What Wine Teaches You About South Africa

South African wine has been produced at the Cape since 1659, making it one of the oldest wine-producing regions outside Europe. Its history spans Dutch colonisation, French Huguenot refugees, apartheid-era isolation, and a remarkable post-1994 revival. The only grape variety unique to South Africa, Pinotage, was created here in 1925 and nearly destroyed twice before the world took notice. What you drink in the Cape Winelands carries more history than most people realise.