The Museum van de Caab is housed in an 18th Century wine cellar on the 318 year-old Solms-Delta wine estate in Franschhoek.

The museum records the complex and fascinating history of South Africa through the individual people who lived and worked on the farm, from its pre-historic past to the present – through colonialism, slavery and apartheid.

Evidence of pre-colonial habitation is shown in excavated stone artefacts housed in glass cabinets.

Other archaeological remains in the museum are displayed in a stream of delicate ceramic fragments, all found on Solms-Delta, from Khoisan pottery to the blue-and-white porcelain of the East.

Visitors are also offered guided open-air tours of the excavated foundations of a 17th Century ruined homestead – one of the oldest to be uncovered at the Cape – in addition to a Dutch well and a Later Stone Age settlement site.

Newly opened on the estate is a restaurant called Fyndraai that has a decidedly local twist. With a glass floor that floats above the exposed remains of the old wine cellar, the restaurant explores the diverse culinary traditions of the Cape: Dutch, Indonesian and Khoisan.

Traditional Afrikaaner boerekos, with its Cape Malay (slave) influences, is combined with ingredients that were first used by the indigenous Khoisan nomads who lived here thousands of years ago.

The restaurant is part of a larger conservation initiative on the estate to restore 12ha of farmland to the original mix of fynbos and renosterveld.

A nursery is also in the process of being established to propagate the edible heritage flora. The cuisine at Solms-Delta, like its adventurous wine, generous people and charming buildings, can best be described as Hiervandaan [‘from this place’].

Entrance: FREE
Open: 9am–5pm
 t 021 874 3937   f 021 874 1852
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