The quaint rural town of Franschhoek is located on South Africa’s Western Cape, about 40 kilometres out of Cape Town. It is the centre of venerable, world-class wineries. With a backdrop of stark, blue, rocky mountain ranges Franschhoek was the starting point for our 3 day wine tasting tour. The town, although touristy, boasts fabulous restaurants, fine art galleries, outstanding shopping and is at the beginning of the famed Wine Tram journey, serving most of the 200 wineries, some dating back to the mid 1600s. The hop-on, hop-off Wine Tram was a fun and highly convenient way to see the wineries and tickets can be purchased in the Franschhoek town centre.

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Africa had eluded us for sometime, until we learnt about the Detours Gay Adventure Travel itinerary to South Africa which included Cape Town, the Winelands and Kruger National Park. The fact that Detours is a gay company was all the better and this would be their fifth time in South Africa since starting their tours there in early 2017. Cape Town is a favoured destination for international gay tourists. Additionally, South Africa has protections from discrimination on the grounds of race, gender or sexual orientation enshrined in its post-apartheid constitution and, in 2006, same sex marriage became legal. All this was a winning formula for us and the group of fifteen strangers who would soon become best travel buddies for the next twelve days.

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