They say you must never burn a bridge and this couldn’t be more true than in the hospitality industry. It is due to our non bridge burning ways that we have ended up at South Hill, running our own restaurant and function venue and living the country life! (Which for our Joburg friends is hilarious!)
To cut a long story short, Gordon and I, Emma, were working away in Cape Town - I was a Sales Manager at the CTICC and Gordon an Executive Chef at a boutique hotel - when I received a call from an old colleague from the Arabella, Joep. We had had a conversation two years back about running our own restaurant and doing weddings. Joep remembered the conversation and had an offer for us. If you have ever worked with Dutch people you will know that they do not go away easily, so instead of avoiding his calls we agreed to meet him to see the farm – South Hill. Firstly, we nearly died when we had to go over Sir Lowry’s Pass as we were under the impression that Cape Town stopped at the pass! But to our amazement, and pleasure, a truly beautiful part of the Western Cape lay in front of us and we were instantly mesmerized by the Elgin area and the South Hill farm. The next few months were busy for us - we signed the deal with the farm to take over operations of the venue and to open a restaurant, resigned from our jobs, moved house and had our fist baby girl, Luci – all in a three month period! When we look back, we can’t believe we managed to get it all off the ground. We opened in August 2008 and are now heading into our third season, loving living in the country and expecting our second little girl.
So the morale of my little introduction to our lives on the South Hill farm is to never burn a bridge, because our bridge has bought us to a very special place and we invite everybody to come out, have a great meal and enjoy this little bit of Eden!
Emma
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