BOSJES — Restaurant in Witzenberg Local Municipality

THIS REVIEW IS FOR THE SPA ONLY!!

I don't like writing reviews that's are not 5/5 but I feel like I want to share our experience so it can hopefully help others.

Let me first say that we drove from Cape Town specifically for a rasul spa as we were staying the Wellington for the night. STALLE spa was the only one in the area, so we decided to make a booking with them.

We were caught in traffic from Cape Town and we're running 20 mins late. So 1) I acknowledge we were late. Our appointment was at 2pm and the GPS said our eta was 2:17pm. We phone the spa and told them were were running late. The lady on the phone said she can accommodate us if we arrive by 2:20pm.

Cool, we get there and we struggled to find the SPA as there was little to no signage pointing to the spa. We walked to the restaurant first then was pointed to the right direction. We arrived at the spa probably around 2:23. Anyway, we were late - I acknowledge this again.

We asked that they make the rasul experience short - instead of 45 mins, make it 30 as we rather get our full 60 min massage.

We completed the forms, specifically mentioning which areas of our bodies needed more focus. My husband indicated that he wanted a hard massage that focused on his shoulders.

After we completed the form, the lady took me to the charging room and showed me the facilities we could use after our treatments.

They had a kaftan on a hanger for me for me to change into - I did no and instantly got a smell of old oil. Like you know when oil smells old. I SMELT LIKE THIS NOW. UGH. I didn't say anything after I changed I know we were running late.

We processed to the rasul and it was a lot smaller than I expected. But that's okay, I was more annoyed the fact we has stream for what felt like 25-30 mins whole mins and a then rain (15mins - which wasn't like rain, it was more just like sprinklers from the ceiling - like the ones when a fire alarm goes off but more gentle). It was so unnecessary especially when we asked that this experience would be shorter bc we wanted to get the full 60 mins massage.

Anyway, once that was all done, we went for our massages. It felt RUSHED 😭😭😭!! I was relaxed, I felt like everything was being done quickly. The views were STUNNING but we didn't care about views, we wanted to get a proper massage and we didn't.

After the massage, we went to make coffee at the facilities provided - no coffee pods nor did we get any offer to get the pod coffees filled to make coffee (when I told the lady at reception).

On our way out, I also told her my kaftan smelt like old oil and they must was their kaftans well before giving it to guest.

My husband told me in the car that his massage wasn't even hard - and this was what he wrote on the piece of paper he wanted.

Guys, we paid R2500 for the whole experience - this was for our 10 YEAR WEDDING ANNIVERSARY. I WAS...

Overall the trip was a poor experience, because of an insect infestations, construction site and lackluster service.

We travelled to Bosjes, as per a recommendation of a friend and had anticipated a nice stay to get away from the city. The rooms, whilst being somewhat modern, one can clearly tell the wear and tear of the furniture. Overall, we would have given it a 4/5, as it was still a timeless design, but this was overshadowed by the infestation of insects in our room - call them cockroaches or crickets, but these things were nasty and kept us up at night. Even though the staff tried to help us out, more often than not I had to get the bug spray to get rid of em. We stayed for two nights, but only slept one properly, because of all of the insects. The rooms are at the moment right next to a construction site, which was no problem in the evenings, but made the pool visit unpleasant. Also, for some reason they have a massive estate, but crammed all of the rooms into a tiny area and the rooms are poorly soundproofed, so you will most of the things going on outside. Additionally good to know - most of the premises are closed between Monday and until Wednesday, which was not clear from the beginning and reduced our excitement, as we stayed over exactly that period. The staff and service at Bosjes was OK, but nothing to call home about. Just as an example - they have an amazing Spa, but nobody told us that until we found out. First, AMAZING that you have a Spa, but why would you not tell us that right from the start. When we asked for treatments the staff forgot 3 times and it took that person 4 hours to make a reservation. The area surrounding Bosjes is nice and they offer a great tour with a driver. That was one of the coolest things about our trip and something they should continue doing.

To sum things up - this is a 2/5 experience. Rooms, service and staff are meh, the insects (which they said was normal, as this is the country side, but I even slept in tents without running water and I had fewer bugs than that) made the entire trip terrible and caused a restless night sleep. Would advised against staying at Bosjes and look elsewhere. Plenty of options available that don't suffer...

The venue absolutely stunning well worth spending the day or arranging a wedding and taking your kids to play. The main problem is the restaurant, unfortunately the food is really bad. We had the starters soup which was ice cold and the chorizo which wasn’t too bad and the breads were ok but that’s where it ended. The mains were a disaster, I ordered the sirloin steak and asked for medium, it came well done and the steak was like rubber wasn’t edible at all, then asked for it medium and the waitress was irritated with me. Then it came back medium but the steak was still tasteless and like rubber, for the price you’re paying they should consider using aged steaks. Then the real disaster was the madras curry, it was so bad it’s like the chef never cooked a curry in their life, unfortunately we are from Cape Town where we’re used to great curries. We sent it back and ordered the “glazed” pork neck. It came not glazed at all, seemed like it was boiled and had a tomato sauce from a can on it really nasty and had some weird potato cake with it. We then sent it back because it tasted so bad and the hostess came back and said we had to pay for it and they would give it to us as takeaway. It was completely insulting since we would not want to eat that and we were also not being rude to them or anything just trying to give them constructive feedback but they claimed that dish was never ever sent back which I see now online is a complete lie. If they were just able to be open to Honest feedback maybe they could be a better restaurant or the chef can be less arrogant and maybe take the time to hear from paying clients who have traveled the world and know good food or maybe they have a really bad chef who doesn’t know better but it’s a shame, the venue and ambience...