Cape Town is a beautiful city! It is where the South Africans go for vacation, and was a joy to explore. As my final stop in South Africa, it was an exclamation point! My hotel was in Green Point, so walking distance to several places including the V&A Waterfront. Cape Town is much like any other large city. It is generally safe for pedestrian traffic, particularly in the high-traffic tourist areas. I used Uber and the red tour buses for transportation when I didn’t walk.
Table Mountain
Table Mountain towers over Cape Town in all directions with its constant cover of clouds. Unfortunately, I didn’t find the opportunity to ascend this geological wonder. I would have loved to hike it, but several sources of information said it isn’t great to hike alone because of the climate and other factors. This also would have required a substantial amount of time. And, the cable car was closed the whole time I was there due to strong winds. I guess it gives me another reason to return to this South African gem of a city.
Victoria and Alfred Waterfront
The Victoria and Alfred (not Albert) Waterfront beats with life. Full of restaurants, entertainment, and shopping, the Waterfront provides endless opportunities for everyone. I was down in this in this neighborhood every day I was in Cape Town. It was a good hub for taking the red tour buses, and it also had all the eats and shopping I could want. However, Cape Town has rolling or scheduled blackouts each day. They’ve been going on for years because there isn’t enough power infrastructure to support the city. This impacts places like the Victoria and Alfred Waterfront, so that in the middle of the day, most of the shops and restaurants can’t perform electronic transactions. They don’t always know when or how long either. I feel really bad for the business owners who lose thousands of dollars in business each week because of this.
I also took a small boat tour of the waterfront. It got us up close to some lounging seals and shared some interesting history of this man-made harbor.
Red Bus Tour
Like Johannesburg, the red bus tour was the easiest and least expensive way to get around town and see the sights. I could hop on and off any stop. This gave me a great overview of the city, its history, and culture while providing an easy way to get from the V&A Waterfront into downtown. The bus company has a few routes in Cape Town, so I got to see all around the city from many vantage points.
Walking Tour
The bus company also offers free walking tours in Cape Town. I took the tour through old Cape Town. We got some great history, both older and more recent, from our guide. We got to walk through the Company Gardens, visit the City Hall (on the anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s speech from its steps), and so much more.
Rhodes Memorial
My great grandfather spent several months in the Cape Colony in various cities and towns. He wrote about climbing Table Mountain and hiking around to the Rhodes estate. I didn’t find the Rhodes estate, which I think is now part of the university, but I did visit the Rhodes Memorial, a very classical temple to a man. As mentioned before, his reputation is both for good and bad. No matter whether you agree with his personal views and how they informed his policies, this man shaped South Africa and its history in very big and important ways.
Whales
Everything told me that whales wouldn’t be around Cape Town when I would be there. This is why locals and visitors alike smiled and awed when several pods of these majestic mammals breached all along the coast. Even though seeing whales breach and flash their tales is spectacular, it begs the question of why they would be in those waters at a time of year they normally are not.
