Arriving in Cape Town last week I was greeted with a cerulean sea, matching the sky, and temperatures of 30C. Coming from the depths of the UK’s cold snap, it was a heart-warming sight — even knowing that contestants from the ITV2 dating show Love Island were doing unspeakable things in a villa in nearby Franschhoek couldn’t shake my good mood.
The weather was so perfect that there was no sign of Cape Town’s fabled “tablecloth” — the wispy cloud that often shrouds the city’s distinctive plateau; instead the steep cliffs of Table Mountain were thrown into sharp relief by bright sunshine.
Also pleasing was knowing that a weak rand is making Cape Town a bargain for Brits — it meant that I’d arrived into a glorious holy trinity of sun, sauvignon blanc and sterling strength.
It has been a rocky road back from Covid for South Africa, but its pandemic wounds have now been thoroughly disinfected and to mark its return Virgin Atlantic has, after a seven-year break, resumed flights from Heathrow to Cape Town. The airline is up against British Airways, the only other carrier to offer a non-stop service on this route, South African Airways having retrenched post-virus.
Since take-off in November the Virgin route has exceeded expectations, with flights about 80 per cent full and premium cabins selling out first. When travellers touch down they will discover that the Mother City is also having the mother of all moments — Cape Town is abuzz, with its hotel, dining and arts scenes having used the enforced period of Covid hibernation as a springboard to ever-higher levels of sophistication.
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That includes its A-lister hotel, the waterfront One&Only Cape Town, which has just completed a top-to-toe refurbishment. Its bedrooms and public areas now have a softer, more contemporary look, and there’s a fresh, pleasingly understated decor at its Vista Bar & Lounge, a famed sundowner spot thanks to its 18m-tall windows that frame Table Mountain — the new menu has been devised in collaboration with Karen Dudley, one of the city’s best-loved chefs.
The hotel’s most daring lockdown move, however, was to replace its gift shop with the Wine Studio, offering bespoke wine-paired dinners, tastings and wine-blending with Luvo Ntezo, the charismatic head sommelier. If you book one of these sessions Ntezo will suggest a range of South African varietals based on your grape preferences; you then experiment with blends until you settle on your perfect combination, choose a name and label, bottle and cork it to take home; Ntezo retains the recipe for future orders.
A stone’s throw away the V&A Waterfront arts and entertainment complex has upped its epicurean ante too. Two sparkling French-inspired newcomers are the fine-dining Pier (ten-course tasting menu £66pp; pier.restaurant) and its slightly more casual sister the Waterside (nine-course tasting menu from £57pp; thewaterside.restaurant). These are offshoots of La Colombe in Constantia, a 20-minute drive south from Cape Town — which came 56th in the 2022 World’s Best Restaurants list. Another potential legend in your lunchtime is a brand-new branch of Tang, Johannesburg’s answer to Nobu — it has a huge dining deck where your sushi is served with a side order of spectacular mountain views (mains from £9; cpt.tanghospitality.com).
The Waterfront has also bolstered its arts and crafts profile — its Watershed warehouse is now lined with stalls selling covetable ceramics, fashions and jewellery from local artisans. Typical among them are Africa Nova, which has colourful textiles from £50, and Ilundi, where exquisite handcrafted leather bags start at £60 (waterfront.co.za).
For a more immersive deep dive into the arts the Iziko South African National Gallery reopened last September and is showing Breaking Down the Walls – 150 years of Art Collecting, which juxtaposes South African artists such as Irma Stern, Gerard Sekoto, Peter Clarke and Gladys Mgudlandlu with paintings and sculptures from Rembrandt, Picasso and Goya (£2; iziko.org.za). In the up-and-coming Woodstock neighbourhood works from emerging artists can be found at the SMAC (smacgallery.com) and Stevenson (stevenson.info) galleries. In edgier Salt River you’ll find dozens of intriguing murals to explore on the walls of former factories and warehouses.
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At some point the twinkling ocean will lure you back, though, and Cabo Beach Club is the first place in Cape Town to recreate the ambience of a Mediterranean beach hangout. Admittedly this place is more about the vibe than the view (it overlooks working docks), but it does tick off the hipster essential: an industrial-chic design that works as well for digital nomads and sun-worshipping sloths. Table legs are tucked into its pretty dusting of artificial beach, there’s a swimming pool as skinny as a supermodel and a decadent caviar, champagne and oyster deck. It’s the kind of place where those Love Islanders would be happy to work on their tan lines when they’re finally unleashed from the villa next month (mains from £8; cabobeachclub.co.za).
● Best things to do in Cape Town
Those highly groomed reality-TV stars will probably also make a beeline for Sea Point, where they’ll feel a natural affinity with the ethos of the Nines (as in dressed to the nines) — the neighbourhood’s newest rooftop restaurant and lounge, with a light, airy mood board, a surf-and-turf menu and cocktails that breeze through from classic daiquiris to contemporary white chocolate and chai margaritas (mains from £10; thenines.co.za).
The Shoreditch is bound to be on their radar too — this is the new restaurant at the Winchester, where the Dutch Cape architecture has been given an impressive 21st-century whoosh and the dining brought bang up to date with a fire-based concept that flirts with cuisines from Mexican to Indian. Ask to be seated in the bougainvillaea-draped courtyard for top-notch people-watching (mains from £7; newmarkethotels.com).
Perhaps not all lockdown developments were unequivocally positive. At the One&Only a harbour otter took up residency in the canal that slices through the resort. Quite understandably Boris (not named after you know who) decided to stick around, and he is still occasionally spotted at the swimming pool. However, he can be a bit too friendly — last week he nipped the toe of a sunbathing guest. The hotel doctor administered precautionary tetanus and rabies jabs, and an hour post-squeal she was back sunning herself on the poolside sunbed.
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She’s not alone in feeling that Cape Town feels like exactly the tonic we need right now.
Susan d’Arcy was a guest of One&Only Cape Town, which has B&B doubles from £812 (oneandonlyresorts.com). She was also a guest of Virgin Atlantic, which has Heathrow-Cape Town returns from £764pp; the service ends on March 25 and resumes on October 29 (virginatlantic.com)
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