Hermanus - Newsletter 18 - Sept'07 to Feb'08

Hermanus Burns (literally).

The centre of Hermanus was engulfed in a large bush fire on 16th January 2008. Taking in its wake - 6 thatched houses which were burnt to the ground, the small hill of Hoys Koppie and a huge slice of the high mountain range, some 5 kms long and 220 hectares were completely destroyed. Hermanus Golf Club and our Floral reserve of Fernkloof luckily escaped.





One fire destroyed house.....and the mountain side alight.

Added to the mayhem for the emergency services was an electricity power cut, which meant that the traffic lights were out, so the entire town was in utter chaos and the traffic police had their hands full directing traffic to safety all day.

Wines of South Africa.

The new John Platter wine book hit the streets in Nov 2007 and the crowning glory for our local wine valley, Hemel-en-Aarde, was that the wine voted the best in South Africa, against 6000 other contenders, was Bouchard Finlayson’s Tete de Cuvee Pinor Noir 2005. Sadly for those wishing to get their hands on a bottle, they have already sold out, unless of course you are willing to offer Percy Tours a large bundle of cash for the 2 bottles sitting in my wine cellar :-))))

On one of our many Wine Tours we came across one rather aptly named wine -

Sir Percy wine from Bilton Wine Estate in Stellenbosch :-))))

Rugby World Cup, France.

Even tho’ it was afew months ago, the Rugby World Cup was a fabulous event, with many mighty giants being surprisingly thrashed by smaller up-starts, making this Rugby World Cup completely compelling watching. Title holders England started off badly and everyone had them down as having a very slim chance of getting anywhere. Even the UK “bookies” had them down as 80:1 to reach the finals. So to see them enter the final against South Africa was a dramatic transformation in their game play.

South Africa has always been a mighty strong Rugby side and England were in for some very hard work to try to topple them. All credit to both sides for making the final match such a thrilling game.

Being a Londoner who has now been living in South Africa for over 4 years, I was firmly sitting on the fence, with me waving a large South African flag above my head and waving a small George Cross under the table :-)))

As for the South African public, the entire country grew to truly appreciate their sides efforts, with the press doing a fabulous job at whipping up national pride and patriotic feelings. South Africans of all social circles were wearing their country’s green rugby tops, with flags hanging off buildings and plastered all over cars and lorries.

Huge screens were erected at 100’s of locations across the country, with the Hermanus open-air auditorium having a massive screen and sound-system, which over 1000 people attended to cheer their side on.

The party atmosphere obviously got to fever-pitch when South Africa won.

South Africa’s booming economy.

If you thought South Africa was a 3rd world country with no money – then boy did you have that wrong.

South Africa still rockets-on as a power-house emerging world economy. It illustrates this clearly in the famous Jo’burg township suburb of Soweto, which is home to over 900,000 people and where the largest shopping mall in the southern hemisphere has just opened its doors on 27th Sept, 2007. Maponya Mall houses stores such as Levi’s, Woolworth’s (South Africa’s version of up market Marks and Spencer), Nike, Puma and many trendy restaurants serving up Sushi, Italian, French and Thai cuisines.

Queues of eager shoppers slept outside the mall nights before its official opening, so that they could snap up big 1st day opening bargains. Even at 9pm that day, people could be seen walking home with brand new TV’s or stereo systems in their arms; the traffic queues were so large that 100’s of extra Traffic Police had to be called into direct it.

This 3 year-to-build and R650million project was officially opened by Nelson Mandela, who has this year started to reduce his public appearances.

If this wasn’t enough of a show of economic boom, then you should see the housing market in Soweto. It is estimated that there are many new estate agents starting businesses here to cater for the large demand for houses and that a standard “matchbox” house is fetching as much as R70,000 (£5000). While larger houses in the Diepkloof area of Soweto are reaching astonishing prices as high as R1.5million. (That’s about £100,000 to you and me).

Gob-smacked? Yes you should be, it’s truly incredible how fast this “new” country’s economy is growing.

TV advert, assisted by Percy Tours.

In mid-January, Percy Tours was honoured to chauffeur around the film crew of brand new Marks and Spencers TV adverts, at their official end-of-shot party. The adverts featuring Twiggy and Jade Jagger are to launch the UK summer range of ladies clothes and were all filmed around Hermanus, with it’s pretty scenic back-drops. So keep your eyes out for these.

As usual there are many new Percy Tours photos on your Gallery site, so check them out by clicking here at - See over 200 Percy Tours Photos

2010 World Cup update.

In Durban in late November 2007, the FIFA 2010 World Cup preliminary qualifying knock-out groups were announced.

For a full listing of who is playing who, please check out their website. The top tabs of the page have each of the 4 continents/regions – Africa, Asia, N&C America and Europe -

FIFA 2010 World Cup Qualifiers

Also available is a pdf file that lists every single match during the 2010 finals and where each match will be played in South Africa. Please check out –

FIFA 2010 Match Schedule in South Africa

It is predicted that ticket sales should start in early 2009.

As for the building work, everything is going to plan, which is all good news.

Below is Cape Town’s Green Point stadium in late Dec 2007, with the new stadium now sitting where the Golf course used to be. It's foundation work now completed and the first tiers of grandstand supports are clearly visible under the yellow cranes. Quite a transformation in 12 months, I think you will agree.


Gold Miners rescued, after being trapped a mile under ground.

3,200 Gold Miners who were trapped under ground on 3rd Oct 2007, at Elandsrand mine, owed by Harmony Gold Mining Co., were finally rescued a few days later.

Their rescue high-lights the vast dangers they face working in South Africa’s gold mines which are the world's deepest, with 113 workers killed last year by rock falls, tremors and gas explosions. About 180,000 people work in gold mines in the country.

Declining output from South Africa's mines has forced companies including Harmony to dig deeper to tap the Witwatersrand Basin, the world's largest gold deposit, underneath Jo’burg. Harmony has plans to deepen the shaft to 3,566 metres to tap richer seams of gold and extend the life of the mine. While South Africa is the world's largest producer of this precious metal, production fell 7.5% to 8.85 million ounces last year, the lowest level in 84 years.

The magic of Red Wine.

Patients suffering from a number of diseases could soon be trying a new drug that has been found to be in Red Wine. SRT501 (or Resveratrol) could herald a whole set of new drugs that have been found to slow down the effects of ageing and diabetes. Trials are to start in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and India very soon. SRT501 apparently has the power to considerably reduce glucose and weight gain and if taken with another diabetes drug Metformin, amplifies these benefits greatly.

So our advice to you is – keep drinking red wine because its scientifically proven that it is good for you. Bravo we all shout :-)))

Morgenster Olive Oil does it again.

Morgenster, the Somerset West wine and olive estate, has once again been voted “The Best Extra Virgin Olive Oil in South Africa” at the recent 2007 SA Olive Awards held in Paarl. They also collected the gold award for “The Best Table Olives” with their Spanish style Nocellara green olives. These just add to their already impressive list of awards, including Italy’s L’Orciolo d’Oro winner for 8 consecutive years and gold medal winner at the Los Angeles County Fair.

Other winners at Paarl were – Hamilton Russell (from Hermanus) for their “Intense Fruity Extra Virgin Olive Oil” and Hermanuspietersfontein (from Hermanus) for their “Medium Intensity Olive Oil”.

So get down to your local supermarket and try these amazing South African products.

Shark diving nutter to be filmed free-swimming with the worlds most dangerous sharks.

A recent Discovery Channel documentary showed a South African, Craig Ferreira, free-diving (in other words WITHOUT the protection of a cage) with a 5 metre Great White Shark at Gansbaai, Hermanus, South Africa.

This first program was such a huge success when aired in USA, that the Discovery Channel has now commissioned him to free-dive with the worlds 12 most dangerous sharks known to man, dubbed "The Dirty Dozen."

The extra ingredient to these shows is his family are also filmed and they are most definitely in 2 minds as to whether it’s safe and whether all this dangerous swimming is a good thing or a bad thing. So this adds a full and comprehensive dramatic to this new series.

Certainly makes for interesting television watching :-)))

“Mr. Build-It” is back in South Africa.

Millionaire Irish builder Niall Mellon is back again in Cape Town for his 5th year in a row, to do his utmost to transform the townships, by building as many inexpensive and solid houses as he can in a short space of time.

In 2002 his team built 150 homes. In 2007 he planned to build over 5000 and has a target of 7500 new homes in 2008. Incredibly ALL this building work gets done in one week each year. Yes that's right, just one week.

In October 2007 he organised a huge army of 1350 building professionals from Eire to spend one week to construct as many houses as possible. This army give their time for free and paid for their air tickets and living expenses by fund-raising in their home country.

He also has plans to start tackling the housing shortages in Gauteng (Jo’burg & Pretoria) when he bought a South African commercial building company that specialises in low-cost housing and turning it into a not-for-profit organisation.
His aim with this company is to start a mass production of factory-made homes that can be erected quickly and has all the comfort and facilities that all normal homes have.

Music tours by local and international stars.

As it’s summer, South Africa has enticed quiet afew international music super stars to visit here, including - Mary J. Blige, Enrique Iglesias, the Black Eye Peas, Elton John, Celine Dion, Jethro Tull, Isaac Hayes, Foreigner, Gladys Knight, Seether and Dj Tiesto, with home-grown talent like Freshly Ground, The Parlotones, Watershed and Johnny Clegg doing the rounds too. South African stars Shaun Phillips, Tony Cox and Steve Newman performed at the Acoustic Earth Concert, Waldorf School in Constantia with 3000 people coming to watch.

Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens are set for their large list of summer out-door musical treats, as is the winery of Vergelegen in Somerset West.

Jazz, Rock, Pop, Dance, Rave and Trance, Soul, Folk, Classical, and a huge dollop of African sounds are all catered for.

Fatboy Slim arrived in South Africa on 2nd Dec 2007 and was not only spinning loads of tunes at trendy night clubs across the country, but practised his football skills with Township kids. He was also here to announce the opening of a youth soccer training program in Cape Town with the international charity that he is involved with - Coaching For Hope.

Fatboy Slim has recently been announced as the official DJ for the 2010 FIFA World Cup.

Thanks all and we’ll be in touch with another Newsletter in 3 months time.

Cheers, Percy :-)))) XXXXX

PS. We will be on holiday to London in late May 2008, for those of you wishing to catch up and our wedding is planned for November 2008 in Hermanus. :-)))) XXXXX
www.percytours.com

Designer Tours of Hermanus, Cape Town and the whole Western Cape region.

Hermanus - Update 17 - June to Sept. 2007

Nelson Mandela's 89th Birthday.

Nelson Mandela celebrated his 89th birthday in Jo’burg, on 18th July, 2007, which was attended by the group now being called “The Elders”.

This fine, upstanding group of elderly statesmen and women is the brain child of Richard Branson and Peter Gabriel, who approached Mandela afew years ago with the idea of bringing together a group of elder world prominent figures. This group, have no active political affiliations or ties to big business (as they are funded completely independently), are able to speak freely and openly about many issues facing the world and will work publicly and behind the scenes to address many world problems. This group now includes – Archbishop Desmond Tutu, former US president Jimmy Carter, former UN secretary general Kofi Annan, former Irish president Mary Robinson and former Chinese foreign minister Li Zhaoxing. The group is chaired by Tutu, with Mandela only taking a consultancy role.

A football game to celebrating Nelson Mandela’s birthday was also attended by past and present world soccer stars, including Pele, Ruud Gullit and former Leeds United captain Lucas Radebe. 52,000 fans crowded into Newlands in Cape Town to watch the match, dubbed “90 minutes for Mandela”. Earlier in the day the football greats, with past political prisoners, kicked 89 goals against racism into the nets set up on Robben Island, to celebrate Mandela’s birthday.

Western Cape Film industry.

Following on from last years report stating that the Cape Town city council issued over 48,000 Filming Licences in 2005, this years official report issued recently states that the film industry in the Western Cape generated a whopping R3.5 billion to South Africa’s GDP in 2006, while also employing over 8500 local people. This important industry also helps to generate jobs in many other spin-off industries, such as catering, accommodation, machinery & equipment hire, financial & insurance and transportation.

Recent movies filmed here have been “Blood Diamond” with Leonardo DiCaprio, who shot scenes in wineries near Stellenbosch (and enjoyed a day of Great White Shark cage diving near Hermanus between filming days); a Bollywood movie and only last month James Bond Daniel Craig was here filming a new movie called “Flashbacks of a Fool”, which includes Helen McCrory, who played Cherie Blair in “The Queen” and Miriam Karlin who starred in Stanley Kubrick’s notorious 1971 movie “A Clockwork Orange”. Daniel Craig braved the cold Atlantic Ocean while fully dressed in a suit for one scene. Other locations for this movie included Camps Bay, Llandudno (a seaside suburb of Cape Town) and Bantry Bay. The entire cast and crew stayed at the luxury 5 star Mount Nelson Hotel in the Gardens suburb of the city bowl.

Percy Tours gets published in the London press.

For those of you in London, check out a brand new magazine called SQUARE. Percy Tours will be writing articles in every publication about all aspects of South Africa, Cape Town and Hermanus. Square is a FREE magazine with a 50,000 print run and i would guess that your tube journey to work will now be much more entertaining, now that you will have a copy of this fine magazine under your arm. :-))))

Music and Entertainment news.

Altho’ we at Percy Tours are not the greatest of fans of her music, it was recently publicised that Celine Dion will be gracing us with her presence at Vergelegen Winery in Somerset West (40 minutes from Cape Town) on Feb 23rd and 24th 2008. Slightly more-rock’n’roll, it was also confirmed that Sir Elton John will be performing here on 13th Jan 2008.

The spectacular stage show of The Lion King is being performed in Jo’burg, in a purpose built theatre and has attracting loads of press interest and big crowds, including Oprah Winfrey who spoilt all 149 students of her new school she started in South Africa to see the show recently. Many of the shows songs have been adapted to feature African languages, like Zulu and Xhosa.

The Soweto Gospel Choir, which was only formed 4 ½ years ago, continue to tour the globe to sell-out crowds, with their outstanding vocal harmonies, while collecting many music awards along the way, including a recent Grammy. This inspirational 25 piece choir have performed at the Edinburgh Festival and many concerts in USA, New Zealand, Australia and across Europe. They also sang Happy Birthday at Nelson Mandela birthday celebrations in 2005 and have performed with Diana Ross and Christina Aguielera. Their first album topped the USA gospel charts for many weeks. Check them out because they are amazing.

World Cup 2010 and Football update.

An incredible R1 billion was paid in late June 2007, by Supersport to PSL (Premier Soccer League) in South Africa, so that Supersport will be able to exclusively televise South African league matches on satellite tv for the next 5 years. This has led some local critics to say that this predominantly black watched sport, will have now completely marginalise the poor of the country from watching their favourite sport, as it will be outside the affordability levels of the lower working classes of the country.

The proposed Jo’burg to Sowato mono-rail link is set to cost R12.5billion and aims to be completed by 2009, in time for the World Cup.

Recent press reports have suggested that some 2010 World Cup tickets could be as cheap as R150 (£12), so that local South Africans will be able to afford tickets to see the matches. Allowing some in the media to comment that this could easily lead to ticket-touts buying loads of cheap tickets in one go, but the authorities have afew plans for limiting the amount of tickets purchased, either by - cross-referencing peoples ID numbers and passport numbers to each ticket bought, or by a Lottery system, which would require the public to apply for tickets and if they are drawn out-of-the-hat, then they are eligible to buy tickets, or by issuing Named vouchers which are then redeemed for a ticket. Only time will tell as to which system will be implemented. The cheapest German 2006 World Cup tickets were R450.

The highest price for premium tickets for 2010, could be approximately R3000 (£220).

Also announced was that the World Cup tickets will be on sale from late 2008. 3 million will be issued – 1 million internationally, 1 million for the teams, officials and corporate sponsors and 1 million for South African fans. So watch this space for much more 2010 World Cup info.

The photo below, taken on 1st Sept, 2007, shows the continuing building work of the Cape Town Green Point stadium for the 2010 World Cup, with foundation work well under way and many cranes now in place.




Tottenham Hotspurs won the Vodacom Challenge at the end of July, which was a 3 team event featuring South African sides the Orlando Pirates and the Kaiser Chiefs - the football team, not the music band obviously :-))).

South Africa & Western Cape -Nature update.

Africa’s stock-piled ivory, which police and security forces have confiscated from illegal smugglers over the last few decades, is being considered for re-sale onto the international markets. Currently valued at $850/ton, the held 60 million tons, has a total value of $51,000 million.

If this sale goes ahead it would obviously stop the illegal slaughter of elephants in Africa, as this amount of ivory would flood the international markets for many years.

Fish Eagles are being breed and released back into areas where they are a very rare sight. These majestically large eagles have a wing span of 2 metres and The Breede River valley in the west of the Western Cape is one such region where their re-introduction back into the wild, is being seriously considered by the conservation teams. While in the Kogelberg Nature Reserve (only 20kms from Hermanus) there has just started a Black Eagle conservation project. With only afew breeding pairs left in this area, these large eagles need all the help they can get.

The Whales are here in Hermanus – the weekly aerial surveys have recorded numbers of 3 times that of the same time last year, with 50 or 60 whales being spotted in mid July, compared to only 20 or so Whales being spotted in July 2006.


And even better news today (10th Sept, 2007) was that Iceland has announced that it will be stopping whaling very soon. About time too we all shout.

South Africa Tourism figures continue to grow.

Following on from our last report about South Africa’s tourism, a new industry report has mentioned that, incredibly tourism here generated nearly twice the income generated by the country’s big gold industry, allowing some to call tourism the “New Gold” of South Africa. Also the total year-on-year increase of tourists holidaying in South Africa is up 13.9%, which is an incredible growth rate, when you consider that the global average increase is only 4.5%.
Long may that continue we say :-))

Check out our new photos.

Percy Tours loves to snap-its-camera of the local wonders, so please check out our new pictorial collection, including Great White Sharks, Southern Right Whales, Safaris and much more, at our online gallery of over 200 photos at Flickr –

Over 200 amazing Percy Tours Photos

Hermanus Festival season is underway.

Hermanus sure does know how to celebrate, with the August and September months being Festival time.

First up, in early August, was the highly successful Wine and Food Festival, now in its 11th year, which attracted over 4000 people to the 45 local wine producers stands. The show has now grown so large that a huge marquee, next to the main building, had to be erected to house the Food and Beer stalls, with a local Marumba band performing their catchy tunes. Percy Tours was proud to be the organisers designated transfer company for the weekend.

Then the following weekend we had the brand new - Great White Shark Festival. This is not only a first for Hermanus but is the only Great White Shark Festival in the world.

All 7 shark diving operators offered the public cut-price journeys to swim with these fabulous creatures. There were many international Researchers and Scientists conducting educational talks and film shows on this much mis-understood species; a large marquee housed the stage for local bands to perform; the market stalls did a roaring trade, as did the bar; the kiddies had bouncy castles to entertain them; and all-in-all over 6000 people attended, with the press, radio stations and TV film crews reporting on this celebration. After such a successful event, you can guarantee this will be an annual feature in the local calendar.

Percy Tours was equally as proud to be the organisers designated transfer company for the whole event and we also sponsored the transfer of 2 of the Township bands which performed at the event. With a mention of thanks to us, from the organisers, in the local newspaper a week later.

This coming weekend we have the colourful Flower Festival, which show-cases our multitude of amazing floral plant species. The next weekend Hermanus hosts the very hugely successful Whale Festival which attracts over 10,000 people to our picturesque seaside town and the following weekend there is the annual Stanford Birding Festival which also coincides with the 150th birthday of this small neighbouring town.

Ok I appreciate that it’s not quiet the Glastonbury Festival, but at least our local people get off their back-sides and love to put on a show (or 5) to celebrate our town and it’s many natural treasures.

Recent Percy Tours fun and adventures.

With the tourism season now in full-swing, Percy Tours loves to equally explore this marvelous region. A light-airplane flight over Walker Bay was a first for us, so that we could enjoy the outstanding beauty of the coast and farmlands, which was made even more brilliant by us flying over Dyer Island, Shark Alley and Geyser Rock, all the Shark Diving boats and to see over 30 Southern Right Whales frolicking in the sea. We even saw 2 rare grey Southern Right Whales which our pilot said he had not witnessed before.



Afew weeks before we ventured up to the spring Flower region of Namaqualand on the West Coast, which did not disappoint, as this winter it has rained quiet abit and therefore this has produced huge carpets of multi-coloured flowers. Infact it has rained so much over our short winter period that Cape Towns reservoirs, are for the first time in 6 years, now 100% full. The farmers will be jumping-for-joy I am sure of that. :-))

While we conducted a fun-filled 2 week tour with 2 fabulous clients (Dave & Tessa, from Cornwall) "Action-Lady" Ronel enjoyed with them, some exciting Horse Riding trips into our magnificent mountain ranges and along our huge deserted white sandy beach. As well as enjoying a Shark diving trip, a Whale watching boat trip and an African Safari at a fabulous 4 star Safari park in the remote Little Karoo region; while Percy enjoyed our airplane flight over the whales :-))

Many thanks all, chat soon,

Percy :-)))

www.percytours.com

Designer Tours of Hermanus, Cape Town and the whole Western Cape region.

Hermanus - Update 16, March to June '07

World Cup 2010 preparations and Football fixtures.

Cape Town’s Green Point World Cup 2010 football stadium site is certainly taking space. Check out the pictures below – the 1st one taken in December 2006 and the 2nd taken in April 2007. As you can see, the old stadium is just about demolished and the digging of the foundation works of the new stadium are clearly visible, taking over a huge piece of land from the oldest golf club in South Africa, much to the annoyance of the clubs golfers. This stadium is designed to hold over 68,000 supporters and will be 16 stories high, which will dwarf the surrounding buildings when finished.





Stadium, airports, roads and many construction sites across South Africa, for the World Cup have now all started in earnest and are really taking shape fast.

We have had visits by FIFA officials, as well as 2 members of the German national side - Bayern Munich's Philipp Lahm and Piotr Trochowski from Hamburger SV visited Soccer City in Johannesburg on 11th June 2007, before attending a press briefing at SAFA House, the already finished headquarters of the 2010 World Cup. Both were here to see the progress being made by South Africa, in planning this footballing extravaganza and they are very happy with what they saw.

The Africa nations pre-qualifying games are continuing to happen, with South Africa winning its last 4 matches in a row. Carlos Alberto Parreira is happy with progress so far, but realises that much more work is still needed, as well as he is trying to organise games with afew South American sides in the near future, so as to give the South Africa national side something to really think about by play against much stronger opposition.

South African Premier Soccer League champions Mamelodi Sundowns will get the chance to test their skills against one of the world's most famous clubs when they face Barcelona at Loftus Versfeld Stadium in Pretoria on 20 June, 2007. Whether or not Barcelona will bring a full strength side to South Africa remains to be seen. The team is loaded with world class stars, with none bigger than Ronaldinho, who was named Fifa World Player of the Year in 2004 and 2005. It is rumoured that the cost of bringing Barcelona to South Africa is somewhere in the region of R25 million.
This follows recent news that Tottenham Hotspur will also be visiting South Africa to take part in the Vodacom Challenge against local sides Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates - an annual three-way mini-tournament sponsored by Vodacom. Last year Manchester United were here for this mini-tournament and games were very well attended by South African fans.

Amazingly Percy Tours has already received 3 tour enquiries about the 2010 World Cup, all of them from USA, so we are not too sure which advertising campaign has hit the USA T.V. stations but it seems to be working. As we have exactly 3 years to go before this incredible footballing festival, it’s all alittle too early to be totally confirming things, with Hotels and Airlines not committing to anything just yet either, but Percy Tours does have a plan. That is to buy a Corporate Suite at the Cape Town stadium, so that Percy Tours are able to accommodate a good number of our clients in one go. These will have air-con, t.v’s, dining area and waitress service, so that we are able to enjoy each game in utter luxury. We have already made enquiries with 7 sporting event organising and hospitality companies and will be keeping in constant contact with them so that Percy Tours is at the top of the list when these suites become available. More news when we have it.

Wines, Olives and winter arrive.

Over the last 3 months the local wineries and olive farms have been in full swing, with harvesting and crushing grapes and olives, which certainly made our Wine Tours even more interesting for all to observe. Harvesting is done in our autumn months, with the vine leaves taking on magnificent shades of red and brown colours across the wine farms hills. Afew weeks later they shed their leaves and the entire wine valley takes on a very plain and bald appearance, so quite a contrast in a very short space of time.

Percy Tours website gets a face-lift.

After 3 months of very hard work, Percy Tours is proud to announce that our website now has a sexy looking upgrade, with loads of new photos, loads more colour, brand new flash film at the top of pages and much more. To be added next week, will be a menu page with over 30 different Articles on all sorts of relevant tourism topics. Check it out at – www.percytours.com

And don’t forget to check out our monstrous collection of over 200 photos of this incredible region, with 35 brand new photos -

Over 200 amazing Percy Tours Photos

Much needed holiday. Phew!!

Well even we at Percy Tours need to relax and have a holiday too, so we decided to venture into the interior of the Western Cape and explore the pretty Route 62. This was the original road that the colonial explorers took by ox-cart way back in the 1700’s. Thankfully we travelled by luxury minibus and stayed a delightful B&Bs, so we were way more refreshed and pampered than the early explorers were. This scenic route is also one of the Western Cape's major wine regions, so much sampling by us was heartily enjoyed too.

Massive increase in Tourism numbers to South Africa.

It sure has been an amazing year for the South African tourism industry, as the total number of tourists had a big increase of 21%. There were 7.5 million visitors in 2005 and 9.5 million tourists in 2006. The vast majority arrived overland from neighbouring countries, but we still had over 2 million arrive by plane.

Business conferences, concerts, shows & festivals of art, food, wines, fashions and music and all sorts of gatherings have also helped to swell these figures too. Cape Town is THE destination in Africa for conferences, accounting for over 70% of the continents business to business meet-and-greet events.

Recent and new discoveries by Percy Tours.

We love this Province so much, as nearly every day we find a new discovery.

One that the ladies will most certainly love too was our recent visit to a chocolate making shop. All their fine creations are made there on the premises and we certainly over indulged ourselves by buying loads of assorted flavours. Yummy!!!

Then there was the day that we discovered by complete accident - a sex shop....that sadly isn’t a sex shop at all. Shame really!!! Ronnie’s Sex Shop is actually a bar and restaurant stuck in the middle of nowhere, on the Route 62. So indulgence of another kind all together :-))

Hidden away in a quiet suburb of Hermanus we discovered quite the most fabulous new restaurant, the Hornbill. Run by a young and enthusiastic head chef called Jon, his culinary venue not only has delicious delights but is surrounded by huge glass walls that look into an African art gallery. The large patio garden at the rear has a cascading water feature, sculptured clay totem-poles and tables set amongst all sorts of exotic plants and trees, making the whole experience a marvelous feast for the eyes and the taste buds.

And continuing with the food and drink theme; Percy Tours attended the grand opening in Hermanus, of a new winery, restaurant and deli in the Hemel en Aarde wine valley – La Vierge. With commanding views of the valley from its panoramic windows, Rabbit on its menu, local farm produce in its deli and the only winery in Hermanus to produce a champagne – then this venue will go very far in a very short time we think.

For those for us in Hermanus who love our chilli, we are now in deep shock to discover that not only has our favourite and only Chinese restaurant now moved to Somerset West but that our Thai restaurant has also shut-up shop. If anyone wants to make some seriously big money, then you could do no better than to start up a restaurant catering for Chinese, Thai and Indian foods, because this large seaside town is now gagging for these styles of cuisine, as we have none available. Save us from KFC and Wimpy, hit us with oriental munchies, please.

And we even found the only Tequila factory in the world outside of Mexico, so we obviously had to explore that and do some tastings of their amazing liquor.

While we were on Safari, we were privileged and over-joyed to see a family of 10 cute little Meerkats playing and jumping around, about a metre away from our safari jeep.

While exploring during our holiday we found a very rare sight – SNOW. Yes snow in South Africa is very rare indeed, so when we found complete mountain ranges covered in the stuff, we had to investigate first-hand and throw snow-balls at each other.

Plettenberg Bay in the Garden Route was also hit by snow and their beach was covered in the stuff for one short day. The last time it snowed there was way back in 1957.


Cycling madness.

The Western Cape holds many cycle races each year which attract loads of locals and foreigners alike. Take the Pick’n’Pay race, which this year had 38,000 mad people cycle from Cape Town city centre down towards Cape Point and return up the western coastline thro’ Camps Bay and back into the city. That’s one heck of a lot of people zipping around on bikes.

Then afew weeks later there was the Cape Epic - a mountain bike race over 1,000kms and 8 days of hard racing, which starts in Knysna in the Garden Route, heads inland and finishes at Stellenbosch. The nearby town of Kleinmond hosted one of the stop-overs, so we went to investigate this huge biking event.

Recent visitors to Hermanus.

One of our most recent “famous” visitors to Hermanus were the male strippers – the Chippendales from USA. Stripping off during the winter can’t be that much fun, so I truly hope that the lady audience were not too disappointed with what they witnessed,...or didn’t witness :-))

Only afew Southern Right Whales have been spotted so far, but over the next 6 months we will be again rewarded by the majestic sights of these massive gentle giants of the sea coming to Hermanus and Walker Bay. Last years record number spotted in one day was 172 whales.

That’s it for now folks.

As a side line, please read the report below this one, for a quick run down about what Hermanus (and Percy Tours) has to offer you.

Many thanks all, chat soon,

Percy :-)))

www.percytours.com

Designer Tours of Hermanus, Cape Town and the whole Western Cape region.

Hermanus, South Africa - Activities & Personalised Tours of the region.

Hermanus is a delightfully pretty seaside town, only an hour and half from Cape Town, which is sandwiched between the very scenic coastline of Walker Bay and a high lofty mountain range, afew kms inland.

Regarded by WWF and Greenpeace as being one of the world's best locations to watch Whales, it holds the annual week long Whale Festival at the end of September, which attracts over 100,000 eager Whale watchers. Southern Right Whales, Humpbacks and Bryde Whales are spotted, with the highest number of 172 Whales ever being viewed in one day in October 2006. (Whale watching season is from June to December each year.) Boat trips will take you out to sea to meet them up close, but cliff top viewing spots are everywhere, allowing you many very good vantage points to witness these huge gentle creatures slowly swim by.

Another major attraction is Great White Shark cage diving, which is based 50 kms around the coast at Gansbaai. This is THE place in the world to do this once-in-a-lifetime activity and has attracted many famous Movie Stars, Royalty, Music Stars and nature film and TV crews. It is extremely safe and an exhilarating experience to be really so close up to these large creatures. The best visibility is during the South African winters (May to August) with the sea sometimes allowing you up to 20 to 30 metres of clear water to view them slowly glide by. The sighting “hit-rate” is 99% all year long, with some trips having been known to witness up to 15 different individual sharks in only afew hours out at sea.

Set in a World Heritage site, the Cape Floral Kingdom is amazingly colourful and has 1000’s of diverse plant species, collectively called Fynbos. Hiking and walking in the mountains and the Fernkloof Nature Reserve is also a high delight.






With over 70 restaurants, 3 night clubs and many cafes in the town means that you will never go hungry, thirsty or bored. From - steaks, lobsters and prawns to sushi, Portuguese, Italian, French and many other culinary pleasures. Try Springbok steaks with chilli chocolate sauce, or Bobotie (a spicy Malay curry) and finish off your meal with a Dom Pedro alcoholic milkshake. Delicious!!

Hermanus also boasts its own Wine route in the valley called Hemel-en-Aarde (meaning “Heaven & Earth” – which is rightly named), where there are 28 wine farms and 7 amazing tasting rooms to quoff well over 40 different wines, which range from soft white wines of Sauvignon Blanc, thro’ harsher whites like Chardonnay, to smooth Rose, to mellow reds like Pinotage and Pinot Noir and into “peppery” reds like Merlot and Shiraz.

There is even one venue that has over 1,600 different types of wines, champagnes, ports, brandies and all manner of South African liquors available. Pinotage is a grape that is only grown in South Africa and is most definitely worth tasting, as it is a lovely mellow red that is easily quoff-able. Percy Tours conduct many wine tours of our local valley and will introduce you to many special wines and pretty locations to sample them all.

Hermanus offers so many other activities too, including - Sandboarding; Quad Biking; Micro-lighting over the Whales in Walker Bay and the spectacular tapestry of farmlands and open countryside; Paragliding off the mountains; Canoeing the vast lagoon areas; Kayaking in Walker Bay to meet up with Seals, Penguins, Whales and occasionally Dolphin; Horse riding into the mountains or along the long deserted Grotto Beach; Art and Craft Markets full of African crafts and souvenirs; Boat cruises on the sea or along rivers; Golf at our 2 large 18 hole courses; Bird watching and a great Safari park is only a short distance away so that you get your African animal fix, plus many more activities.


Accommodation establishments are very good and ranges from 5 star hotels, Guest Houses, Lodges, B&B's and Backpacker Hostels.

For those wanting a scenic and relaxed (or action-packed) holiday in South Africa, Hermanus has alot to offer and is well worth a 3 to 7 day stay.

So to explore this incredible region contact - Percy Tours - who specialise in designing completely individualised and personalised tours of Hermanus, Cape Town and the Western Cape regions. We also research and book accommodation across the entire spectrum as well as all sorts of adventure sports and chilled out pursuits too.

See you in amazing South Africa soon. :-)))

www.percytours.com

Designer Tours of Cape Town, Hermanus and the whole Western Cape region.

Hermanus Summer Madness with Percy Tours - Update 15

DECEMBER 2006 – FEBRUARY 2007
Yes I know, I know - Christmas and NYE were ages ago, but we haven’t sent you an Update since mid December, so therefore - Happy New Year everyone and hope you had a great festive time. :-)))

Percy Tours has had a very very busy 3 months, as the South African summer season is here in total full swing, with afew days last week blasting us completely when it reached 35 and 36 degrees. We obviously dived for shaded cover or into the nearest swimming pool to cool ourselves down instantly. The good weather has been non-stop too, without a drop of rain for 8 weeks. So our gardens are now looking rather parched. (Well I lie, it did rain for 5 minutes on one day :-)))

Hermanus was literally rammed with tourists from mid-Dec to mid-Jan, when we were invaded by a staggering 220,000 people, which quadrupled our pretty and small seaside town of only 70,000 local residents. So to find a bed for the night, a parking space or a restaurant table during this hectic time was damn near impossible.

Antartica bound.
After 6 months of constant sex our Whales are now well and truly worn out, as well as very hungry, as there is no food for them here, so they have all now left our shores to swim back down to Antartica to gorge themselves on tons of krill, shrimp and plankton.

The record number spotted in ONE DAY in Walker Bay still stands at an astonishing 172 whales, in mid October 2006.

Summer swimmers.

Due to the warm summer, we have had our usual swimming visitors turn up, with pods of dolphin regularly playing in the bay. Other species recently spotted that you don’t really want to be swimming with have been Zambezi and Hammerhead sharks. Colonies of African Penguin have been molting their coats and are now back in the sea catching their dinners.

Interesting tours.

Tours with Percy Tours are never-ever boring and we can certainly say that about our fabulous clients too, that have jumped into our luxury minibuses for full-on adventures. We have been honoured to have escorted members of the Austrian royal family; 2 families of lords and ladies from Belgravia, London and a famous artist from Amsterdam who has organised art exhibitions for David Byrne from The Talking Heads, the flamboyant Vivian Westwood and David Bowie.

Other less famous but still extremely entertaining clients have included – many Russians, who’s tourist numbers have certainly increased this season and who most definitely know how to live life to the very fullest; many Irish, German and British golfing fanatics; 16 cycling crazy Americans and Canadians; shark diving nutty Australians and horse riding Norwegians. We also arranged a 21 day overland tour from Cape Town, via Namibia, the Skeleton Coast, Etosha safari park, Windhoek, Botswana, Okavango Delta, Chobe safari park, to Victoria Falls.

I even had a great surprise phone call from a friend from London who was staying at the plush 5 star Bay Hotel Camps Bay, who called me completely out-of-the-blue, so that I could take him and his lady on a Cape Point exploration – great to see them (hi John and Karin).

New ground covered has been numerous (as usual), but what sticks in my mind are – a Crocodile farm where there were over 10,000 of them lazily basking in the sunshine; discovered the delights of the South African Gold Museum (anyone got a huge credit account they wish to burn?); the National Gallery with some very weird and out-there art installations; explored more deeply the vibrant townships for totally ethnic African living, whos school kids are so funny to watch when a camera gets point their way; Wine quoffers by the lorry load, who have all enjoyed the delights of our incredible wines, while sampling olives, olive oils, wine drenched salami, cheeses and gorgeous honey. And to cap it all, there was the amazingly pretty wedding up at Moggs Country Cook House that laid on a spectacular spread, a Bedouin tent village with huge comfy lounge suites and kick-butt DJ dancing session.

Global Underground party.

Talking of kick-butt DJ sessions, we had a great time at the Global Underground party in one of Cape Towns monstrous warehouses, with that nutter Lee Burridge spinning tunes to a highly enthusiastic crowd of pretty and sexy Capetonians (including Ronel and myself :-))). This was all part of the Global Breakthrough events of 2 weeks of full-on clubbing nights that were arranged by Lovecapetown.com. A very well done to them for starting a new night clubbing destination to totally rival Ibiza. Winter sunshine clubbing anyone?? :-))) What with beer at £0.75 a bottle and so many outrageous activities between night clubs that you will be shattered and smiling from ear-to-ear for years to come? :-)))

World Cup 2010 – update.

Things are progressing slowly but steadily for the South Africa 2010 World Cup, with the final go ahead for the demolition of the old Green Point stadium to make way for the brand new 68,000 seater soccer stadium, as well as in Jo’burg big construction is still happening to construct the new Gauteng railway line which will run between Pretoria and Jo’burg, for footy fans to commute between games.

On another side issue, Fifa announced the exact dates that the 2010 World Cup will be held. Starting - June 11, 2010. Ending - July 11, 2010.

Absa / Barclays has, in partnership with local government and the Grootbos Foundation, made a huge contribution to starting work on the brand new soccer facility and stadium at Gansbaai.

This is the first ever Barclays Space for Sports project ever to be sited outside the UK and will form part of the Absa / Barclays Corporate Social Investment programme.

There are rumours about that this purpose build soccer stadium may be home to one of the 2010 World Cup countries. That will be very interesting if it is true.

Gansbaai is only 2 hours from central Cape Town and accessed by driving thro the beautiful seaside town of Hermanus, some 35 minutes away from Gansbaai.

Ship Wreck.

Please could we have all our belongings back? Thank you!

As you may have heard, the container ship Napoli ran aground off the UK coast last week with many tons of products destined for South Africa. VW South Africa had to announce that it will be reducing its work forces working hours from 5 days per week to 4 days per week, for the next 4 weeks.

This is due to the plant at Uitenhage, employing some 6500 workers, being now obviously unable to have enough raw materials for full scale production to occur, as the ship was carrying many VW parts on board it.

The plant produces 400 to 500 new cars daily, so this reduction of man hours will now mean that they will have a loss of some 1600 to 2000 units.

It was also carrying many oak barrels for the South African wine industry, as we are now in full scale grape picking and crushing here, so we desperately need all these oak barrels to put this years harvest into.

New Photos.

Percy Tours is always very busy taking loads of new photos of this incredible country. So please check out over 190 corking pictures at -

Over 190 amazing Percy Tours Photos

Enjoy!!!

Our website is going thro’ a huge amendment presently and will feature about 30 brand new pages and over 100 new pictures. So check it out in a week or 2 to see the new sexy looking website.

Thanks all and chat again soon,

Cheers Percy :-)))

www.percytours.com

Designer Tours of Cape Town, Hermanus and the whole Western Cape region.

Hermanus, South Africa, Percy Tours. Update 14

Update 14 – SEPT to DEC 2006.
Summer is most definitely here.
Thankfully the winter passed us by quickly and we are now in the middle of a full-on hot sunny summer, with daily temperatures hitting 25 to 30. Phew!!! :-)))

This has brought to Hermanus, Cape Town and Percy Tours, a bumper amount of tourists flocking to our spectacular part of the world. (And we still have at least another 4 months of summer to go) :-))))

Even the Whales joined in the action and were here in record numbers, with a monstrous 172 Southern Right Whales being counted on one day in Walker Bay in mid October (shattering last years record breaking count of 138).

The Hermanus Wine Festival in mid August brought coach loads of wine quoffers to the Wine Village. Local produce such as - olives, cheese, chocolate, meats and many other culinary delights were also on offer to all. Yummy!!! :-)))
The Fernkloof Flower Festival in mid Sept. delighted us all with its floral masterpieces.
The Hermanus Whale Festival brought over 20,000 fun loving and whale spotting folk in late Sept.

Recent nutty famous great white shark cage divers this month have been – Monica Seles and Barbara Windsor. (That would have been an interesting boat trip, if they went diving together) :-)))

World Cup 2010 update.

07/12/2006

It’s Green Point Common for the stadium, or Cape Town loses 2010 World Cup, the Cape Town city council said today.

Cape Town could easily lose hosting altogether any of the 2010 World Cup games, if it doesn’t build the 68,000 seater stadium at Green Point and start right now.

There is and has been, so much political rantings and arguments over this and that, that sadly no-one has agreed anything yet and if the “warring” decision makers don’t agree upon a plan immediately there is a possibility of Cape Town losing ALL its World Cup games to another city in South Africa.

There were light-hearted thoughts by Fifa that Newlands Stadium could take on the games but it’s got many disadvantages, including being too small.

The Executive Mayor, Helen Zilla, said today that “the provincial and national government have said that we must host a semi-final or we (Cape Town) lose 2010.”

On another side issue, Fifa today announced the exact dates that the 2010 World Cup will be held.

Starting - June 11, 2010.
Ending - July 11, 2010.

The continents that will have teams here are – 6 African, 12 European, 5 Asian, 1 Oceanic and 8 from the whole continent of the Americas. This effectively gives Africa one more team and Europe one less.

African qualifying games will start in October 2007.

Silly Season Tours.
Needless to say Percy Tours has been working manically on providing tours of absolute professional quality to many tourists.

We have satisfied many thirsty wine quoffers, with plenty of enjoyable Wine Tours of Stellenbosch, Hemel-en-Aarde in Hermanus, Franschhoek and all points inbetween.
Loads of new wines have just been released on to the market, some being extremely rare, been given high accolades by wine critics and are now very collectible. (With me buying some of them. Who would have believed it, I now collect wines, I must be getting old). :-)))

The new 2007 John Platter wine (bible) book, which reviewed over 4500 wines this season, is now on the shelves too.

With our fleet of luxury minibuses, we have recently completed over 12 individualised tours that each lasted over a week or longer, with one lasting a monstrous 3 weeks for an English lady living in Saudi Arabia, (Hi Louise); visiting all the sights and part-taking in all sorts of adventure sports, including - Micro-lighting over the whales, Dolphin watching boat trip and tree canopy rope swings - travelling from Cape Town, thro’ the Overberg to the Garden Route of Kynsna, Plettenberg Bay and Tsitsikamma.

Organised many events, all sorts of tours and accommodation for - a lady from Bombay, India; 3 nurses from New York; 2 Jordanian gentlemen; 3 great American ladies from Chicago who bought half a jewellery stores diamonds; a delightful couple from rural Somerset; 2 British sailing fanatics who embarked upon a 5 day yacht sailing trip around the Cape of Good Hope & across False Bay and then a 5 day zip around Hermanus; 2 nutty English ladies living in Dubai for a full days wine tasting; a family of 5 Swedes for a 3 week exploration of the Western Cape in November; escorting wives of international professional golfers taking part in the Nelson Mandela Golf Tournament in November at Arabella, Hermanus and chauffeured a wedding party of 40 South Africans in early December.

We zipped up to Clanwilliam on the West Coast in early September, to escort a family around the mind-blowing wonders of the West Coast Flower region, where at that time of the year the wild flowers bloom to create a huge natural carpet of colours and visit the ancient San rock art paintings.

We have conducted over 10 Safari and game viewing trips, including a big 3 day Safari tour in German, (for a couple who spoke very little English), witnessing many African animals jumping about in their wild environments of the Veld.

With the Ysterplaat Military Air Show in full swing, international Generals and Air Marshals wives decided to leave their husbands to play boys-with-toys and required some relaxation and recreation; so with 2 armed body guards in a dark windowed limo and an ambulance of medical staff in convoy; Percy Tours took them on an action packed journey with the Whales, explored the incredible local scenery, enjoyed much fine wine quoffing and indulged in great food at Heaven restaurant in the wine valley.

Royalty even graced Percy Tours, as we chauffeured Sir David & Lady Barbie Plastow, (who once represented Rolls Royce in South Africa), to a days whale watching boat trip.

We certainly enjoy a crazy and speedy team building Treasure Hunt and were more than happy to accompany a group of energetic young aspiring Cape Town solicitors last month.

In early November, Percy Tours took a group from the WWF (Worldwide Fund for Nature) on a whistle-stop tour of Hermanus and the surrounding countryside. We even did our bit, by donating R3,200 (£300) to their very worthy causes.

We also helped to sponsor a local adventurer to climb to the peak of the highest mountain in Africa - Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania.

(Apologises if we have left anyone off this run-down, who toured with us recently. It’s been one heck of a season.) :-))))

Friends aplenty.
In mid September, my mate Martin arrived for a 6 month stay. Then in mid November, we were visited (or should that be – were descended upon) by my mate Roger, his lovely lady Bev and his son Ben for their annual 3 week stay. Also at the same time, my friend Louisa arrived to experience South Africa too. (We first met on my 16 month world tour, back in 2000, on a 4 Land Rover trip of Frazer Island, Australia.)
This just gave Percy Tours an excuse (as if one was ever really needed) time to do some serious socializing and exploring the Western Cape with them all. The Backpacker bar didn’t know what had hit it either, as we arrived mob-handed and over ran the pool table for many crazy nights of silliness. This also coincided with my birthday party in my garden, attended by 20 mates who rustled up a feast on the braai. Yummy!!!

Eventful proceedings ensued – Great White Shark cage diving, Whale watching, Quad biking, Safari, 2 Wine Tours, a Brewery tasting, Sandboarding, Cape Town city centre visit, Cape of Good Hope & Cape Point day trip, Boulders Beach penguins, Betty’s Bay and many beach visits to sunbath & swim in the cooling Atlantic.

My first experience of Quad Biking was not only great fun, with everyone zipping along and creating a dust cloud after themselves, but as we were high up on a mountain range, the views were utterly incredible. I will certainly be enjoying this fab activity again. Roger enjoyed it SO much that, as soon as he got back to the UK, he went and bought himself a Quad Bike on ebay. If that isn't a seal of approval of a great day out, then i don't know what is :-)))

As you can probably gather, there really has been very little time for us to just chill-out, what with all this utter lunacy occurring at such a frantic pace. :-)))

Please feel free to view more than 170 photos of this incredible region at our photos website -

www.flickr.com/photos/51084760@N00/search/tags:percytours/

Percy Tours – Chauffeur guided tours in our luxury minibuses, Transfers, Airport & Restaurant door-to-door services, Wine Tours & tastings of all wine regions, Safaris & game viewing, Whale watching, Great White Shark cage diving, Quad biking, Kayaking with the whales & seals, Micro-lighting over Walker Bay, Penguins, Cape Floral Kingdom, all types of adventure sports and much more relaxing pursuits.

Over 300 tourist activities to choose from………..

Plus all sorts of day trips and longer tours – Cape of Good Hope & Cape Point, Cape Agulhas, Cape Town city centre, the Little Karoo, Garden Route, West Coast, etc……...

Corporate and Team Building events organised.
Accommodation researched, arranged & booked.

Have a fabulous Christmas festive season and Percy will raise a glass to you all, while we sit sunning ourselves by the swimming pool, zipping cocktails and munching on big Prawns, Ostrich and Springbok steaks.

www.percytours.com

Designer tours of Hermanus, Cape Town and the Western Cape region.

Hermanus & South Africa Winter has gone. Percy Tours Update 13.

UPDATE 13 – APRIL to SEPTEMBER 2006.

World Cup –

Even tho’ we at Percy Tours are not the greatest of club football fans, we sure do enjoy our 4 yearly indulgence of World Cup footy action, supporting the under-dogs to overthrow bigger footballing nations.

Being in Africa, we cheered on the African teams and much praise must go out to our 4 teams, who put some serious scares into the more established teams. So a big cheer goes out to Ivory Coast, Ghana, Angola and Togo.

With Germany hosting their perfectly organised games, many here in South Africa suddenly thought we had better get our skates on if we are to be ready to host our own World Cup in 2010. The South African press has (sadly) been slating its own country, by scare mongering, saying that we won’t be ready, but this Ladies and Gents is just sensationalised media propaganda aimed at doom and selling newspapers; when infact South Africa is already doing a mighty fine job at delivering infrastructural facilities – now!!

For example – South Africa already has its own World Cup logo designed and using it to full effect worldwide – when Germany only had its logo design ready 2 years before their games. South Africa 2010 merchandising is already on sale in many of the stores here too.  

In Jo’burg, the Finals stadium is already very close to being finished, with official announcements stating that the doors will be to open for action as early as OCTOBER 2006. It’s a marvellous state-of-the-art complex, with the facilities being extremely ultra-modern and high-tech.

The new Gauteng railway is already under construction, (a full year ahead of schedule) – this is the high-tech railway between Jo’burg and Pretoria to assist the transfer of football fans between games.

ALL the major airports are in full construction of new terminals and facilities – with Cape Town airports big new multi-story car park just being opened last month.

Cape Town is also constructing a brand new train link from the airport to the city centre, covering the distance of 30kms. This is some achievement as South Africa has a diabolic public transport system (ie. its non-existent) and roads are, for the majority, the ONLY mode of transport. So we all commend this project.

Cape Town has decided to build its brand new 68,000 seater stadium on the site of the current Green Point stadium, which will host many games, including one of the semi-final games. Located within a short (and safe) 10 minute walk of the magnificent V&A Waterfront complex – with its multitude of top-class hotels, (like the award winning 5 star - Cape Grace, Table Bay and Arabella Sheraton), 100’s of shops, restaurants, bars, a large craft market, cinemas, open air amphitheatre, access to Robben Island and many other tourist attractions.

However South Africa’s national side (called Bafana Bafana) is another story altogether and are currently a miserable shower, in comparison to other mightier African footballing nations, but we have a plan – South Africa has just employed the fine services of ex-Brazilian coach Carlos Alberto Parreira (4 times manager of a World Cup team, including Brazil who won under his managership).

He will certainly have his work cut out, but we are all urging him on to do a stunning job at turning around South Africa’s team. As a matter of fact there are many South African team members playing in major European clubs and this can only be extremely good for the sides training, skills, experiences and enthusiasm to be able to develop the national sides competitive edge fast.

More information when we have it.

See you here for some excellent footballing and partying in 2010 :-)))

Cape Town – A world class Movie destination? – Definitely!-

Cape Town has, for the last 5 years or so, been a mecca for the film and advertising industry, with over 48,000 filming licences being issued in 2005. The amazing scenery, long warm sunshine hours all year round, magnificent architecture and cosmopolitan cultures has attracted many to use the city and its surrounding countryside as back-drops for movies and photo shoots.

This is all about to explode into further attention with the proposed construction of the monstrous Dreamworks Film studios, about 15kms outside the city centre.

And on that note - Cape Town has been recorded to have the 5th best sky in the world, following the 1st expedition to measure the planets bluest sky. Measured by the UK’s National Physical Laboratory, readings were taken in 22 countries over a 3 month project to establish the place whose heavens had the best hue, brightness and colour.
Rio came 1st, Bay of Islands NZ 2nd, Ayers Rock Australia (Uluru) 3rd, Fiji 4th - San Francisco and London came last.

Great White Shark Attack -

Afew weeks ago, while on life-guard practice at Muizenberg beach, a young man had his right foot devoured by a rather hungry Great White Shark. He has recovered very quickly and has had many offers of medical help from prosthetic limb companies and physios.

Well, as we all know, if we humans continue to invade the territories (ie. the sea) of many of gods marvelous creatures, then we can hardly blame them for “reacting”. I mean, would you get out of your car if you suddenly spotted 20 lions in Kruger Park?

NO – should be your answer, unless you are stark-raving mad.

Needless to say, Muizenberg beach now employs a team of shark spotters along the nearby mountain range, equipped with walkie-talkies and all important remote control siren alarm activators.

Flowers in the Cederberg mountains -

Percy Tours has been on “walk-about” and recently explored the mind-blowing area of the Cederberg mountain range, where at this time of the year the wild flowers bloom to create a huge natural carpet of colours.



Not only is this area blessed as a Botanists heaven, but also there are San rock art paintings dating back to 6,000 years old.



These intricate and elaborate designs are beautiful and show “hunter-gatherer” drawings, ancient cave life and African wildlife.

Whales on their summer holidays -

Hermanus is THE place in the world to get really up-close and personal with Whales. Greenpeace and WWF have stated that here is the best spot to view Southern Right Whales. Last weeks aerial count spotted 100 in the bay and last years record-breaking count was a staggering 138 whales.

Please check out Percy Tours new article on our Whales, on our “What to See and Do” page, by clicking the “Read More…” next to Whale and Dolphin watching.

Percy Tours Whale Article

Percy Tours is also now listed on the Hermanus Whale Festival website as being the ONLY tour company to assist you in your Whale watching endeavours -

Hermanus Whale Festival

This years festival happens between 22nd September and 30th September.

Wines of South Africa -

Over the winter period, Percy Tours enrolled and successfully completed the Cape Wine Academy wine college course and is now accredited as professionals in the Cape wine field.

Not only that, but many new and award winning wines have just been released onto the local market, making our Wine Tours a very popular activity for many tourists. :-)))

In fact mention has definitely got to go out to 3 Canadian ladies recently – who between them managed to buy a whopping 26 bottles on a one day Wine Tour with Percy Tours – that has got to be a record by any-ones standards, the minibus was choke-a-block :-))) – and guess what, they took the entire lot back to Canada (in newly purchased suitcases) safely and with a minimum of added tax at Halifax airport by the Canadian customs police. Not one bottle smashed. That’s a mighty achievement. Happy quaffing ladies. :-)))

And infact on that day we also added our other minibus in convey to Stellenbosch, with 6 crazy Brits on board, who also bought an astonishing load of wine too. The Wineries utterly loved us that day :-)))

Percy Tours also has written a Wine article, to keep you all informed – check out our “What to See and Do” page and click the “Read More…” next to Wine Tours.

Percy Tours Wine article

New Photos gallery -

As you can appreciate, with all this intense action going on, we have been clicking our new 8 mega-pixel camera at everything imaginable – so check out our ever increasing excellent montage of South Africa by clicking our photo gallery website, where there are over 150 stunning pictures for you to consume – throw it onto “View slide show” mode for a full and delightful display –

Over 150 amazing Percy Tours Photos

Tours have exploded into action -

Yes, it may be only the start of spring and the tourist season but by heck has it been manic, with Percy Tours already completing 5 full-on tours in just 4 weeks (and many day trips too).

We are also starting to see a growing tread too – Single ladies on long holidays.
All power to them I say, as we have escorted 5 ladies around this marvelous part of the world on their own whirl-wind adventures. With just recently – one nurse from New York – Hi Amanda - one lady from Bombay – Hi Khushnuma and 3 ladies from Newfoundland, Canada – Hi Michelle, Carol & Christine – and recently booked, for a huge 3 week mammoth exploration of this incredible region - one lady from Saudi Arabia – Hi Louise.

But where on earth are all the guys? Do all the guys just consume way too much time spending their hard earned cash on cars, music, dvds, clubs and getting rat-arsed?? I have no idea.

Weather in winter -

Rain, rain, rain and some hot sunny days is what has occurred over the last 4 months, but this week has been much warmer and hit the 25 degrees mark today, so summer is here at last.

Our reservoir is now 100% full, so we are ready for the next 8 months of hot weather to arrive.

Other bits and pieces -

Hippos are now on the Red Data Books endangered species list, after 100’s have been shot and eaten in Zimbabwe.

On the Zimbabwe front – anyone travelling there should take note that the Zim dollar has suddenly just deduced 3 zeros off all their currency notes, so an old 250,000 note now equals 250.

Ginger Baker, ex-drummer of Cream and the Eric Clapton band has just bought a farm in Tulbagh.

Music – on my stereo at full blast are - Kasabian 1st album (can’t wait to hear their new album) , Arctic Monkeys (well done for winning the Mercury Music Award) and Hard-fi.

Percy Tours has now expanded its merchandising range to include - new t-shirts, jackets and sweatshirts and the new 2006 Percy Tours flyer is going down a storm at all our tourism partners establishments. :-)))

And a new and gorgeous addition to Percy Tours is the fabulously lovely professionism of - Ronel - who has taken over the duties of our tours in the Hermanus area. She is a Wine specialist and enjoys the incredible landscapes of South African nature and scenery.

Where are you now - For anyone that keeps getting constantly pestered by very annoying notifications and emails from www.wayn.com, I humbly apologise. Please delete these messages as this site has got to be one of the most un-user friendly sites in existence. It’s a complete nightmare to navigator or understand and I therefore apologise profusely for any inconvenience this site may have caused you. Please throw any emails you might get from these useless sods into your “block sender” folder, cos I want nothing to do with them, sorry, thank you and Cheers – DOH!!!!

That’s the lot for the moment troops – loads of love to all and chat every soon – Cheers :-))))

www.percytours.com

Designer tours of Hermanus, Cape Town and the Western Cape region.

Hermanus, South Africa. More action with Percy Tours - Update 12

Hermanus and Cape Town exploits.

Leopards in Hermanus -

Over the last few years scientists have spotted the paw prints of 4 separate reclusive leopards roaming in the vast and scenic Hermanus mountain ranges.
During March 2006 they released another 5 leopard into these hills.
These beautiful creatures have been released to breed with the other 4 and (hopefully) reduce the number of the local baboon troops, who regularly terrorise the dust bins of the Hermanus outer suburbs – hay that’s mans intervention into nature (once again) :-)))

Electricity Blackouts -
Cape Town and the surrounding area are currently under-going a period of electricity blackouts. The reason for this is that the nuclear power station, that has 2 generators, recently had a bolt “accidentally” thrown into one of them, which shattered its turbine. This means that only one generator is supplying electricity to the entire area, when 2 should be doing the job. The replacement turbine needs to be built and exported from France and will take about 6 months to be fully operational. When that is fitted, the other generator needs to be shut down, serviced and refuelled with new nuclear fuel rods. (The current ones are “apparently” the wrong type) DOH!! Square peg in a round hole any body??
So it’s all abit silly here presently. Candles, gas cookers, torches and petrol driven small generators have sold out in milli-seconds from local hardware shops, due to everyone exploring other forms of power. I am even considering solar panels to be put on my roof.

Wines to be savoured -
With the grape harvest well and truly complete, we only have afew more months to wait before the first wines of this season hit the shelves. With over 1,000 wineries in the Cape region, we are in for another quoffing bonanza.

A local wine tour with Percy Tours, would never be complete without experiencing the new and quite excellent “Heaven” restaurant. Bruce from the outrageous and highly acclaimed B’s Steakhouse, conjures up a lunchtime menu with so many mouth watering delights. Try his Babotie or Malay chicken curry or chilli steak – stunning!! Set on a high view point that’s so mind bending and beautiful, that you wish you could stay for eternity. (Should I start a local eatery review page??)

Cheese, wine, olives and food Festival -
Last weekend we investigated and indulged in the heady atmosphere of a food festival. Cheese was the main produce, but many other incredible delights were on offer, including wines, olives & olive oils, meats, champagnes, oysters, herbs & spices and much much more. Obviously we had to sample as much as possible - there's nothing quite like wondering around with a glass of excellent Pinotage, while munching on loads of delicious foods. Our cupboards are now full with our many fabulous purchases too. :-)))



Ground breaking Great White Shark journey -
Nicole the shark (nick-named after Nicole Kidman) recently was satellite tagged and tracked swimming from Gansbaai, (near Hermanus) South Africa, to the western shoreline of Australia and back again in 99 days. That’s an epic journey of over 22,000 kms. Scientists speculate as to why she did this (the shark that is, not Nicole Kidman – dopey!!), but as this was the first satellite tagged great white from here, then this can only mean that this species regularly makes this incredible journey.

Famous shark cage divers who have recently been here are -
Robbie Williams and Leonardo DiCaprio, with the King of Jordon partaking in his second diving session.

A new shark diving adventure, without the use of a cage in the open ocean, has just started. Viewing blues, makos and many deep continental shelf species. Its mad and a fabulous experience.
There are now over 100 fabulous pictures to entertain you at this site.

Even more beautiful photos of South Africa - Check Percy Tours new pictures at –

Over 100 amazing Percy Tours Photos

Musical excellence -
Cape Town was the place to be last month, with a full day concert of over 15 international bands playing over 12 hours, on 2 enormous stages. We were graced by the mighty Metallica headlining, Fat Boy Slim, Stereo MC’s, Collective Soul, The Rasmus and many more.

With over 10,000 music hungry nutters attending on a very warm day and a 3 hour queue for the over crowded beer tent, it certainly made for a mad day :-)))

Cuisine extravagance -
One evening we went to the fabulous Spiers (wine village) and had a highly indulgent meal at their Moyo restaurant – dining capacity of 1,800 people at one time, with a great range of foods served buffet style. Ethnic dancers and bands in all sorts of colourful costumes performed and played acoustic African sounds. The atmosphere is further enhanced by tree houses with large platforms and tables, water fountains and sculptural modern art features, huge sofa and cushion crash out areas, large oak trees draped in tiny lights and English rose maze gardens. A great evenings entertainment.

Running the gauntlet -
With over 20 or so forest fires in the region during the summer months, I actually witnessed one at very close quarters near Hermanus. High winds pushed the fire along at great speed and flames rose 100’s of metres into the air near a Shell Garage. A police escort drove us thro’ the flames and I was very glad to see the other side of that mayhem. All rather scary and damn hot. Phew!!!

Poor old Table Mountain had another fire hit it in February, which swept right across the cable car route and thankfully stopped at Devils Peak.

Ever changing weather conditions -
The Capetonians have a saying - that you can experience many different weather conditions in one day here - and that has certainly been true recently. With one very hot day hitting the 35 degree mark in early February and the next week it’s down to 15 degrees. Completely barmy.
Winter is on its way now tho’, with wind and rain starting to be a regular feature and the sudden need to get out the space heater and fleeces, to start up my little fire place and drink some corking red wines. For those in the northern hemisphere - Have a great summer everyone.

Extra curricular activity -
This month I decided it was about time I did some extra studying and enrolled to do the Tour Guides course. It’s a complex set of exams and covers (nearly) every South African topic imaginable – history, culture, politics, economy, health & safety in the work place - right thro’ to tourism, animals, geology, plants, climate – and all points inbetween. This is no easy walk in the park either, as they estimate it should take about 8 to 12 months of hard home study to complete. Fingers crossed all.

Recent Percy Tours designer tours -
March was quite a month and over a 12 day period Percy Tours escorted – a group of 6 UK nurses; a group of 3 UK Uni students and a Canadian lady around the many delights of the Western Cape. A trip last week involved chauffeuring a birthday party up to a game reserve, with champagne on ice for all. Wine tours have been very popular too – 4 crazy British people, 4 Dutch student teachers and a party of bonkers Swedish students. Another exploration of the spectacular Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens was a fab walk around, with the amphitheatre stage being fully constructed by the road crews, for 4 concerts by the king of soft pop rock Bryan Adams.

If you go down to the news agents today, you’re sure for a big surprise -
Yes Percy Tours has another juicier that hell advert in a gloriously glossy magazine – check out - Explore South Africa (issue 10) and fest your eyes on page 39. This magazine also goes into every SAA and Cathy Pacific airplane, is sent to over 300 travel agents in Europe, every foreign embassy in South Africa and given out free at the Durban Tourism Indaba in early May.

Cape Epic mountain bike race -
Just last weekend Hermanus was thrust into the international lime light, with the arrival of over 1,000 international mountain cyclists riding into town, for the Cape Epic Challenge. With their whole entourage of support staff, caterers, T.V. film crews on motorbikes and in helicopters, physios and following village of supporters adding another 3,000 people, the town was a buzz. The finishing line at the Hermanus, Old Harbour resembled a Tour de France spectacular. The whole race covered a distance of 921 kms over 8 days.



Come on – you know you desire an amazing holiday in South Africa with Percy Tours. Email us NOW!!!! :-))))

Cheers all, chat soon,

www.percytours.com

Designer Tours of Hermanus, Cape Town and the Western Cape region.