The balmy summers call for outside entertaining: a light but long lunch in the shade, glasses filled with chilled wine. During the rainy Cape winters everyone moves indoors and huddles around the fireplace with a glass of world-class red wine, produced right here in the Paarl Valley.
The arboreal giants of Paarl – mainly oaks donated by Simon van der Stel, Governor of the Cape of Good Hope colony – provide shade on hot summer days. On the bank of the Berg River is an arboretum that boasts some 4 000 trees representing about 700 indigenous and exotic species.
The Main Street of Paarl is one of the best – preserved historic streets in the country with many original buildings, representing the most popular architecture styles of the last 250 years, still intact and beautifully preserved. The interesting juxtaposition of the different styles that developed as the town expanded, interspersed with some of the original farms, lends an air of comfortable established country living to an otherwise vibrant commercial town.
The Heritage Foundation has recently published the “Historical Walking Tour of Paarl”. This walk, shaded by giant old oak trees, provides a glimpse into the heart of the earliest part of the town, but there are also many other areas so well preserved that Paarl could qualify as the best preserved 19th Century town in SA. Paarl is the third oldest permanent settlement in South Africa – you can imagine the amount of exciting stories Paarlites can tell.
