Since it was a fairly clear day, we went to table mountain. This is the cable car terminal at the top of the mountain. Unfortunately, the cable car was closed due to high winds. It was built by the swiss, a long time ago.
Day 5 Hiked Table Mountain, browsed the Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens. For dinner we drove around looking for the Butcher's grill, but couldn't find it. We were stuck in a parade in the middle of town which made it really difficult to get to a restaurant or our hostile. Finally we got to the hostile, got cleaned up, and went to a cool restaurant called the News Cafe. Back to the hostel, read some of Brother Lawrence's "Practicing the Presence of God."
Since it was a fairly clear day, we went to table mountain. This is the cable car terminal at the top of the mountain. Unfortunately, the cable car was closed due to high winds. It was built by the swiss, a long time ago.
So, we drove down the mountain a ways and got out. Another nice view. We decided to hike the mountain since the cable car was closed!
View on the way up. I think we did the hike up in just over 2 hours. Mostly 820 meters of straight up, but it was staircased rocks mostly so it wasn't too difficult, just long.
We were all quite hot going up b/c the sun was intense. The first day in Capetown my right arm got badly sunburned just while driving around table mountain!
One of those orange-winged birds
Yes, we're doing something dangerous! Oh yeah!
At the top of the gorge. Just a little further up to the table top.
View of camps bay from the top.
This is actually higher than the cable car.
Don't fall down!
David looking matcho. It was really cold up here, so we all quickly buttoned up.
Left to right: Lion's head, Robben Island, and cable car terminal.
Camps Bay
Really windy, b/c the wind went up and over the mountain. The wind was in pockets, so you could back away from places and it would die.
Capetown, V&A area.
Rock Dassies!
We later found a plaque that talked about these skittish yet inquisitive guys. It confirmed the theory that these guys are supposedly the elephant's closest relative.
It's a long way down...and these guys would crawl out on those green bushes hanging over the edge and eat them!
Believe it or not, that cable car spins the whole way down, and can hold like 68 people!
Cute little fella.
Oh, yeah. By the way, we quickly domesticated these guys. Nick pulled out some sour straws candy, and the dassies quickly smelled it. They stopped making their funky noises and perked their heads at us. Little by little we fed them and got them to trust us until they were literally eating out of our hands! I eventually got bit on the thumb b/c I wouldn't let go of the candy. Later we found a cool bumper sticker making fun of tourists that had bloody thumbs from feeding the dassies
Going down now.
We flew down the mountain in 40 minutes. We found a watering hole-where David decided to go in the buff - don't ask - and then we drove to the Kerstenbosch botanical gardens. The traffic was heavy into the gardens, b/c that day they had a rock concert there. I found a Capetown license plate on the side of the road and collected it for my next souvenier.
This thatched roof building is similar to what our bungalos would look like in Krueger National Park.
Lots of pretty green, but it wasn't spring anymore, so not as colorful as I expected.
The helmeted Guineafowl. These turkeys have communal nests and so they'll put all their eggs in one basket!
SA has quite a bit of desert variety, including these colorful ones here.
And this one here.
Nice green lawn
This is THE iconic flower of the botanical gardens.
They also had many sculptures that they sold to pay for things. This one is from a single piece of stone, just some of it is polished and some of it rough.