Did You Know the World’s Longest Wine Route Runs Through South Africa?

Did you know that...

The longest wine route in the world is South Africa’s Route 62, stretching about 850km from Cape Town through the Western and Eastern Cape to Gqeberha, connecting wine regions like Robertson, Paarl, and the Little Karoo, offering diverse scenery and historic towns along its path.

On this day in history, December 18

1271 Kublai Khan renames his empire ‘Yuan’, marking the start of the Yuan dynasty of Mongolia and China.

1620 The Pilgrim Fathers first land in what is today Plymouth, and, albeit unknowingly, begin to lay the foundation of the US.

1622 Portuguese forces score a military victory over the Kingdom of Kongo, in Angola.

1688 William of Orange makes a triumphant march into London as James II flees.

1737 Antonio Stradivari, the most renowned violin-maker in history, dies in Cremona, Italy. He made about 1 200 violins of great quality, half of which survive. There is evidence that the quality of sound in Stradivari violins was due to chemicals used to protect them.

1898 The first land speed record (63kp/h) is set in an electric car.

1899 Field-Marshal Lord Roberts is appointed British supreme commander in South Africa during the Boer War.

1944 Seventy-seven B-29 Superfortress and 200 other aircraft bomb Hankow, China, a Japanese supply base.

1971 Three members of the Irish Republican Army die when the bomb they were transporting explodes in County Derry.

1991 IFP leader Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi withdraws from negotiations on ending apartheid, saying he will not attend the first session of Codesa, as the decision not to invite King Goodwill Zwelethini was an ‘insult’.

1995 Britain’s Queen Elizabeth asks Prince Charles and Princess Diana to file for divorce.

1999 After living up an ancient redwood in Humboldt County, California, for two years, activist Julia ‘Butterfly’ Hill sets foot on terra firma, ending her anti-logging protest.

2012 Police arrest 17 people for ‘the Great Maple Syrup Heist’ after 3 000 tons is stolen from a storage facility in Quebec, Canada.

2018 A meteor explodes over the Bering Sea. The blast has 10 times the energy of Hiroshima atomic bomb that flattened that city in 1945.

2020 Argentina beats France, 4-2 in penalties after the teams were locked at 3-3 after extra time in the final of the Fifa Soccer World Cup.

2023 The Vatican approves a landmark ruling to allow Roman Catholic priests to administer blessings to same-sex couples as long as they are not related to civil unions or weddings.

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