HYDERABAD: My Cape Town visit was presided by JP, the rotund, wisecracking guide well versed with Indian jokes and music, in that order. He would burst into a roaring “Jai Maata Di”, especially before starting a journey; play Bollywood music in the coach and start swaying his massive frame (thankfully while still being seated); his infectious guffaws and gurgling laughter made the trip a huge fun!
Cape Town was once a stopover for Dutch ships sailing to East Africa, India and the Far East on their quest for exotic goods. With its majestic Table Mountain backdrop, it is considered as one of the most beautiful cities in the world with a rich architectural heritage. Scattered between the high-rise office blocks, the meticulously preserved Edwardian and Victorian buildings and the many outstanding examples of ‘Cape Dutch’ architecture garner much admiration.
V&A, the core of Cape Town
Victoria & Alfred Waterfront in the midst of country’s oldest working harbour is South Africa’s most visited destination that attracts more than 23 million visitors a year. Set against the magnificent sea and the mountain views, exciting shopping and entertainment venues are intermingled with imaginative office locations, world-class hotels and luxury apartments in the residential marina.
Looking from here we saw the Devil’s Peak, which is part of the standard picture postcard view of the iconic Table Mountain. Devil’s Peak name comes from the folk-tale about Jan van Hunks, a Dutch prodigious pipe smoker who had a smoking contest with a devil and won. After a sumptuous lunch in “Fish Market”- a restaurant in the V&A Water Front, we boarded the ferry to Robben Island for a tour of three and a half hours.
Robben Island
Cape Town was home to many leaders of the anti- apartheid movement. Nine km off Table Bay, on the infamous Robben Island, many well-known political prisoners were held for years. It has been used as a prison and a place where people were isolated, banished and exiled to, for nearly 400 years. It was also used as a leper colony, a grazing ground, a mental hospital, a military base etc. Most famously, Nelson Mandela was imprisoned there for 18 of the 27 years he served behind bars before the fall of Apartheid. We visited the notorious Maximum Security Prison, where an ex-political prisoner recounted the horrible conditions under which they were imprisoned. We saw Mandela’s former cell and stopped at the lime quarry where Mandela and his fellow prisoners did hard labour.
That night we dined at the “Gold”, a unique African restaurant in the heart of Cape Town. The 14 course ‘Cape Malay’- African menu was like a safari that transported us from Table Mountain to Timbuktu. This opulent feasting was accompanied by vibrant African traditional song and dance, with a 45-minute drumming lesson thrown in. It was fun to pick up drumming in a short time though we had to nurse our aching hands the next two days.
Table Mountain
The next morning we set out to explore the Table Mountain, South Africa’s best-known landmark. It is also a hiker’s paradise with numerous trails, amazing views and plenty of interesting facts to learn. But we chose to take a shortcut to this paradise through the cableway. JP said that the ‘Table Mountain Aerial Cableway’, designed by the Swedish, has transported more than 25 million visitors since it opened in 1929, including royalty and celebrities. The journey took a little more than five minutes in a rotating cable car (where only the floor rotates). I made the best of the 360-degree view, shot quite a few pictures and videos as we were lifted up the mountain. Luckily it was sunny and bright with neither rain nor much wind. I took a long stroll on the huge table, enjoying the vistas all around. Imagine watching a beautiful African sunset from the top of Table Mountain!
Table Mountain, one of the New 7 Wonders of Nature is part of a World Heritage Site, the single richest floristic area in the world with over 1,460 different species of plants. Its wildlife includes dassies, lizards, snakes, insects and birdlife. I sat quietly in a secluded spot and soon a hyrax (dassie) came to check on me, the intruder.
Sitting on the wall, the cute dassie studied me for long, just as I was equally curious about the creature.Although it resembles a small rabbit, the dassie is actually a hoofed mammal, related to, of all, the mighty elephant! It has a short, furry body with tiny hoofed legs and a small tail. Thanks to special pads on the soles of its damp feet, which act as suction cups on rocky surfaces, the dassie is an agile climber. Some dassies are rock dwellers that live in colonies of up to 50 animals.
When I looked down from the cliff, I saw many families of dassies basking in the sun. I spent a full 20 minutes in the company of that innocuous dassie with curious eyes, surrounded by the beautiful hills.
Some visitors chose to hit one of three hiking trails that start at the Upper Cable Station and explore the summit further, but I opted for a hot cup of coffee at the cafeteria, to celebrate my exciting climb of Table Mountain and the chance encounter with the cutest little dassie.
(The author is a documentary filmmaker and travel writer; she blogs at ijayaprataptravelandbeyond.com)