Zip Zap zests up with added vooma by Adele Blank

Zip Zap Circus

I've never been to watch the Zip Zap Circus in Cape Town. I've known of its exist­ence, espe­cially since it moved into its 'tent' just behind Artscape. Who wouldn't. What a great space, all you see from the N1/N2 fly-over above Table Bay Boulevard is the dome to your left, the words Zip Zap emblazoned for all to view. It is a home and envi­able advert­ising space all in one.

And let me tell you there is some ser­i­ous cir­cus magic at work within the dome's peri­met­ers. On near­ing the cir­cus, the chil­dren (some of them a little older than the term 'child' will allow, but still young enough to be deemed youth) begin to weave their spell on vis­it­ors straight away. Continued

O’ways Teacafe in Claremont

O'Ways Teacafe

Tea houses haven’t exactly taken off in Cape Town. While we embrace cof­fee cul­ture with almost reli­gious zeal, we tend to sniff our noses at any­where that offers any­thing other than Ceylon and Rooibos (or per­haps Green Tea or Chamomile for the real dare­dev­ils.) The now defunct Tea Emporium in Cavendish Mall had dozens of vari­et­ies of tea, but its many Eastern-inspired teapots stood empty whilst den­iz­ens of the mall jostled for room in the cof­fee shops.

Thankfully we now have a new tea house in the sub­urbs to chal­lenge the cof­fee olig­archy. O’ways Teacafe offers more than sixty-four exit­ing forms of nigiro teas and infu­sions sourced from all over the world.  The exotic names are enough to make you try them all; Chinese Gunpowder, Strawberries and Cream and even the more eso­teric flower­ing teas. Continued

Short & Sweet comes to Cape Town

Short & Sweet

Capetonians are in for a winter treat! Short & Sweet, London's only weekly short film even­ing comes to Cape Town for an exclus­ive five-week spe­cial. In asso­ci­ation with Highland Park Single Malt Whisky, Short & Sweet launches on Tuesday, 28 June at the Bay Harbour, Hout Bay (31 Harbour Road – oppos­ite Fish on the Rocks). Doors open at 18h00. Films screened from 19h30–21h30 includ­ing inter­val. Entrance costs R20.

Short & Sweet is ded­ic­ated to the exhib­i­tion of short film as a crit­ical art form in its own right. Each week you can expect to see a selec­tion of the finest short films, music videos and short anim­a­tions from around the globe: old films, new films, films from estab­lished dir­ect­ors to break­ing tal­ent. The intent is to inspire all who attend, expose the best tal­ent and ulti­mately cel­eb­rate film. Continued

Winner 2 Nights at a Hip Boutique Hotel in Cape Town

CONGRATULATIONS to Rob Crozier of New Zealand who has won a 2 night stay in the hub of Cape Town's café cul­ture (and just about 5 minutes from everything and every­where else!) at the Hippo Boutique Hotel. The prize includes 2 con­sec­ut­ive nights accom­mod­a­tion for 2 people in an exclus­ive indi­vidu­ally branded Suite, break­fast daily at Greens, 1 din­ner at Fat Cactus, 1 din­ner at Simply Asia, 1 bottle of wine on arrival and air­port trans­fers, if required (flights for own account).

Rob, your voucher is on its way. Please con­tact Hippo Boutique Hotel to redeem your voucher (valid until 15 December 2011). We’re sure you’ll enjoy your stay! Continued

Cape Town Top of the World

Cape Town came out tops in this year's Travellers Choice Destinations Awards by TripAdvisor. With a huge jump from 25^th last year, Cape Town finally takes its right­ful place as the favour­ite des­tin­a­tion in the world as chosen by mil­lions of trav­el­lers. Congrats to the "Mother City"!

Cape Town #1 on TripAdvisor
Travellers' Choice 2011 Best Destinations in the World Continued

Jesus Christ Superstar on at Artscape

On at the Artscape Opera House in Cape Town and presen­ted by Pieter Torien is one of the world’s best music­als: Jesus Christ Superstar. The musical tells the story of the last days of Jesus Christ and high­lights the polit­ical and inter­per­sonal struggles between Judas Iscariot and Jesus.  The new pro­duc­tion is a spec­tac­u­lar, dram­at­ised ver­sion of the last seven days of the life of Jesus of Nazareth as seen through the eyes of Judas.  Jesus is played by Cito and Mary Magdalene is played by South African singing sen­sa­tion Nadine.  Continued

Starke Ayres in Rosebank — much more than a nursery

Starke Ayres

My hus­band is a closet nurs­ery fet­ish­ist. Now many of you might argue that he is simply a garden­ing freak. Granted. But there is some­thing a little insi­di­ous, do you not think, in spend­ing untold hours in a nurs­ery. A nurs­ery, for good­ness sake! Filled with plants, plants, and, well, plants. I don't get it.

Or at least I didn't until I vis­ited Starke Ayres in Rosebank recently, and real­ised that the mod­ern nurs­ery is the latest line of con­sumer des­tin­a­tions to have under­gone some­thing of a meta­morph­osis. Gone is the idea that a nurs­ery is simply a place to store plants, a plant ware­house, if you wish. Now the aver­age nurs­ery is an 'exper­i­ence' ... Continued

Rondebosch Common and the café where you do lunch

Common Ground Cafe

'Meet me at this really great venue,' my other half chimes at me across the cell, 'it's in Rondebosch, you can't miss it, right across from the com­mon'. And that is the main allure of this café – the view.

Essentially, it must have one of the best views in Cape Town. Well, cer­tainly one of the best views of the moun­tain, even if it is the back side of the table top. But you don't get bet­ter than sit­ting out on a ver­andah over­look­ing the com­mon and the uni­ver­sity build­ings, the moun­tains a gor­geous back­drop. Even if you have to know some­thing about the slip road to get there, or at least I did... Continued

Win 2 Nights at a Hip Boutique Hotel in Cape Town (Closed)

Hippo Boutique

WIN a 2 night stay in the hub of Cape Town's café cul­ture (and just about 5 minutes from everything and every­where else!) at the Hippo Boutique Hotel.

This hip four-star boutique hotel, has twenty spa­cious stand­ard rooms and five designer exec­ut­ive suites (double volume lofts with bed­room / bath­room on a mezzan­ine level). The rooms are en-suite, air-conditioned and come equipped with king-size beds Continued

Do the Design Route in Cape Town

Design Route

At the recent Design Indaba you could pick up a Design Route Map – pro­duced by the team behind the huge exhib­i­tion, and Cape Town Tourism. Without doubt Cape Town has pretty unique cos­mo­pol­itan vibe, so it is no sur­prise to learn that it is regarded as the cre­at­ive cap­ital of South Africa. The Design Route is a col­lec­tion of local design – shops, ware­houses, boutiques, pro­jects and col­lect­ives. It's a bevy of indi­vidu­al­ity, and a flush of young up-and-coming and estab­lished names and brands. It's also incred­ibly excit­ing to know that so much is hap­pen­ing on one's very doorstep.

And the great part of trav­el­ling the Design Route is that the major­ity of 'spots' lie in the City Bowl and Woodstock, Salt River and Observatory. In the city this means that if you do not have your own car, or even if you do, you can use the City Sightseeing Cape Town bus on both the Blue and Red routes – most of the ven­ues are within walk­ing dis­tance. You will get to see Cape Town at the same time. It is a great route to offer your friends vis­it­ing the city ... Continued

The Potters' Market at Rondebosch – I feel an obsession coming on

On the second-last Saturday of March and November is ceram­ics fever in Cape Town. Everyone even remotely inter­ested in pot­tery des­cends on the Rondebosch Potters' Market, where every­one who pro­duces pot­tery in any shape or form, is there to exhibit. And we're not talk­ing cousin John's barely there, not so very well exhib­ited just-learnt-to-use-a-wheel type ceram­ics either. Unassuming the mar­ket might be, but some of the top ceramic artists in the Cape exhibit here under the leafy boughs of the park's oak trees. Continued

The Flamjangled Tea Party

Flamjangled Tea Party

Set on the Contermanskloof Wine Farm, only 30 minutes from Cape Town, the Flamjangled Tea Party in Durbanville is a unique, col­our­ful week­end long party and cel­eb­ra­tion of music. With its ‘Mad Hatter’s Tea Party’ theme, fest­ival­go­ers need little encour­age­ment to dress up in psy­che­delic cos­tumes, embra­cing the oppor­tun­ity to dust off their zani­est out­fits. A magical array of props and fest­ival décor set the scene for one of Cape Town’s most beloved fest­ivals, which attracts a more folksy and artistic crowd than most.

This year’s party prom­ises to deliver, with a stel­lar line-up of great bands and artists per­form­ing on Saturday and Sunday, with per­form­ances by the Ruby Robins, Mzfitz, The Jack Mantis Band, Mr. Cat and The Jackal, Peachy Keen, Guy Buttery and Hot Water, amongst oth­ers, which are sure to delight! Continued

A Review of La Masseria Restaurant in Durbanville

 Italian food is one of the world’s great cuisines, and I per­son­ally could eat it every night of the week. And so I’m always on the look out for great Italian res­taur­ants. La Masseria cer­tainly fits the bill for me, as this is an authen­tic Italian family-run busi­ness. La Masseria means the “farm­house” in south­ern Italian, and is the per­fect name for this res­taur­ant, which is set in a his­tor­ical build­ing, the old Evertsdal Celler, and dates back to 1714. The main din­ing room has a quirky feel, with crooked walls, and a huge hearth that houses a roar­ing fire in winter. There are old pieces of farm equip­ment dot­ted around, such as a huge oak bar­rel and a plough hanging from the ceil­ing. These bits of equip­ment were uncovered dur­ing renov­a­tions of the 300 year old build­ing in 1980, and now form part of the décor and the iden­tity of the build­ing. Continued

Pet friendly Restaurants in Cape Town

Pet friendly

Recently we found a lost dog, a beau­ti­ful golden Labrador with violet eyes, and the sweetest demeanor. No one claimed her and she became part of the fam­ily. We named her Perdie, and she was the per­fect dog — our abso­lute shadow. She suffered from sep­ar­a­tion anxi­ety though, which meant that unless we wanted the house howled down and chewed to bits, she went every­where with us. This of course presen­ted a chal­lenge when eat­ing out. We felt that most res­taur­ants would not take kindly to us arriv­ing with Perdie in tow. However, we dis­covered that there are quite a few res­taur­ants in Cape Town which are sur­pris­ingly accom­mod­at­ing when it comes to dogs. Usually they had a few con­di­tions, such as that you must sit out­side, that your pooch is well behaved and does not dis­rupt other diners.

Some res­taur­ants are Continued

The Old Biscuit Mill revisited

Old Biscuit Mill

The Old Biscuit Mill, in Albert Rd, Woodstock, was once a run down mill and an eye­sore. Courageous developers had a dar­ing vis­ion to cre­ate a unique space for cre­at­ives and design­ers who could work and show­case their cre­ations in the same space. The idea was to see people at work, to wit­ness the source of the cre­ations. The intro­duc­tion of the Neighbourgoods Market on a Saturday helped cata­pult the amount of vis­it­ors to the old Biscuit Mill on Saturdays, although many people began to think the entire build­ing only oper­ated on a Saturday. This is obvi­ously not the case – there are many incred­ible busi­nesses, cof­fee shops and res­taur­ants there that are world-class and deserve your atten­tion. Take the time to visit the Old Biscuit Mill Continued