
Sea. Beach. Fresh air. This is the stuff of weekend getaways in the West Coast village of Paternoster, South Africa. To enjoy it to the full, you’ll be looking for Paternoster accommodation. So here’s a cool place to stay that I recently discovered: Azzuro self-catering.
We love to pop in to the West Coast National Park on our way up and there are lots of things to do at Paternoster itself, like visiting the Cape Columbine nature reserve and lighthouse, whale-watching, enjoying a carpet of wild flowers in spring, kayaking or just sinking our toes into the white beach sand. And for food lovers like me there’s a bunch of really cool restaurants that consistently serve up delicious meals (including Wolfgat, which was declared the best restaurant in the world in February 2019). Some have kick-ass views of the beach and ocean to enjoy while you eat.
For a small village, there’s an ample choice of places to stay, from luxury boutique lodges to Paternoster self-catering accommodation. For our most recent mid-summer visit, we planned to eat out to catch up on two of the Paternoster restaurants we hadn’t sampled yet and to revisit an old favourite. So all we needed was an affordable place that was self-catering; we’d have simple coffee and rusks for breakfast and restaurants would take care of the rest of our nosh.
When we looked for where to stay in Paternoster, we discovered the charming Azzuro self-catering accommodation in the Mosselbank section of the village. A little thatched Cape cottage, it was as cute as a button on the outside with its blue door and shutters, its potbellied braai-cum-pizza-oven on the stoep, a blue and red fishing boat plonked on the pavement to remind us that we were now at the seaside.
Through a stone arch and down a few stairs were the bedroom and bathroom. I loved that the bedroom was big enough for a queen-size bed (I hate narrow double beds when it’s hot) and that it came equipped with both heater and portable fan, for either cold winters or hot summers.
How close is the beach?
One potential shortcoming at Azzuro is that there’s no sea view from the cottage, but the price takes this into account. We paid R900 a night for the cottage for two people when we stayed in February 2019. This is remarkably affordable in Paternoster, where accommodation can go for a stratospheric R4000 to R5000 a night for two people. And honestly, you’re one street or just 100m from the beach, so it’s very easy to enjoy an early morning reflective walk next to the sea, watch some of the fishing boats coming in, or take a pink-tinged sunset stroll.
Want to book for Azzuro Paternoster? Do it with Paternoster Rentals here.
Given that Azzuro is a self-catering cottage, I have to say something about rock lobster (crayfish). The official season is from November to March/April but crayfish is now on the red list of the SA Sustainable Seafood Initiative. This means you shouldn’t really buy crayfish at all because stocks are so low they’re unsustainable.
You will be tempted. If you visit during this time you’ll see many bag-toting locals wiggling their fingers at you from the side of the road to show they have crayfish for sale. These may or may not have been caught with the necessary permit but I recommend you resist the impulse to buy anyway, so as to give wild stocks a chance to replenish. You may be depriving someone of money today but you’ll be doing your bit to assure the survival of the species in the long term.
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