You will all know by now, that we have had a bit of a rough start to the week. Understatement of the year. I wanted to show you how quickly things can change here on the farm. With a series of clicks you are able to track how things moved.

We start off here, where Rob posted the high winds on the mountains on Sunday afternoon.

24 Hours later, here is the next image, which is a sad one, as you can see the fire damage. What you can see is part of 5000 hectares of land from Jonkershoek to the Haut Espoir farm and beyond that has burnt, destroying landscapes, hectares of Fynbos and so much vineyard that it’ll never be recovered. This is 2 years in a row now that the big fires have raged.

It was a real nerve wrecking time on the farm, and the following sites have great overviews of what happened:

Spit or Swallow had a great article on their Wine Times site here.

News 24 has another here and the Cape Argus has their cover here.

All in all, a sad start to the week. Here is to hoping things can only improve and that negligence does not cost so many people so much in the future.

Haut Espoir would like to thank everyone who sent us wishes of safety in this period. It’s very much appreciated.