On Helshoogte Pass above Stellenbosch there is a bend where the road briefly opens up the view: west over the valley and its estates, east to the mountains above Franschhoek. Drive on and you soon notice that every town here sits behind a mountain. That makes the Winelands bigger than they look on the map.
The district has five municipalities and around a dozen towns that matter to travellers. Which one suits you depends less on wine than on how much you want to drive. Stellenbosch, Franschhoek and Paarl are less than an hour from Cape Town and close together. Tulbagh and Ceres sit behind their own passes, the Breede Valley behind the Huguenot Tunnel, Robertson and Montagu already on Route 62 towards the Klein Karoo.
The towns below are grouped by region. Each town page gives distance and driving time from Cape Town, the estates nearby, places to stay from our partner feed and wines from the town that you can order at home.
