Literally over the Hottentots-Holland Mountains via Sir Lowry’s Pass, approximately two and a half hours drive out of Cape Town, lies a region of such immense beauty that it attracts thousands of visitors a year to its orchards, forests, grain fields and vistas surrounded by rolling mountain ranges.
What would have been a momentous journey in days gone by is today simply a case of driving "over the berg" (mountain) and into the Elgin Valley, one of the major apple-growing areas in South Africa today. The Cape Overberg is a great expanse of beautiful and diverse landscapes.
The Overberg stretches from the Hottentots-Holland Mountains in the west, to Swellendam in the east. In the north it reaches as far as the Riviersonderend Mountains and ventures south to include an incredible coastline that draws regular annual visits from those great beasts of the ocean, the Southern Right and the Bryde's whales.
From Elgin and Grabouw the N2 wends its way through the incredible Houw Hoek Pass en route to Bot River. Here one's journey can either continue inland via Caledon and Riviersonderend to Swellendam or south towards a coastline that is rich in beauty and fast becoming one of the most famous coastlines in the country.
The towns of Hermanus and Gansbaai are particularly popular during the whale season between June and December - Hermanus boasts the best land based whale watching along its cliff path as well as the popular whale crier, whilst Gansbaai is famous for sightings of whales and the Great White shark. Yet it is other more remote and lesser known villages that offer the true 'jewel' of the Overberg. Each and every one of them has something to offer the visitor and is pretty on the eye.
The Overberg fruit route takes one through the villages of Barrydale, Elgin and Villiersdorp; wine is a product of Bot Rivier, Grabouw, the Hemel-en-Aarde Valley, Villiersdorp, Elim and Stanford; whilst nature reserves and gardens abound – the Harold Porter Botanical Gardens, the Kogelberg Nature Reserve and the De Hoop Nature Reserve.