Cape Town (V)

For his project in South Africa Piet went to Cape Town again, for the fifth time already. He is always enjoying these trips: working with the local team, the (generally) good weather, and the possibility to see the surroundings.

This time there was an added bonus: the Cape Argus, the biggest organised cycling event in the world. Two of his colleagues from the Cape Town team had asked if he wanted to participate, and as you can guess convincing was not difficult. So he borrowed a cycling transport bag and took his own bike with him on the plane. Piet flew out on Friday, on Saturday was the registration and on Sunday the event. Piet even got a Shell cycling kit, and was ready to go. With more than 35,000 cyclist one can imagine the size of this event; all the roads were closed for traffic, and the start was a well-organised schedule that took 4 hours! Unfortunately Piet couldn't cycle with his colleagues as the start groups are strictly regulated, and he only saw them at the finish. The ride started downtown Cape Town, and went southwards towards Cape of Good Hope, on one of the highways. Then the coastal road was followed, and the peninsula crossed from east to west, returning to Cape Town along the Atlantic Ocean road. There was a very strong wind, which made the ride tricky in places, and Piet finished the 108 km in 3 hrs and 45 minutes. Time for a beer with his colleagues!

The week afterwards Piet spend time in the office, did voluntary work in Kayelitsha township, gave a lecture at a university, met the South African authorities and also did some more bike rides early in the morning, to benefit from the hills behind the hotel, and of course the nice weather. Next stop: Ronde van Vlaanderen.....

The Castle of Good Hope, an old fort build by the Dutch

Cape Argus: the coastal road towards Simon's Town

The climb at Smitswinkel

Chapman's Peak: a beautiful stretch of road along the Atlantic Coast

Descend from Suikerbossie

The home stretch: cycling towards Camps Bay and Cape Town

 Andrew, Peter and Piet after the race

Piet teaching at the University of Western Cape

Early morning cycle: Lion's Head and Table Mountain (left)

A short skiing trip

The drive from the Champagne took longer than expected, due to the busy holiday traffic. We normally drive down through the night, and don’t notice any queues at the tollbooths or petrol stations. We started our week with a day of rest, organising the house and sorting out our ski gear. The weather was beautiful; we had a full day of sunshine and reasonable temperatures. Piet even went out on his bike and rode up his training mountain Col d’Ornon. Mary did some work in the garden, and we sat outside reading our books. The next 5 days we went up to Alpe d’Huez to go skiing, with 3 very nice, sunny days and good snow, and 2 days with snowfall and limited visibility. Our last descend was in a whiteout–blizzard! The girls were always leading the pack, and managed to do a number of black runs without their parents. The week ended with another day of rest, cleaning the gear and the house, and Paula’s first “real” job: as a dishwasher in our local restaurant. This is a preparation for a potential summer job, which she really would like to do in France.

On Sunday we had the usual trip home: leave the house around 6, arriving in The Hague late afternoon, with plenty of time to visit our lost son: Beau (now nicknamed "the granny killer").

 Beautiful weather in Bassey on our first day

The ladies on the Sarenne

 Dorien stylish on the Sarenne

Paula and Dorien at the entrance of the infamous "Le Tunnel" black run 

Paula skiing moguls on Les Balcons

A raid in the Champagne

The annual trip of Piet’s wine tasting society “Het Derde Glas” took some time to fix. It was decided early on that everybody’s stock of Champagne needed a major boost.; especially us, as we drank our last bottle on New Year’s Eve. The main difficulty was the alignment of everyone’s busy family and work schedule, and finally a date in February was chosen. Unfortunately this coincided with the first weekend of our skiing holiday, which we had postponed to allow Paula to prepare for some of her final exams. But the need was high, and a compromise was quickly found. Piet got one of the first trains to Utrecht on Friday morning, where he met his friends, and drove off to the Champagne in an empty mini van. The girls went to school, left early, and after lunch Mary drove off in the same direction.

The fellowship had lunch in a Michelin-star restaurant near Reims, but had to urge the waiters as the first appointment was at 2 pm. When leaving we experienced the French way of parking: no space to manoeuvre (the rest is history - we used the Paris method to get out). At Barbier-Louvet, in the village of Tauxieres, the lady of the house received us, and she made her intentions pretty clear from the start: she would only open two bottles for tasting. In a very efficient manner she (now the “sour witch”) worked us out of her house, with a small score of bottles only. This looked again like the traditional misjudgement of our appearance. We drove to Theophile Petit in Ambonnay, were we stood for an empty door, despite agreeing a visit beforehand. We rang their mobile number and heard it ringing in an empty car. Ready to leave, we wandered around the garage, and found them (hiding?) in a cellar, oblivious to their guests. All was forgiven after another efficient, but friendly tasting. At our third address (Simart-Moreau, in Chouilly) the most remarkable was the promo-video, with the owner as lead actor, and badly chosen background music. Then we rushed to Grauves for our last appointment at Le Royal Coteau, which we already visited in 2011. They had called us a few days before, got the chairman to receive us, and even dug out the 2011 invoice. What followed was unlimited tasting (and a large purchase) and a very animated discussion, about selling your grapes to the devil (the big Champagne houses), the system of Millésimé and numbers of bottles and hectares, all badly translated in English by the assistant. In the end it was difficult to leave, the chairman was hanging on the van trying to direct us to the hotel in Epernay.
At the hotel we met the ladies, who had arrived as well. We all went out for dinner, the restaurant a pleasant walk away, through the impressive Avenue de Champagne, where all the main brands have impressive mansions. The next morning we drove off to Bassey for our week of skiing, the others continued on a Saturday of tasting, discussions and buying bottles.

 A large sign welcoming guests...not

The village of Grauves, with the barren vineyards in the background

Tasting at Le Royal Coteau