10 top things (with kids) to do in Cape Town this (winter) holiday

Things to Do with Kids

Just the other day I heard one of the local DJs on a radio sta­tion, whilst in my car in the middle of Claremont, talk­ing about the 'secret sea­son' in Cape Town. The Mother City's win­ters might have a sched­uled wet sea­son, but they are, argu­ably, an even more beau­ti­ful time to visit the city.

Incredibly, whilst the worst can hap­pen – it does some­times rain for days on end, which is why accom­mod­a­tion in Cape Town with a fire­place is nigh on essen­tial — it invari­ably doesn't. And those days when the sun shines, the leaves are orange and red on the trees (or not at all) and the city green and glisten­ing, are when Capetonians really come out to play. For without the sum­mer wind or scorch­ing sun, Cape Town turns into a wel­com­ing play­ground, with plenty to do. Continued

Stanford Valley — time out in the company of mountains

Stanford Valley

Stanford as far as the crow flies is not far from Cape Town. But there can be the odd occa­sion when, by the time you reach there, after hav­ing battled the numer­ous sets of lights through Somerset West, you feel slightly as though you've been through a man­gler. Which is even more reason why, in the shadow of the Akkedisberg Mountains in a val­ley through which the Klein River flows, a stay in Stanford Valley can feel a little like com­ing home.

The Overberg is quite the most beau­ti­ful part of the Western Cape. With its rolling wheat fields, sheep and beef farms, gor­geous moun­tains, sea­side and river­side vil­lages, and swathes of sump­tu­ous scenery, one is eas­ily enrap­tured. Stanford Valley, des­pite sound­ing like a val­ley in which the town of Stanford lies, is infact a beau­ti­ful organic farm, which also offers a guest farm and retreat centre, roughly 10 kilo­metres out­side of Stanford on the R320. It's pos­i­tion is breath­tak­ing and the mostly restored build­ings and out­build­ings incred­ibly pretty. Continued

Pezula certified as a Preferred Family Destination

Pezula Resort Hotel & Spa, South Africa’s award win­ning resort on the Eastern Head of Knysna, has been cer­ti­fied as a Preferred Family Destination by Preferred Boutique, a col­lec­tion of small, lux­ury boutique hotels in a host of stun­ning loc­a­tions across the world. According to Gert Venter, GM of Pezula Resort Hotel & Spa, Preferred Family Certified hotels and resorts are des­tin­a­tions that go bey­ond family-friendly. “Each offers unique amen­it­ies, cus­tom­ised pro­grammes, and age-appropriate activ­it­ies for young guests and their grown-up trav­el­ling companions.”

Continued

10 great ideas for a family holiday in South Africa

Great for Families

Waiting for hol­i­days to simply 'hap­pen' when you have chil­dren is tan­tamount to expect­ing your fairy god­mother to make an appear­ance, wings and wand intact. The chances are that the hol­i­day, unless other chil­dren and a ream of activ­it­ies are 'on tap', could go hor­ribly pear-shaped and find you in the star­ring role of cir­cus ring­mas­ter respons­ible for a list of children's enter­tain­ment.  If you want 'down time' then a little plan­ning doesn't go amiss.

There are sev­eral child-friendly ven­ues in South Africa that cater for exactly this. Whilst not everyone's idea of a hol­i­day is get­ting cozy with a host of other couples with whom you have only  chil­dren in com­mon, gone are the days of 'hol­i­day camp' style ven­ues. These days some ven­ues man­age to cre­ate a won­der­ful bal­ance between keep­ing your child out of sight and barely in mind, and lay­ing on a num­ber of activ­it­ies that chil­dren and par­ents can do together ... Continued

Blue Water Cafe, Imhoff Farm — children's parties to remember

Blue Water Cafe

The social cal­en­dar of the aver­age pre-schooler without doubt chal­lenges the 'com­ing out' — a cus­tom for girls in those days to enter into soci­ety by attend­ing a vari­ety of balls and dances in search of a hus­band — of the aver­age Jane Austin heroine. At least the out­come for the Emmas of this world is a wed­ding; ours is an over-sugared five year old. This is our ump­teenth birth­day party this year. And as each out­does the other in terms of child enter­tain­ment, the search for avail­able and easy to use ven­ues increases.

On this par­tic­u­lar Saturday, we find ourselves at Imhoff Farm's Blue Water Café, just out­side Kommetjie. It isn't our first visit to the res­taur­ant, although for a lot of the par­ents it is. We've been here before, although admit­tedly not for a children's party ... Continued

Child-friendly, tea-toting garden nurseries in Cape Town

Child-friendly nurs­er­ies

If you haven't already taken up garden­ing since hav­ing a wee bairn, there is always time. Garden nurs­er­ies have under­gone a metamo­phosis in the last gen­er­a­tion as more and more of them cater for chil­dren and par­ents gasp­ing for five minutes' down time in an envir­on­ment that isn't a shop­ping mall. And, inbetween, you acquire a plant or two. It's a win-win situation.

My all time favour­ite nurs­ery lies in the pretty south­ern sub­urbs. Ferndale is a clas­sic for chil­dren, and doesn't suf­fer from the pre­ten­tion or the 'nurs­ery super­mar­ket' syn­drome that some of the lar­ger, cor­por­ate nurs­er­ies (like Bugz in the north­ern sub­urbs) have suc­cumbed to. It does sadly lack a cof­fee shop, how­ever, the reason for which I have never been able to estab­lish – it's not as if there isn't room for one, or absence of demand; the place, on the con­trary, cries out for one ... Continued

Cool Runnings — Africa's first toboggan track

Cool Runnings

The concept of a Jamaican bob sled team is as about as far removed from Cape Town, South Africa as I thought it could get...or is it? On a won­der­fully warm spring day, we headed out at 08h30 on a Saturday morn­ing, accom­pan­ied by three eager seven-year-olds, to “Cool Runnings” in Belville, one of Cape Town’s north­ern sub­urbs. Now an early riser I am not (par­tic­u­larly on the week­ends), neither am I an extreme sports per­son, but one will do any­thing (almost) for your first born’s birth­day party!

Cool Runnings is a little like the super tube, ‘sans’ water, only here you are seated in a tobog­gan and hauled up a steep incline to begin the 821m down­ward  tobog­gan trail. Riding for seven-year-olds means fly­ing duo with an adult, as only eight-year-olds and up may ride solo. But of course this provides an excuse for Continued

Adventure holidays for families with kids around South Africa

South Africa, land of per­petual sun­shine, incred­ible vis­tas, diverse land­scapes and a people who go to the nth degree to make one feel at home, is per­fect for fam­il­ies with chil­dren, who real­ise that hav­ing kids does not mean the end to adven­ture. All nine provinces have some­thing to offer ...

Learn to surf

The Western Cape province's beauty includes the wild Cape Agulhas coast, the Cape Winelands, windswept spaces of the Klein Karoo, Cape Town, and the con­stant reas­sur­ing pres­ence of moun­tains. The Mother City alone holds a host of activ­it­ies, like the Two Oceans Aquarium, the Cape Peninsula National Park, the Planetarium, the MTN ScienCentre, and Ratanga Junction.

Abseil Table Mountain, ride horses at sun­set on Noordhoek beach, learn to surf at Big Bay, Bloubergstrand, take a heli­copter flip over the city, go ostrich rid­ing in Oudtshoorn, moun­tain bik­ing in Langebaan, paraglid­ing in Porterville, and a wine cruise on the river in Robertson ... Continued

Creative ways to have fun in the snow

Build a snow man

Heavy snow­falls over parts of South Africa overnight have given many fam­il­ies the chance to enjoy fun in the white stuff. Here are some simple but cre­at­ive ways to enjoy snow that you may not have thought of before:

First things first!
Wrap every­one up warmly — I know it sounds obvi­ous, but chil­dren are not pen­guins and aren’t auto­mat­ic­ally enthu­si­astic about ven­tur­ing out into freez­ing con­di­tions! To per­suade them to have fun in the cold out­side they will need to feel very warm and toasty on the inside! Continued

What to do with the kids this winter in Cape Town – 10 great (mostly) indoor activities

Kids Winter holidays

What were they think­ing when they des­ig­nated five whole weeks to the June / July hol­i­days this year? This is the time of year when it rains and chil­dren end up on the couch in front of tele­vi­sion or before the com­puter screen, rather than out of doors where they would rather be. And par­ents end up tear­ing their hair, and each oth­ers', out.

My sis­ter always has a back-up plan. A list the length of her arm of options she can do with her kids at the drop of a hat. I con­fess, I tend to leave a lot of this up to inspir­a­tion. And on the desired after­noon, a I've-been-infront-of-the-computer-working all morn­ing stupor usu­ally pre­vents my addled brain from com­ing any­where close to cre­at­ive, and my attempt at com­pet­ence falls flat on its face... Continued

Old Mac Daddy Airstream Trailer Park comes to Elgin in 2010

Old Mac Daddy

Daddy’s World (who brought you Daddy Long Legs Hotel and the Grand Daddy Hotel and Airstream Penthouse Trailer Park in Cape Town’s Long Street, is bring­ing some oomph to Elgin in the form of the Old Mac Daddy Luxury Trailer Park (due to open July 2010).

Positioned on a pine-slope in the fam­ous fruit-growing Elgin val­ley, the site con­sists of twelve vin­tage Airstream suites and a lux­ury cot­tage, Daddy’s Villa, with a cent­ral com­munal facil­ity for meals, meet­ings, events and leis­ure activ­it­ies – as well as lots of fresh air, out­door spaces, a pool, dams and a kid’s play area..., and its all just one hour from Cape Town. Continued

Holiday Fun at Emperors Palace

Holiday Fun

If you are a par­ent with a child at school you will be well aware of the long school hol­i­day that has been set dur­ing June and July. You may be pan­ick­ing slightly about how you will keep your kids enter­tained, because inev­it­ably you will hear the words “I’m bored” dur­ing this time.

If the World Cup is not your child’s thing and you would like a safe and fun envir­on­ment for them, then Emperors Palace in Kempton Park, Gauteng has come up with a few options. They have a super child­care facil­ity, Jupiter’s, which is both run and man­aged by qual­i­fied and exper­i­enced child­mind­ers. They provide a safe, fun and stim­u­lat­ing envir­on­ment for young chil­dren. Your child can be cre­at­ive in the art room or get the cre­at­ive juices flow­ing in the play room or dis­cover new things in the edu­tain­ment room. Teens are not for­got­ten at Emperors Palace and they can play arcade games at the Magic Company with some of the latest video and arcade games. Perhaps they can even chal­lenge Mom and Dad to a round or two? Continued

A visit to Bellevue Park in Ramsgate

Bellevue Park

Ramsgate can be a very busy beach hol­i­day spot dur­ing peak sea­son. Personally it has never been one of my favour­ite beaches, often boast­ing very strong cur­rents and rough con­di­tions. On one of our recent trips to visit Granny how­ever, we dis­covered a secluded little eco-park called Bellevue Park. And once you have had an over­dose of sunny days, or should an unto­ward over­cast sky des­cend, it is the per­fect antidote.

Bellevue Park is a nat­ural her­it­age site and has been rehab­il­it­ated to provide a won­der­ful envir­on­mental edu­ca­tion loc­ale.  Situated on the main road trav­el­ling towards Southbroom, it is easy to miss, but the adja­cent Bellevue Guest Lodge is well sign­posted and provides a vari­ety of self-catering accom­mod­a­tion. Continued

Table Mountain Aerial Cableway’s annual family winter special

Table Mountain cablecar

Table Mountain Aerial Cableway’s annual fam­ily winter spe­cial starts on the 1^st May and is valid through to 31^st October 2010. Throughout this period, two chil­dren (under 18) will ride for free to the top of Table Mountain when accom­pan­ied by a full-paying adult. The spe­cial is valid over week­ends and pub­lic hol­i­days and every day of the school hol­i­days from 10^th June 10 to 12^th July 12 and and in the September holidays.

A spe­cial hol­i­day pro­gramme for kids will be run­ning dur­ing the five-week long hol­i­day which fea­tures a Winter Treasure Trail, spot prizes, magic shows, face paint­ing and craft activ­it­ies. Continued

101 Things to Do with Kids in Cape Town

Kids wish list

As much as your kids will tell you they can’t wait for the school hol­i­days, the words "I’m bored," will inev­it­ably cross their lips when the hol­i­days are longer than a week or 10 days. So we've com­piled a list of "101 things to do with kids in Cape Town", revis­it­ing pop­u­lar kid-friendly ven­ues and includ­ing a few new finds to help you keep them busy. We hope our list will inspire a few out­ings or per­haps give you some fresh ideas for school holidays ...

Have fun explor­ing new places and revis­it­ing old favour­ites with your kids and we hope the 'kid' inside you will enjoy these out­ings too ... Continued