If you haven’t entered any dates, the rate shown is provided directly by the hotel and represents the cheapest double room (including tax) available in the next 60 days.
Prices have been converted from the hotel’s local currency (ZAR7,434.78), via openexchangerates.org, using today’s exchange rate.
The future’s bright at Future Found Sanctuary, a hi-tech hideaway in Cape Town’s Hout Bay. Admirers of handsome, slightly squat hills will enjoy the proximity to Table Mountain and the Twelve Apostles that form its curvy behind. The two-villa retreat has a forest in the middle, with views of the valley served straight to your balcony in many of the supersize suites, each of which has high ceilings, hand-painted wallpaper and generally winning design. The seven acres include a natural immersion pond, rather more enticing heated pools, several gardens, and is the starting point for numerous hiking trails over Table Mountain.
Double rooms from £366.73 (ZAR8,550), including tax at 15 per cent.
More details
Rates usually include breakfast, as well as airport transfers and laundry.
Also
This temple of tranquillity has a wellbeing director, who’ll customise your retreat from a number of experiences including guided hikes, tai chi and conscious breathwork.
At the hotel
Free WiFi throughout, seven acres of grounds and gardens, yoga studio, gym, spa. In rooms: tea and coffee kit, TV, sound system, air-conditioning, mini fridge and free bottled water.
Our favourite rooms
Each room has been crafted with painted floral or acacia-tree wallpaper, impeccably selected furniture and windows with a view – the main issue is deciding on the square footage, since some are huge enough to be houses in their own right. If size matters, go for a Grand Master Suite and prepare to get lost in it.
Poolside
Each villa has its own heated outdoor pool, and there’s also an immersion pool filled with spring water straight from the mountain.
Spa
The villas share a spa that’s bigger than the average hotel’s – it has three treatment rooms, a large steam room and yoga studio. You’ll also be able to feel at one with nature in the pond-resembling immersion pool.
Packing tips
Table Mountain, one of the new Seven Wonders of Nature, is right in front of you and it’d be rude not to attempt to scale it at least once – make sure your suitcase contains a pair of trainers.
Children
Kids are welcome when the villas are booked out as a whole – babysitting can be arranged on request.
Sustainability efforts
The hotel has banned plastic, sources its water from a nearby borehole and used local materials for its construction. All food is either grown on-site or locally sourced – and the hotel’s bath products are produced sustainably as part of a local design scheme.
Down in the cellar, where there’s a long table begging to host a wine tasting.
Dress Code
Art-school types.
Hotel restaurant
Breakfast and lunch are included in your rate, but you’ll have to venture further afield for dinner – luckily, a handful of the best restaurants in the country are within a short drive of the sanctuary. Breakfasts are a hearty spread of seasonal hot and cold options. Lunch is laid on in the form of a ‘harvest table’, laden with several salads and meats – the suppliers of which the team has vetted personally.
Hotel bar
There’s no formal bar, but staff will be able to mix up cocktails – plus, each room has its own G&T station.
This private Hout Bay hideout is at the back of Table Mountain in Cape Town, within easy reach of the centre and a short drive from the Cape’s Winelands.
Planes
Cape Town’s international airport is half an hour away by car – transfers are included in the rate.
Automobiles
Many of Cape Town’s star sights are within walking distance (Table Mountain is literally right in front of you), but if you’re hoping to get out to the wine route, a car will come in handy – there’s free parking for up to 10 vehicles.
Worth getting out of bed for
Oenophiles, rejoice – the many wineries of the Cape Winelands unfurl outside your front door, in Stellenbosch, Franschoek, Paarl and the Constantia Valley. Stockpile crafts while you road-test the street food at Bay Harbour Market, or wander down to the V&A Waterfront at weekends for organic farm fare, with a side order of fashion and homeware. There are lots of hikes to set off on, including Myburgh’s Ravine on Table Mountain, especially pretty in summer, when the red flowers are in full bloom – though, with waterfalls pouring down the mountainside, the colder, wetter months aren’t bad, either. Or combine that day’s workout with a spot of view-hunting by climbing up to Little Lion’s Head.
Local restaurants
Book early for a visit to La Colombe – the restaurant on the Silvermist wine estate, a few minutes away by car, is one of the finest in the whole of South Africa. The two Chef’s Warehouse restaurants – one a 10-minute drive away and overlooking the Constantia Valley, the other 15-minute journey from Future Found Sanctuary in Tinstwalo – each have a backdrop as spectacular as the food. Head to the former for tasting menus and wine flights, but for sunset at the ocean’s edge, secure one of just a handful of tables at the latter. The Beyond restaurant at the Buiterverwachting winery in Constantia is in (yet another) ridiculously good-looking setting.
Local bars
In case you haven’t been drinking enough wine, book in at Beau Constantia, a small-scale winemaker where the tastings are held in what is essentially a glass box (because, views). And for the trendiest terrace in Camps Bay, Chinchilla is the rooftop retreat for you.
Every hotel featured is visited personally by members of our team, given the Smith seal of approval, and then anonymously reviewed. As soon as our reviewers have returned from this homely hotel in South Africa and unpacked their walking boots and Winelands reds, a full account of their break will be with you. In the meantime, to whet your wanderlust, here's a quick peek inside Future Found Sanctuary in Cape Town…
In the foothills of Table Mountain, one of the most biodiverse places on the planet, Future Found Sanctuary hosts regular retreats for guests to really get to know their setting, from teaching the art of living to how to feast (we’re guessing the latter’s a little easier to grasp). The hi-tech houses consist of Maison Noir and Villa Verte, which have nine bedrooms between them; and both can be booked as a whole. The owner has some impressive fashion creds in his native USA, having run both J Crew and Anthropologie – the stylish interiors may have been a giveaway. They include floral wallpaper, sweeping concrete corridors, chic grey sofas and the odd likeness of an acacia tree.
In between learning how to live the good life, meditating on a yoga deck or dunking into the cold immersion pool, guests can come together for long lunches and trips down to the wine cellar, before setting off on wholesome hikes or hitting up some of South Africa’s best restaurants. If this is what the future looks like in Cape Town, fire up the DeLorean.
