PLETTENBERG BAY NEWS - The countdown for the fourth annual Plett Wine & Bubbly Festival has started.
On Saturday 25 November, this event – which has grown into one of the town’s most anticipated festivals – will kick off with a packed programme celebrating the region’s ever-growing wine industry.
Visitors to the two-day event, which is presented by the Bitou municipality and Plett Tourism, will have the opportunity to enjoy more than 30 different wines and bubblies from nine of the 16 local producers.
Saturday starts with the main event, a showcase of the wines along with artisan cheeses, charcuterie, breads, savouries and oysters, also produced by locals, while festinos are treated to even more spoils including the soothing sounds of local and visiting musicians.
Sunday will be a repeat of the programme, but with an added event – the Plett Wine Theatre.
This will include talks by guest speakers Pieter “Mr Bubbles” Ferreira from Graham Beck Wines, Bramon cellar master Anton Smal and well-known wine columnist Peter “Pee Bee” Bishop. Plett Tourism spokesperson Patty Butterworth said theatre talks will take place in a small, intimate theatre for those wanting a wine aficionado experience. Ferreira is set to talk about the geography of wine while Smal and Bishop will chat about “the empirical tasting assessment of successive vintages of Plettenberg Bay sauvignon blanc.
“The Plett Wine & Bubbly Festival is an anticipated highlight on the Plett events calendar. Agriculture in Plett is growing. The wine industry has developed over the past 17 years and has become a key component to the tourism industry. With a focus on growing the agriculture industry as a whole, wine can possibly be seen as a gateway to other produce for the area. Other agricultural products include honeybush tea, olives, macadamia nuts and pomegranates. Job creation and sustainability are two areas of growth that we look forward to tracking,” Butterworth said.
The Plett wine industry was established in 2000 when local Peter Thorpe, who grew up on a wine farm in Worcester, planted the first vines of sauvignon blanc in the Crags area on his Bramon wine estate – the first wine estate that far east of the Western Cape.
Today there are 16 wine farms of which nine are open to the public with either a tasting room and/or a restaurant. These include Bitou, Bramon, Newstead, Redford Lane, Kay & Monty, Lodestone Wine & Olives, Luka, Packwood and Plettenvale.
Not only has the industry grown in terms of numbers of vineyards, but also quality of wines with several winning awards for their wines.
* Tickets: Quicket (online) / Plett Tourism office at R200 pp per day or R350 for a weekend pass. Each ticket includes access to the festival, a complementary tasting flute, tastings of all the wine estates and R20 discount on a bottle purchase.
* Full programme: www.plett-tourism.co.za/events/plett-wine-bubbly-festival-2017
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