Table Mountain is the landmark of Cape Town, no vacation to the city is considered complete until you have paid a visit to this gorgeous mountain. The top of this huge slab of sand, located right in the middle of the city, in most days is covered by a thick fog; the locals call it the Table Cloth, giving it that unique fairy tale like settings. The mountain has been the biggest attraction of the city for many years and a show piece to illustrate the beauty of the city to the foreign visitors.
The mountain has its own unique eco system which includes about 1400 different species of insects and plants that you will not find any where else on the planet. Provided that the mountain is not covered in its table cloth, you can get the best bird eye view of the whole Cape Town and its shore line from the top of the mountain.
Cape Town is the biggest tourist magnet of South Africa as it attracts more than half of the total foreign tourists to the country. You can easily find a cheap flight to Cape Town from most of the major European airports and the city’s hotels are of world class quality, the only problem can be that you will be spending a lot more here on accommodation and transportation than what you expect to pay in the cities of the neighboring countries.
You can reach the summit of the mountain in a number of ways, if you feel that you are physically fit enough then there are quite a few tracks that lead to the top of the mountain and can provide you with an awesome hiking experience, but beware it takes a lot of physical effort to complete this journey on foot. A cable car service called the Table Mountain Aerial Cableway has been taking the tourists to the top of the mountain since 1929. The cable cars were renovated in 1997 and now are made up of glass providing an excellent 360 degree view of the mountain, city and the shore line.
The small Table Mountain National park is a great place to observe the unique flora and fauna of the mountain. There is a single restaurant on the top of the mountain that provides a good quality of food and services but again at a comparably higher price. The souvenir shops on the mountain’s summit is also a good place to visit to take some thing home by which you can remember the mountain for. If you are a rock climbing enthusiast then Table Mountain is a perfect destination for you as it has many well documented climbing routes of varying difficulties that you can choose from according to your own level of skills. The mountain also has a huge network of natural caves which are unique in a sense that most of the caves in the world are in the mountains made up of limestone, but Table Mountain is made up of just the sandstone and yet it has this large cave network providing a great chance of exploration.
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