CAPE TOWN is southern Africa's most beautiful, most romantic and most visited city. Indeed, few urban centers anywhere can match its setting along the mountainous Cape Peninsula spine which slides into the Atlantic Ocean. By far the most striking - and famous - of its sights is Table Mountain, frequently shrouded by clouds and rearing up from the middle of the city.
More than a scenic backdrop, Table Mountain is the solid core of Cape Town, dividing the city into distinct zones with public gardens, wilderness, forests, hiking routes, vineyards and desirable residential areas trailing down its lower slopes. Standing on the tabletop, you can look north for a giddy view of the city centre, its docks lined with matchbox ships. Looking west, beyond the mountainous Twelve Apostles the drop is sheer and your eye will sweep across Africa's priciest real estate, clinging to the slopes along the chilly but spectacularly beautiful Atlantic seaboard. Turning south, the mountainsides are forested and several historic vineyards and the marvelous Botanical Gardens creep up the lower slopes. Beyond the oak-lined suburbs of Newlands and Constantia lies the warmer False Bay seaboard which curves around towards Cape Point. Finally, relegated to the grim industrial east are the colored townships and black ghettos, spluttering in winter under the smoky pall of coal fires - your stark introduction to Cape Town when driving in.
To appreciate Cape Town you need to spend time outdoors as Capetonians do, hiking, picnicking or sunbathing, or often choosing mountain bikes in preference to cars and turning adventure activities into an obsession. Sailboarders from around the world head for Table Bay for some of the world's best windsurfing and the brave (or unhinged) jump off Lion's Head and paraglide down close to the Clifton beachfront. But the city offers sedate pleasures as well along its hundreds of paths and 150km of beaches.
The City
Between two mountainous flanks reaching away from the docks through the intense city centre and up the mountain is the City Bowl (made up of the Upper and Lower city centers and the Waterfront), where lively areas such as Long Street, the Bo-Kaap and Gardens rub shoulders with the serious new wealth of Tamboerskloof and Oranjezicht. Straggling south from the centre along the eastern slope of the mountain, the predominantly white southern suburbs become progressively more affluent as you move from arty Observatory through the comfortably middle-class districts of Rondebosch and Newlands, culminating with the Constantia wine estates. |
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