world, including the city and surrounding layout of this southernmost tip of Africa.
Optional: White Shark Encounter
Great White Sharks… imposing in size, their graceful beauty has perfectly adapted to their environment. Their powerful predatory behavior and the mysteries surrounding this spectacular creature will beckon you to come closer and closer. Experience the White Shark in its natural environment above or underwater. And for the less courageous, this boat offers a large viewing platform on top and great space on the main deck for seating and viewing. After a full security briefing, you will make your way to the boat waiting to take you out to the world-famous Shark Alley, off the coast of Gansbaai. Upon anchoring at Shark Alley, you will get the chance to observe all of its inhabitants, from its seals and various birdlife to Southern Right Whales visiting the waters in season (July to November), and of course the Great White Shark. A wetsuit and a diving mask will be provided so you can share the waters with the awesome creatures from the safety of a cage, which is attached to the boat and floats right next to it. The time you spend in the cage will be between 10 to 30 minutes as it depends on the weather and the number of spotted sharks. No diving experience is required for this tour.
Optional: Cape Town Helicopter Experience
Head on an exciting 12-minute flight that will take you over the Mother City for a bird’s eye view of the Cape Town Stadium, Lions Head, the white beaches of Clifton, Camps Bay, and the magnificent twelve apostles.
Optional: Robben Island Boat Ticket with transfers
Board your boat cruise at the Waterfront and head towards the famous Robben Island. A cruel home of our Nelson Mandela for so many years, this is a highly charged emotional visit as you visit this site of suffering and realize how far South Africa has come since those days. For nearly 400 years, Robben Island, about 12 kilometers from Cape Town, was a place of exile and imprisonment where rulers sent those who they considered being outcasts and troublemakers. Since 1997, Robben Island has been a museum acting as a focal point of South African heritage.
Optional: Full Day Cape Winelands Tour
While South Africa's fertile valleys are world famous for their crisp white and classic French-style red wines, the area is also a treasury of rustic beauty and sprawling estates shaded by giant oak trees. Our drive today will include the country's principal wine routes of Paarl, Stellenbosch and Franschhoek, with a stop en route for lunch (for own account). Our day starts with a visit to Paarl where you will be struck by the beauty of the Valley, the pristine blue sky, the rolling vineyards, and the Pearl of Paarl set high above the valley. Paarl made headlines when President Mandela was released from the Groot Drakenstein prison (formerly known as Victor Verster prison), on the outskirts of the town, to freedom and the start of the new South Africa. We enjoy a wine tasting at one of the local estates. From Paarl, we'll continue north-west to the beautiful village of Franschhoek, near the Drakenstein Mountains founded in 1688 by French immigrants fleeing the Huguenot religious persecution in Europe. A memorial in the town commemorates the arrival of these early settlers who helped develop the wines sought after by Napoleon, Bismarck, and royalty such as Edward VII, the Prince of Wales. Here we will stop for lunch (for own account) and another wine tasting at a local vineyard. Guests will then head to Stellenbosch, the second oldest town in South Africa and the historic heart of the country's wine region. In 1679, Dutch East India Company governor Simon van der Stel, recognized the fertility of this long valley on the banks of the Eerste River, as perfect for vineyards. The rest is history, which has been carefully cultivated in this town. A gracious blend of 18th-century Cape Dutch, Georgian and Victorian buildings is evident on Dorp Street, where massive oaks still shade original water furrows. Enjoy a final wine tasting before returning to Cape Town.
