[Worldtrippers home] [World Cruise home]
Cape Town is the capital and oldest city of South Africa. Its most prominent feature is Table Mountain, a two-mile-wide, flat-topped mountain. Table Mountain is one of the most-visited sites in South Africa, though the city’s advertising slogan is: “Cape Town – we’re more than just Table Mountain.”
We originally bought tickets to the 9.5-hour “Aquila Private Game Reserve” excursion. This sold-out tour would have given us one last chance for an African safari. Unfortunately, Russell ended up with a lecture scheduled for 6:30 pm. We couldn’t take a chance of returning late, so we reluctantly turned our tickets back in.
Instead, we went on one of the two included tours: “Table Mountain.” This three-hour excursion would take us on a rotating cable car up to the top of Table Mountain. We would enjoy a panoramic view for an hour and a half, before riding back down.
As we discovered from two previous cancelled ports, South Africa’s weather is notoriously unpredictable. Cape Town is no exception – locals say you can experience all four seasons in one day. We disembarked the ship to strong winds. Looking up at Table Mountain, all we saw was fog.
The excursion guidelines state that if the cable car is not running, we go to the Museum of Natural History instead. But if the cable car is running, we are required to take it. Despite today’s zero visibility, the cable car was running. So up we went.
When our bus arrived at the lower cable car station, visibility was still good, and we saw a terrific panorama of Cape Town. But above that, everything disappeared into fog. Unfortunately, Gail had no idea we were going up in a cable car. She is terrified of edges, and had a miserable ride up.
The top of Table Mountain was completely fogged in, cold, wet and windy. Unfortunately, Gail had no idea the weather would be like this, and she didn’t bring a jacket. She ended up joining most of the other guests, crowding into the tiny souvenir shop for an hour and a half just to stay warm.
Russell tried going on a one-hour walk led by the guide. She very quickly realized that there was absolutely nothing to see. She walked guests around for 15 minutes, showed them the way to the rest rooms, and ended the walk.
On the plus side, Gail found some nice souvenirs to buy. And at least we made it to the top of Table Mountain. We heard that some tourists have been to Cape Town three times and have never been able to get to the top.
The weather never did clear up today. If we make it back here next year, maybe we’ll have better luck.
