Day Tours - Cape Point Route, Cape Town
On the way to the Cape of Good Hope, you will pass first through Fish Hoek, which has one of the loveliest and safest beaches on the False Bay Coast. It is an ideal family beach and its calm bay is almost guaranteed to provide good swimming, snorkeling along the rocks and a lot of sandy beach to make sand castles or on which to soak up the sun. Even the beach front coffee shop and restaurant seems imbibed with the local placidness and serves you as and when they see fit, but you don’t seem to mind as the views are so spectacular.
The next stop is Simon's Town, a quaint naval village, 40 km from Cape Town en route to the Cape Point Nature Reserve. Named after the Governor Simon van de Stel, who chose to use the town as a winter anchorage for the Royal British Navy, the town was handed over to the South African Navy in 1957. Simons Town is also home to the Boulders Penguin Colony, a growing colony of the vulnerable African Penguin. Wooden walkways allow visitors to view the penguins in their natural habitat and there is also a new information centre. Children will love the penguins and their antics and Boulders Beach is also worth a stop for safe and enjoyable swimming.
Cape Point is situated in the southern section of the Table Mountain National Park and is accessible via the Cape of Good Hope entrance. The Table Mountain National Park encompasses the incredibly scenic Table Mountain Chain, which stretches from Signal Hill in the north to Cape Point in the south, as well as the seas and coastlines of the Peninsula. This narrow stretch of land, with its beautiful valleys, bays and beaches, is surrounded by the cold Atlantic Ocean to the west and the warmer waters of False Bay and the Indian Ocean to the east.
The return towards Cape Town along the western side of the peninsula is just as magnificent. Indeed, Chapman's Peak Drive, carved out of solid rock along the coast, is one of the most dramatic roads in all Africa and not for those who suffer vertigo. Chapmans Peak Drive is a dramatic, snaking route that hangs suspended between the Cape mountains and the restless ocean far below.
Your last stop on the way back should be Hout Bay for Dinner, or alternatively a sunset drive up Signal Hill.
Hout Bay was formerly a fishing village and has managed to maintain its unique combination of fishing harbour and country atmosphere, despite development. Its long, sandy beach faces a bay framed by mountains and is quite simply exceptionally beautiful. Capetonians throng here over weekends to partake of the local fish & chips and to catch a glimpse of the resident Cape seals that make the harbour their home.
In the evenings Signal Hill is a little like ‘lovers lane’ - popular with couples who are up there to enjoy the lights and the romance of the Table Mountain backdrop, particularly during summer when Table Mountain is lit at night. Signal Hill separates the City Bowl from the suburb of Sea Point, and its name is indicative of its function as the site for the noon gun, which is fired every day, a little lower than the viewpoint on Signal Hill, at Lion Battery. |
