Table Mountain
Within The UNESCO Cape Floral Region Protected Areas Inscription (2004) And One Of The New7Wonders Of Nature: A Flat Topped Sandstone Massif Rising A Thousand Metres Straight Out Of A City, Reached By A Rotating Cableway In Five Minutes Or On Foot Up Platteklip Gorge In Three Hours, Carrying More Plant Species On Its Slopes Than The Whole Of The United Kingdom · Cape Town, Western Cape
A flat-topped sandstone massif rises a thousand metres directly out of Cape Town, and the city is arranged around its foot. A rotating cableway takes five minutes to the top, where a level network of paved paths runs out to viewpoints over the City Bowl, Robben Island, the Atlantic seaboard and the spine of the Cape Peninsula - and on the plateau itself there is fynbos carrying more plant species than the whole of the United Kingdom, which is why the mountain is inside the Cape Floral Region World Heritage inscription. You can also walk up: Platteklip Gorge takes two to three hard hours straight up the front face, and the gentler routes come in from Kirstenbosch and the back table. The thing to understand before you build a day around it is that the CABLEWAY CLOSES FOR WIND with no notice and the mountain is often in cloud, so the only sensible plan is to go up on the first clear morning you are given.
Directly above Cape Town's City Bowl, with the cableway at Tafelberg Road and Platteklip Gorge the walking route up the front face, Cape Town, Western Cape, South Africa
The cableway runs daily in daylight with the season's hours, and it CLOSES FOR HIGH WIND WITHOUT NOTICE and for an annual maintenance period of roughly two weeks - CHECK THE SAME MORNING on the cableway's own status rather than planning around a forecast. Tickets are cheaper bought online in advance and the queues in high season are long, so an early car is worth it. The walking routes are open at all hours and unticketed, which does not make them safe to do alone or in the dark. The upper station has a cafe, shop and toilets. Parking on Tafelberg Road fills early and there is a shuttle from the lower station in season. The mountain's weather can change from clear to fog and cold rain within an hour in any month.