Making Ourselves at Home at Hillview Apartments in Knysna, SA

We’ve been on the road now for seven months.  In that time, we’ve learned some lessons about how we like to travel.

For one thing, we like avoiding tourist high season.  Knysna, the primary tourist town on South Africa’s Garden Route, is the perfect example of why this works.  The town is beautifully situated, with charming shops and lots of activities on offer.  I imagine it’s also packed in the summer.  But in the winter, we had both beautiful weather and the town all to ourselves.

 

We also like staying in spacious, comfortable places that help us feel like temporary locals.  So we were thrilled to find Hillview Self-Catering Apartments, which fit the bill perfectly.  Our little studio apartment was well-appointed, with comfy furnishings, a kitchen, a wood-burning fireplace, and a killer view of the Knysna Lagoon.  Eating breakfast on the terrace, grilling ostrich steaks with red wine for dinner, conking out on the seriously comfy couch for a nap, staying at this place was just like weekends back in Atlanta (except for the ostrich).  Karen, the laid-back owner, and her cats Muggles and Martha (who really ran the place) made us feel like we’d been living there a month.

 

Knysna is a stunningly beautiful place.  We spent our days exploring the “Heads,” the steep cliffs that guard the entrance to the Knysna Lagoon from the Indian Ocean, watching fishermen try their luck on wide beaches, and looking for rare elephants on hikes in primeval forests.

 

This being a coastal town, we ate plenty of great seafood.  Knysna is known for its oysters.  We picked up a dozen to go from a village shop — fat, buttery, saline, they were some of the best oysters we’ve ever had.  We also followed our instincts to Freshline Fisheries, a great hole-in-the-wall seafood joint near the marina that served the best fish and chips I’ve ever eaten.

 

Knysna is also home to Mitchell’s, South Africa’s oldest microbrewery.  We stopped by for a tasting and spent an enjoyable afternoon chatting with Sandy, the owner’s daughter.  We still haven’t found those biting, full-flavor IPAs that we love in the U.S., but we did like Mitchell’s Milk and Honey and 90 Shilling ales.  We also enjoyed a European-style cafe called Ile de Pain on the slightly-too-perfect Thesen Island.  Great coffee, sinful desserts, and crunchy, yeasty baguettes that could pass muster in Paris.

 

 

Disclaimer:  Hillview Self-Catering Apartments sponsored our stay in part.  As always, the writing and opinions here are our own.