Cape Town, the oldest city in South Africa is called “the mother city” as its foundation dates back to the year 1652, by Jan Van Riebeeck, a naval Dutch surgeon. He landed on the Table Bay and immediately decided to make it a supply base for Dutch East India Company ships going East.
Today nearly 3 million inhabitants live in Cape Town, it is a cosmopolitan centre where the unpolluted waters of the Atlantic Ocean mirror the majestic Table Mountain, the imposing promontory looking over the City and whose top is utterly flat.
Myth and goal of great navigators the kaleidoscopic, multiethnic Cape Town shows lots of facets where the colonial-styled buildings and the Victorian gardens stand side by side with the buzz and the worldly life of the harbour, and where the old “English docks” have changed into an animated area of amusement places and modern shops.
The liveliest area in the city is Victoria & Alfred Waterfront, the most ancient part of the harbour built in 1860 which, after being rebuilt and repaired, is today the meeting point of shoppers and night life.
The Waterfront is undoubtedly one of the most capturing attractions of Cape Town, however I will never forget the very beautiful shores of Clifton and Camps Bay, neither will Bishopscourt and Costantia areas escape my mind nor will the botanic gardens of Kirstenbosch. The latter stand in really a unique position: on the Eastern side of the Table Mountain looking over False Bay and Cape Flats.
South of Cape Town there lies territories enchanting the visitors for their rare beauty: the Natural Reserve of Cape of Good Hope. At its and a wind-beaten trail and inhabited by spiteful, little monkeys leads to the big, old lighthouse where the waves of the Indian Ocean and Atlantic Ocean fringe roaringly against the rocks.
Leaving behind the sensation of being at the farthest and of the earth, you can go North-West along the coastline heading to the “English-styled” little towns of Muizenberg and Kalk Bay towards Simon’s Town on whose beaches there lives an important colony of African penguins.
After come the Wine-lands, the picturesque region of “Cape” vineyards: this is the hinterland where you can visit aged-old wine farms showing the ancient “Cape Dutch style” near Stellenbosch, Paarl and Franschoek city. Here it is a “must” to taste “pinotage”, South Africa’s richly smoky and savoury national red wine.
Last but not least, I cannot avoid mentioning Robben Island, that in 1999 UNESCO declared the Heritage of Mankind for its role in the world’s history. The visit to the island is absolutely compulsory as it is a proper memorial of the struggle of liberty. Actually, Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela spent 27 years in the jailhouse in a small cell together with other dissentients during the cruel fight against Apartheid, the tangible mark of the harsh political long conflict for human rights.
A not-long but intense journey, enjoyed minute after minute, moment after moment!