*Pottering around the Cape Peninsula Above: Classic shot by Shan of the view from Table Mountain across the city to Robben Island. Actually, "pottering" is probably the wrong word. The schedule was full, seeing the sights and catching up with various dear people. Not just Shan's and mine this time, Siân and Roger also had old acquaintances to catch up with in Sea Point. But first things first. Table Mountain. And make that early to avoid the traffic. Table Mountain I'd been up this mountain several times over the preceding half-century and a few things had changed. First the cable car is arguably a lot less scary. Certainly less flimsy. Today's cable car is a large round bubble that revolves so that its occupants get a 360 view; from the bastion itself, looming above, to the grand Lion's Head and further to the city below with Robben Island in the background. Then the lower station has been modernised and much enlarged. But most of all, the hordes of people. Happily we were staying just down the road in Gardens and managed to beat most of them to it. Even so, parking was only just doable. There is a picture below illustrating this. We had to park seemingly miles away and walk back to the lower station where it was obvious they catered for much much more voluminous crowds than were there for an early start so, luckily, we were ascending in almost a thrice, the upper station looming like some Gothic fortress. Once you're up there the area is so large that crowds disperse in various directions and it is perfectly possible to contemplate the grandeur in relative solitude. First of all the retro-view looking back from whence we'd come, depicted in the banner photo at the top of this blog. Above: [top to bottom l-r] the view on the way up with the intrepid walkers like ants below - we pitied them, the day was already getting fearsomely hot; the overflow parking on road below - our car was on the extreme right; the mountain top is famous for its flora, the first is a lesser orchid of sorts; then a blue Disa orchid - sadly we didn't get to spot the fabled Red Disa Uniflora this time; two pictures of plonkers - more about them in the text below; a back view from Table Mountain down to Camps Bay; there is something almost biblical about Roj reaching out here to Siân; pictures of Siân and Shan reflecting on the visit on our way down. As mentioned, the substantial plateau on the top of the mountain allows for a network of pathways with a good circular walk which takes visitors, eventually, back to the cable car and rewarding them with vast views of the Atlantic. On the city side there are some smallish parapets but most of the area is bounded by plunging cliffs with and without barriers. Going over the edge would be easy and sudden and result in certain death. So back to the plonkers. This lot was taking it in turns to stand right on the edge to pose for photographs and abounding with braggadocio. Happily none of them went over ... By the time we got back to the bottom of the cableway the queue of people had exponentiated and stretched down the road to the East. They were going to be standing in the heat of the middle of the day for hours. Rather smugly we found our car and set off for Kirstenbosch. Kirstenbosch Most visitors to Cape Town will visit Table Mountain at some time or another. I suspect, despite its popularity and status of botanical world renown (and this might be cause for debate), not quite as many visit Kirstenbosch. A lot do, but its global impact is even more significant than the mountain behind it. If Kirstenbosch has a raison d'être, this is it in a nutshell for me: Above: [top to bottom l-r] this sign just captured what Kirstenbosch means to me - not just cycads but they are symbols of the philosophy of the place; a "forest" of cycads; cycads and a gentle stream; the boardwalk across the forest canopy is a thrill; peace in the forest. It is also cool in the shade. That aside there is an extraordinary collection of plant species, both indigenous and from around the world, cultivated in formal gardens and in areas of natural forest and open fynbos. This excerpt from the South African Natural Biodiversity Institute (SANBI)[1] about Afromontane Forest particularly grabbed my imagination of the call of Kirstenbosch: "Afromontane Forest, meaning mountain forest of Africa, covers about 0.5% of Africa and occurs in isolated pockets, like a series of forest islands, in the mountains of the Western Cape, up the east coast through the Drakensberg to Limpopo and through Africa to the Arabian Peninsula. Forests need rich soil and high rainfall, which is why they are usually found only in well-watered kloofs (ravines) and south-facing slopes. Afromontane forest is dominated by evergreen trees that can reach up to 30 m in height. "At Kirstenbosch forest is found in the kloofs and on the slopes below the highest peaks. The oldest and largest trees can be found between Skeleton and Nursery Streams. Thousands of trees were felled for timber in the late 1600s and 1700s, then alien timber trees were planted, reducing the forest even further. The Kirstenbosch forests have been protected since the Garden was established in 1913. In the 1960-70s alien species were eradicated and the forests left to regenerate and recover naturally." And now for a joll[2] Cocktails and dinner in Gardens/Tamboerskloof - we'd felt guilty enjoying the Kloof Street House cocktail bar without Shan the evening before and were determined to repair there after a revitalising nap and shower. What a great decision, following which we segued up Kloof Nek Road to the Miller's Thumb, a delicious seafood restaurant owned by one of Shan's oldest friends, Jane, and her husband Sol Solomon. Suitably replete we retired to the Tintagel for a regenerative kip in preparation for the next day of our Cape Peninsular-in-two-days sojourn. Above: Cocktails before dinner at the Kloof Street House. Cape Penguins and Points The Western Cape province is home to two shore-based penguin colonies, one at Stony Point Nature Reserve next to Betty’s Bay in the Cape Overberg and the other at Boulders Beach next to Simon's Town on the Cape Peninsula. Another place I'd visited more than 5 decades ago when it was all pretty informal and you could just kinda wander about[3]. Now it is an industry with boardwalks and ticket offices and all the accoutrements of modern tourism but you can't take it away from the penguins, they are fascinating creatures and are seemingly imperturbed by the phalanx of paying guests admiring them from the walkway above. Above: [l-r] I say, Penelope, fancy a dip ... nah ... Patrick how about a race to the rocks ... too much hassle, mate; Sián and Shan discussing the habits of penguins. I think I identified my friends' aunt's old house at Boulders but I couldn't be sure. There's a whole industry going on down there these days. So off we went to Cape Point, another popular tourist stop. When one gets there it is easy to believe that it's sitting at the extreme Southern point of Africa but we'd already been to Agulhas, which is nowhere near as grand and dramatic. Siân and Roger walked about as far along the point as is practical and took in the vast stretches of the Atlantic Ocean which is a pretty much uninterrupted seascape until it reaches the shores of Antartica 4,200 kilometres away Above: [l-r] The Cape Point lighthouse showing distances to far away continents; Siân glancing around from a 4,200 km stare. When you travel in South Africa you expect to see the biggest concentration of game in the North-East. We'd promised our Faringdon friends all sorts of things in abundance so it was a tad ironic that we got to the South-Western point of the continent before spotting a few special beasties. Actually we had seen a couple (literally) of moth-eaten ostriches on the east of the Breerivier near Malgas but it wasn't until Cape Point that we saw them in any quantity or putting on any antics like the chaps below. An Eland also chose his moment as we were driving slowly past. Above: [top to bottom l-r] Ostriches can be artful comics and here were two of a flock putting on a bit of a show; Eland, too, the world's biggest antelope, had been hiding from us but here they were, one of them extremely au naturel, as we were completing our journey; Bontebok are a little rare but there we were bumping into this (rather scrawny) fellow in the Cape Point Nature Reserve; heading up Chapman's Peak Drive towards one of the open-side tunnels holding up the rock as you pass under it; from the top a view down to Hout Bay; Shan in almost the exact same spot getting on for 45 years previously. What was really weird was an almost dearth of baboons wherever we went in SA. We'd regaled the Starrs with "baboons everywhere" tales of hordes and antics and they just never materialised. Not in any numbers, anyway! The whole way around South Africa! Our friends were disappointed. It was fitting to head back to Cape Town via Chapman's Peak Drive with its splendid vistas and rich history including being the nemesis of many a cyclist in the world's biggest cycle "marathon'. The event, which draws around 30,000 participants is still referred to as "the Argus" despite having been renamed to the anodyne Cape Town Cycle Tour. And "Chappies" is the high point in terms of the challenge with its 144 curves over 9 km ... with energy-sapping climbs on the way up and death-defying descents on the way down. The "Drive" was constructed 100 years ago and since then has provided Capetonians and visitors alike with breathtaking views of its vast panoramas. We were lucky to take the drive on a relatively quiet day and were able to stop at the top to take in the view of Hout Bay and the Ocean beyond. Our stop provoked a memory of an outing on the cusp of 1979/80 when Shan and I first traversed the route together. The romance of it was enhanced by the fact of our first trip away from our Durban home together. It was before we were married and my gorgeous now wife of almost 44 years had only been allowed to make the trip because there were not one but two chaperones in the form of her sister, Kerry, and of my own sister, Sue, both of whom allowed us a lot of latitude. Last night in Cape Town For the first night of our month-long trip the Starrs and Harrisons went their separate ways; Roger and Siân to friends in Seapoint and Shan and me to meet up with the son of friends who, at 25, was resuming his pursuit of a PhD at UCT[4]. We hadn't really got to know Finn (Kinnear) as we had lived on opposite sides of the world all his life. But the sad demise of his Dad, one of my closest friends, Tony (A.K.A. Norman or Spike) from cancer a few months earlier had meant we'd spent a fair time together, a fair bit of it engaged in philosophical banter, occasionally lubricated by some of the finer wines South Africa has to offer. We met at Maria's Greek Cafe on the opposite side of the Gardens suburb of Cape Town for a pukka Greek meal and my dear wife, as is her wont, set the atmosphere of friendly intimacy immediately. Conversation alternated between amusing trivialities and some meaty serious stuff. It was over all too soon and needs a replay before long, possibly in the UK. Finn's Mum, Camilla, might even beat him to it ... Above: Finn and Shan on the edge of Dunkley Square in Cape Town.
Coming next Our only seriously crap accommodation experience, requiring a bit of pampering while languishing up the NW coast in preparation for the vagaries of BA long haul indifference. [Endnotes]:
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April 2024
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