Sunday 8th February - Table Mountain

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Sunday 8th February: day seven - Cape Town.

Today was a 'day for the brave hearted'! An ascent of Table mountain from the Cape Town side, up the "Platteklip" gorge near to the cable car route.

The morning started with cold air rolling in off the Southern Atlantic Ocean (SW winds) turning the warmer air over the land into fog and mist. At one stage you couldn't see the next street in Cape Town, talk about the top of a mountain and a very steep climb into a gorge!!! Fortunately, in our favour, the cooler air brought reduced temperatures, a cool breeze and intermittent cloud cover, which meant the climb was bearable..... We could only guess how much more difficult it would be on a hot windless day.

Our ascent started well, about 1100, by parking the car mid way between the cable car ( our route out-off the mountain ) and the start of the Platteklip Gorge ( so named for the large stone steps that one climbs almost from top to bottom ). We took the more scenic route from the bottom that most tourists avoid. The views became more and more amazing as we 'climbed' higher. The journey also became more interesting and steep as we neared the top of the mountain: The gorge was only 3 metres wide and very steep sided right near the top.

What interested us, was how many people there were on the mountain. Most were heading down after taking the cable car up (whimps !!!!) but there were several also climbing the same route as ourselves. It became quite funny as there were frequent stops to take on fluids, rest weary muscles and take in the views. At each stop there would be a friendly exchange of stories and banter with other groups, as you had just passed the same group, a few minutes before and now it was our turn to rest and them to climb by.

After 2 hours and 10 minutes we reached the top. ( not bad for us teenagers as the estimated time is 2hours 30 mins ).The top of table mountain provided more excellent views and some amazing cloud formations: very interesting to watch clouds form in front of your eyes and then the cloud thicken out to block the view totally. Well worth the climb for the whole experience.

The trip down on the cable car was also quite special. We rushed into the cable car to get the best views out of the front, taking in the steep decent and the shear sides of the mountain, or so we thought!!! As the cable car started to descend it also started rotating ( on purpose you'll note ) so the people at the front ended up at the back.... How clever but a little spooky!

INTERESTING FACT: table mountain was the main source of drinking water for ships in transiting The Cape. Table mountain is 1,085m high.

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