Whether you are staying in the estate's highly recommended onsite 5-star Village at Spier (hotel) or arrive as a day-visitor, you can choose to explore the estate's excellent wines (taste and/or buy), enjoy excellent food in one of four distinctly different restaurants, have a picnic under shade trees on expansive lawns, browse through its farm store, visit the Estate's cheetah project, go horseriding, play a round of golf, enjoy a cabaret in an intimate small venue or a large-scale production in Spier's own amphitheatre.

For groups the Estate even offers a vintage train ride between it and Cape Town. The list goes on and on.

Spier Wine Centre
The Spier Wine Centre provides both for "guided" tasting, where a wine connoisseur introduces you to various cultivars and leads you in the tasting thereof, as well as a separate tasting room where you can sample various wines at your own leisure. The Wine Centre represents 200 local estates and eight international estates, as well as Spier's own brand of wine, the Spier range. The latter has won a number of Gold, Silver and Bronze awards at the Annual Veritas Awards. Some of Spier's branded wines are Longridge, Savanha, Spier Cellars and the Capelands wine ranges (also see: South African wines).

Restaurants
Spier offers four distinctly different restaurants, all high quality but catering for different tastes and budgets.

Spier Deli & Picnics

Spier Estate's picnic area.

The Spier Deli features an impressive range of farm stall like products. You can browse through spices, homemade jams, cheeses, pies, etc. The Deli also bakes fresh bread. Offerings may be bought for take-away or to be enjoyed on the Deli's veranda.

A very popular option is to book a picnic basket and to enjoy the contents under shade trees on the Estate's expansive lawns next to the Eerste River or around its lake. Picnics are weather dependent and must be booked well in advance.

Village at Spier (hotel)
Africa Deluxe Tours conducted an overnight inspection visit to the 155 room hotel recently and we were left very impressed by what we saw and experienced. We rate the hotel as a full 5-star establishment (country hotel). As the name indicates rooms are located in a "village" format rather than an apartment block.

There are thirty-two mostly double-storey dwellings grouped around six private courtyards, each with its own pool and entertainment area. Eight ground level rooms, with reed-roofed verandas, are arranged around each courtyard. The courtyards feature swimming pools and expansive lawns with a good collection of shrubs and other plants. In between are a couple of small "village" streets.

The post-modern Dutch architecture is simple yet elegant. It sits very well in its environment and has a cool Mediterranean feel. The Village offers standard rooms, suites and "villa rooms". Interiors are spacious, luxurious and functional with a high standard of interior decorating. Rooms cater for all the modcons you'd expect in a 5-star hotel but has a down to earth feeling. The Village is within easy walking distance of most of Spier's other attractions but is cleverly placed to ensure good privacy and exclusivity.

The hotel's main complex houses the reception, a concierge & travel desk, a board room, a guest computer with free access to the internet, Toto's bar and the Figaro's restaurant where meals may be enjoyed - you may off-course choose to make use of one of the other three restaurants at the estate. A more detailed description will be made available to Africa Deluxe Tours clients if required.

Camelot Spa
A recent addition to The Village at Spier (hotel) is the Camelot Spa. The facility offers a variety of massages and holistic treatments including aromatherapy, reflexology, facials, manicures, pedicures and other specialised skin care therapy and treatments.

Amphitheatre & Spier Summer Arts Festival
The 1 155-seat open-air Spier Amphitheatre has become a sought after venue for productions ranging from opera to drama since its inception some years ago. It is also the primary venue for Spier's annual Summer Festival, which runs from November to March. The festival organised by the Spier Arts Trust utilises other Spier venues as well. Africa Deluxe Tours will gladly arrange for clients to attend performances at Spier if compatible with their itineraries.

Spier Cheetah Park
The Spier Cheetah Park is home to the Cheetah Outreach programme. The latter is an educational and breeding project managed in such a way as to also raise funds and otherwise support the Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF). The CCF aims to ensure the survival of free-ranging cheetah in the wild.

Visitors to the Cheetah Park pay a small entrance fee to view the majestic cats and learn more about them and their plight in the wild. For a donation you can enter a holding camp, touch and be photographed with one of the cheetahs. All funds raised goes to the CCF.

Equestrian centre
Ponies and carthorses at Spier's equestrian centre provide entertainment and rides for visitors to the Estate. A variety of outrides are available. Breakfast and sundowner outrides are conducted at leisurely pace through the vineyards and if you desire may include adventurous activities such as swimming in farm dams.

More experienced riders can go on longer faster rides. Another option is to travel to the Spier Wine Cellars by horse where you may watch the wine-making process and sample some of Spier's own wines.

Spier Country Club
The relatively new Spier Country Club offers a golf course set on a Cape Winelands wine estate. Designed by top golf course designer Peter Matkovich, The Spier Country Club is an 18-hole, 6 385m course that offers stunningly beautiful mountain views, complemented by vineyards, orange groves and dams. The Blaauwklippen River cuts through the course and frequently comes into play, most notably on the par-3 second, a spectacular hole where the green is adjacent to the riverbank. The first and 18th holes run through the Kleine Zalze wine farm, whose cellar is being used as the clubhouse.

Tennis
For tennis enthusiasts there is a small tennis stadium, which has hosted a couple of international games including an exhibition match between Anna Kournikova and Amanda Coetzer. The complex offers three all-weather courts. A tennis academy is linked to the facilities and aims to develop promising talent as well as growing the game in previously disadvantaged black communities.