Table Mountain: Cape Town's pride and joy...

South Africa is home to beautiful and breathtaking landscapes, and recently one of the country's most well renowned - Table Mountain - was voted as one of the New7Wonders of Nature for 2011 alongside the Amazon, Halong Bay, Iguazu Falls, Jeju Island, Komodo and the Puerto Princesa Underground River. Having initially being selected as one of 440 candidates in 2009, Table Mountain attracted millions of votes from around the world and when voting closed on Friday 11 November, it was declared the winner.



I remember the first time I visited Cape Town in 2008 with my fellow classmates I could not believe my eyes when I first saw this gigantic table of a mountain. Questions jumped around my head like: How did the table shape of this mountain come about? What are the geographical factors that led to such a beautiful feature? My fascination was further intensified when I woke up the following morning and there was what seemed to be a draping covering the mountain resembling a table cloth.
 



The Table Mountain Cableway, established in 1929, has taken more than 21 million visitors to the top of the mountain, where there are extraordinary views of the Cape Town shoreline, the city centre and surrounding areas.
 


The crowning of Table Mountain as one of the New7Wonders of Nature will see an increase in tourism in the Mother City and will further challenge the City of Cape Town to develop new, interesting and genuine tourism offerings to satisfy our discerning visitors.

By Bongani Mtlhavani