Tag: table mountain

Day 669 – Back down

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We’re back down off the mountain after a splendid 24 hours away, filled with fun, laughter and incident. Thunderstorms and shooting stars, skinny dipping (allegedly, at least) and a Cape Cobra encounter.

There will be a time to tell you about the exhausting hike up there in the ridiculous heat, to speak of the fireball in the kitchen, to elaborate upon the gentle 4am rain shower that meant we had to move some mattresses, and to explain how we discovered that Cape Spurfowl don’t eat lettuce.

But that time is not now, because I am completely knackered.

I did manage to get some photos edited and will be doing a Flickr upload tomorrow.

In the meantime, this:

A view over the lights of Cape Town as the cloud rolled in from False Bay. Better bigger and on black, but you’ll have to wait for tomorrow for that. [UPDATE: Here it is]

Watch this space.

Day 666 – Devilish heat approaches

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I’m (almost) avoiding any comment on this, Day 666 of SA’s lockdown. It’s a day very much like any other, and if someone tries to tell you today that the Rothschilds are working with the Lizard people and Bill Gates to depopulate the planet before Nibiru comes upon us, simply because of the significance of the number above, then they need help and you should get it for them.

However, in the most tenuous link possible, it does seem like there is set to be some hellishly hot weather on the way:

Yeah. That doesn’t sound like fun.

So what I thought we’d do, given that sort of heat, is to walk up Table Mountain.

Yep. That seems the most sensible option to take, given the lack of incline and the wide availability of copious shade that Table Mountain is well known for.

It’s a long story and a crazy plan, but it has to be – and will be – done.

Carefully.


Meanwhile, there are weather warnings in Dubai this weekend as well:

“Especially cold”. “Dipping below 20oC”.

Amazing.

Day 186 – Up the mountain

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The Boy Wonder is leading a hike up Table Mountain this weekend, and so we decided to do a quick recce in case there had been any changes since the last time he/we were up there.

Not much had changed since I was last up there except that the dams were a whole lot fuller.

Here’s proof:

The image on the left – showing 11 rungs going to the water level on the Woodhead Dam – was taken on the 24th of March last year. I took the one on the right this morning and the water level is above the third rung down. 18 months and 4 days change.

The overflows were hard at work:

It wasn’t raining while we were up there – it was all gorgeous and sunny – but we did get caught in an unforecasted and therefore unexpected downpour on the way down. A stark reminder that conditions can change very quickly on the mountain.

13km (and 650m of ascent) later, we dragged our soaking wet bodies into the car and headed home for hot drinks and showers.

It was a great way to spend a morning.

Swimmers

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Lovely day with the berg wind blowing today, so we walked the beagle early and then I used the opportunity to get a few jobs done (including bathing a reluctant canine) and watched a bit of the cricket.

A far cry from a few months ago up the mountain, where it was grey, cold and wet. Especially for these guys:

Such were the conditions up there that it was only the next morning we saw the sign saying that perhaps swimming “wasn’t allowed”.

So obviously, if you see any of these individuals in the street, please remind them that they were inadvertently very naughty up in the clouds and they really shouldn’t do it again.

Now on Flickr…

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…(finally) some photos from the last week or so.

They’re here.

And when they were lined up, I couldn’t help but noticed the sharp juxtaposition between the photos taken in Cape Agulhas last week, and those taken on Table Mountain just a couple of days later (not least the ‘grass-in-the-bottom-left-hand-corner’ pics, top left and fourth middle):

Check out the washed-out, near-monochrome top four, compared with the bright, heavily contrasted, colourful selection below them. But that wasn’t merely my photographer’s eye: it’s a genuine representation of what was there.

Cape Agulhas was sunny, full of vivid blues, greens and whites, busy skies and reflective seas. Table Mountain was the complete opposite: greyscale, dull, grim and sullen. ‘Togging the Victorian infrastructure of the dams on the mountain top was easy in those conditions: the dour, powerful, solidity fitted perfectly with the elemental, moody, unforgiving weather.

I enjoyed the fresh air and the walking on each of the days we were out and about, but it’s interesting to note that I probably wouldn’t have taken any photographs at all had the weather conditions been reversed for the two locations. It just wouldn’t have made sense.

Good job I was there on the right days, then.