The first impression of Cape Town is always going to be of Table Mountain. I firmly maintain that every city would be improved by a great big scenic mountain, and we should give up on the Olympics and import a huge pile of rocks into the East End of London. Table Mountain is fairly scenic in its own right but in a meteorological phenomenon I don't quite understand, it often ends up with its top swathed in clouds (the 'tablecloth') even when there isn't another cloud in the sky. Just a couple of hours after getting to Cape Town we found ourselves on a balcony with a beer watching the cloud roll across the mountain at surprising speed. It has quite a wow factor.
Table Mountain and Cape Town from Blouberg
Cape Town can be unbelievably windy and the first time we tried to go up the mountain the cable car was closed, so we eventually made it up on Thursday afternoon. Because of the improbable cloud, you have to pick your day carefully (and tip: beat big queues by buying a ticket online, it's valid for 2 weeks). The tablecloth was forming when we got up there, so we had spectacular views in 3 directions but didn't bother doing a long walk for a southerly view - as the cloud gradually rolled over us we realised that, yep, you really can't see a thing through it.
Well worth going up - in a nice but disconcerting touch, the cable car has a revolving floor so everyone gets a decent view on the way up. (You can walk up but I'd played football the previous day so thought we'd take the easy option for once. We bumped into friends at the top who vindicated our decision by telling us it had taken them 4-1/2 hours and, yes, they would be taking the cable car down.)
On Tuesday we drove around the side of Table Mountain and down the east coast of the cape, first to Muisenberg to take photos of colorful beach huts (a great expanse of beach crawling with tiny marine life, with a lovely backdrop of False Bay), and then on to Kalk Bay and Simon's Town for lunch.
All of these feel like little English seaside towns but with better weather, which was doing its best to make up for the previous 2 days with one of several scorchers. In late October, a scorcher in CT is perfect weather - not quite too hot because the breeze off the sea keeps you cool.
Just beyond Simon's Town is a penguin sanctuary at Boulders Beach - you have to pay to go down to the two beaches to see the penguins, which are mostly lying around doing nothing in the afternoon sun, although you can also see quite a few for free on the side of the walk between the beaches.
This penguin says "Hello Esther!"
We did see 3 active penguins on the beach by the boulders, as they appeared on the beach, waddled into the water, swam at and just around a wading Lilly, and then waddled up through a small gap between boulders and off towards all the other penguins. Lilly emulated them with a quick swim in a very cold sea.
Oh yeah, and this bright red 3-inch-long insect. Lilly refused to handle it so the photo could show the scale
At the bottom of the cape is Cape Point national park, which is certainly scenic enough to merit a visit - a drive and a walk takes you up to the old Cape Point lighthouse, and then round to the Cape of Good Hope which is the southernmost tip of the cape (but not the country) and unbelievably windy.
Lilly demonstrates the hat shell be wearing to Ascot next year
That's the Cape of Good Hope at back left
I made my way out onto the rocks for a photo, nearly lost my sunglasses to the wind when I turned round, and came back covered in sea salt.
Lilly's hair demonstrates the wind slightly better than mine
Finally we drove back up the West Coast, a truly stunning drive, especially with the late afternoon sun, for a sundowner near the beaches of Camps Bay. Recommended.
This is Hour Bay, part of a great drive
Cape Town is definitely a good place to have a car - it's an easy place to drive (hard to get lost with Table Mountain always visible and the centre has a simple grid); public transport is very limited and there are quite a few good places to visit away from the centre; and parking is easy. There are a lot of 'parking guards' throughout CA - it's casual employment, ie they work for tips, but they will keep an eye on your car and you give them a little tip when you get back. These ubiquitous guards also make the place feel a bit safer since you're rarely on an empty street, and they'll help direct you in and out of tight spaces.
On Wednesday we drove up to Blouberg and Big Bay, which boast long sandy beaches and a great view of Cape Town with Table Mountain in the background (see also above).
There's a brand new development here with what look like decent options for a scenic lunch or dinner, though we were too early. Instead we had lunch at the Waterfront, a big area of the docks that has been turned into a shopping and eating area - it maybe feels just slightly too sanitised and tourist fodder, but still a pleasant area to pass a couple of hours.
In the evening we had a football match - a rather cobbled together and patched up team consisting of some friends from university, and some other friends and family of the groom. Under the circumstances losing 6-3 felt respectable, and the local side we played against were a decent bunch. I had a good chat with one of them about career-threatening and deliberate fouls, but I should stress that this was nothing to do with anything that happened in the match.
Yes, our mascot is dressed as a tramp. He'll calm down when someone gives him a can of beer
In our last day and a bit, we ticked off a few of CT's noted museums. The slave lodge was fairly pointless - hint to museums, if you're devoting an entire room to a *replica* of a table on which something once happened, you probably need to try a bit harder. (A temporary exhibit on Mandela is quite informative, albeit just a lot of text on walls, but if you go through the permanent collection to it, you will eventually realise that you're reading it backwards. Great planning.) The District 6 museum - devoted to the stories of coloured people who were relocated from this part of CT - has a bit more imagination but the few stories I had the energy to read were banal, and I imagine your time would be better spent with a book on the subject. The South Africa National Gallery is the best of the three, although part of it was closed to put in a new installation. A large photography exhibition and a smaller career retrospective were nicely staged.
All of these are in the centre, along with an airy little park (named The Company's Gardens), the colourful houses in the Bo-Kaap (Muslim area), cheap souvenirs in Greenmarket (Lilly bought a vuvuzela to add atmosphere at our football match), and the bars, shops and cheap hotels of Long Street, where we were staying.
The Bo-Kaap - I was tempted to burn out the car on the left to make for a better photo, but there was probably a car guard somewhere in the vicinity
Crime is always a bit of a worry in SA - the Garden Route is pretty safe but even here hotels will suggest you don't walk outside the busiest streets at night just in case. All the coastal areas just around CT felt fine but this central area is the one where a bit of extra care feels necessary - and I was happy to park an empty zero-excess rental car on the street here overnight, but I'd be less happy with my own. Having said that, we didn't have any problems and it's handy to be so central. We were easily able to sample the local Nando's (good mains, disappointing sides, one song stuck on loop the whole time) and find somewhere for a drink - the most surprising being inside an exceedingly noisy Irish pub post-football, when we discovered that the upstairs was trying to be a classy piano bar, albeit with the vibrations of downstairs massaging you through your chair. But there's plenty of choice on Long Street, lots of them with balconies.
So we enjoyed CT - 4 nights felt about right (we missed the botanical gardens and decided not to bother with Robben Island), and highly recommend a car for at least a day or two to see the cape.
Now we're off to a wedding, then back to the vicinity of CT to see the vineyards of Stellenbosch...
