Thursday, May 22, 2014

Climbing Table Mountain, Cape Town, South Africa


Don at the top of Table Mountain after our climb


We arrived in Cape Town from Namibia after a ghastly flight.  Air Namibia was great, but we were seated right behind a family of 5 children and disconnected parents.  So the 2 youngest (about 2 and 4) screeched and howled and screamed the entire 2 hours of the flight.  Their parents paid no attention, but you can bet the rest of us on the plane did!  So, we were ready to do something much more enticing  when we arrived in South Africa.

With Don navigating, we managed to drive to the Table Mountain cable car, packed with people and cars.  Not a problem since we had decided to climb up anyway.  It's a 2000 foot climb, up a very steep gorge via very uneven rock steps.  Fortunately, there are some switchbacks along the way to provide a breather, but the steps are quite high, so our knees and thighs protested mightily for a couple of days after our climb.  It took us an hour and 45 minutes to the top and an hour and 15 minutes back down again.  We were quite pleased with ourselves as a lot of 20 somethings were climbing also and couldn't keep up with us.

Table Bay from atop Table Mountain
The views are spectacular all the way up.  About halfway, the gorge gets very narrow and even steeper, so you're climbing right along a huge cliff that offers welcome shade.  From the top of Table Mountain, you get unbelievable views of Cape Town, the Cape of Good Hope, and all the mountains and towns on both sides of the Cape.  Happily for us, who had started out very unprepared, there is a nice little cafe at the top with lots of remarkably good food and rapid checkout.  So we sat outside enjoying the views from on high and fighting off the inevitable birds, these with gray hoods that looked like Muslim headscarves, deep black bodies and orange feathers under their wings.  Voracious and beautiful.

view along the Cape from Table Mountain

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