Stellenbosch is the heart of the Cape Winelands and South Africa’s second oldest town, founded in 1679. An hour from Cape Town, it sits in a ring of mountains with vineyards running up every valley, oak-lined streets and whitewashed Cape Dutch houses at its centre.

This is where South African wine made its name: Cabernet Sauvignon and Bordeaux blends from the mountain slopes, Chenin Blanc from old bush vines, and Pinotage, the country’s own grape, born here in the 1920s and first bottled at Lanzerac in 1959.

The food is as serious as the wine. The Winelands are home to some of the best restaurants in Africa, with chef’s tables on the estates themselves and a farm-to-table tradition that long predates the phrase.

March is the end of harvest: warm days, cool evenings, the cellars busy and the vineyards at their fullest.

Pinotage is South Africa's own grape, a cross of Pinot Noir and Cinsault created in Stellenbosch in 1925. For decades it was misunderstood. Today, in the right hands, it makes some of the most distinctive reds in the world: dark fruit, smoke and spice, and the structure to age.

We taste it where it started. A private cellar tour and Pinotage tasting at Lanzerac, the estate that released the first bottle in 1959, and a visit to Kanonkop, the family estate whose Pinotage put the grape on the world stage.

Alongside it, the wines Stellenbosch is famous for: Cabernet Sauvignon and Bordeaux blends from the mountain slopes, old-vine Chenin Blanc, and Cap Classique, the Cape's answer to Champagne, at two of the valley's most beautiful modern estates.

Every tasting is private, hosted by the winemaker or cellar team, and nothing is rushed.

Stellenbosch is 45 minutes from Cape Town and its airport, which makes this the easiest retreat to build a longer trip around.

Come early or stay on for Table Mountain, the beaches of Clifton and Camps Bay, the restaurants of the city and the Cape Peninsula down to Cape Point. March is late summer in the Cape: long days, warm sea and the best weather of the year.

We'll happily help you plan a few extra days in the city, recommend where to stay and eat, and arrange transfers so the retreat starts and ends wherever suits you.

Lanzerac is one of South Africa's oldest wine estates, founded in 1692 at the foot of the Jonkershoek mountains, five minutes from the centre of Stellenbosch. In 1959 it released the world's first commercially bottled Pinotage, and the cellar still makes it today.

The hotel is a 5 Star Cape Dutch manor house set in gardens and vineyards: 54 individually designed rooms and suites, seven pools, four restaurants and a tasting room, deli and wine shop on the estate.

The Lanzerac Spa has a heated indoor pool, steam room and sauna, and vinotherapy treatments built around the estate's own grapes. There is even a water sommelier.

A stay here is Winelands living at its most relaxed: breakfast on the terrace, a cellar tour before lunch, and the mountains turning pink at the end of the day.