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When was the last time you took a day-trip down the peninsula to see anything but the penguins?If it's been ages, then this Sunday's tour is the perfect excuse for an Autumn Wandel!
Is Simon's Town in Cape Town?
Though that may still be a controversial topic to tackle, it can't be doubted that the two old dorps have always been complementary, even co-dependent, and for at least their first three-hundred years they grew in tandem both in stature and in intrigue.
Today, of course, the former is a lovely faux-Torquay run by penguins and surplus dealers, but - as I never tire of repeating on other stops - the little dreadnought marina used to be the ornate skeleton-key to the entire Southern hemisphere.
No single bay in the world perhaps harboured so many of the horrors and glories of high British Colonialism or had so much imperial revenue thrown at it through covert wars just to protect its sanctuary status.
It's easy for us today to see the Navy and the fripperies of St George's Street as just the living reserves of mindless Victorian kitsch, but history doesn't start as tragedy and end as farce: they're always simultaneous.
Let me confess that I do adore Simon's Town, and I'm looping my Autumn Circuit of 20 peninsula tours here not just because it's the logical end-point of the old Main Road, but because I desperately need a regular excuse to visit. So hopefully this can be yours too!
Every tourist guide and local history will tell you that our city sits on both the 'Cape of Storms' and 'the Fairest Cape in all the Circumference of the Earth', but a dozen generations of merchant sailors, navy men of all stripes and ages, freed slaves, marooned Kroomen, decorated pooches, Tommy emigres, VOC die-hards and forcibly-removed families will attest that Simon's Bay straddles those extremes perhaps more than any other borough on the Point.
So join me this Sunday at 14h00 in front of Admiralty House for a long, loping wandel through the human, animal, maritime, historical, architectural, ethnographical and psychogeographic litanies of the truest part of False Baai.
We'll stop at the top of the Tredree Steps after two hours and change having covered absolutely everything in-between so you'll have no rational need to ever return or learn any more about the barnacled ships or the outcast Deep Southerners...
Thus, bring your memories, your questions, your curiosities, your own factoids, your anecdotes, your snacks, your walking shoes, your donations, your appetite for hake and your joy at getting to live so close to one of the last great havens of the seas.
RSVP for places, tell your friends, make this an event, and start getting excited just as you finish reading this 😉
Yours,
CP of CTHT in CPT x
P.S. If you've read this far I'm guessing you'll want even more of the specs, so here goes:
- Use a two-car system with friends or walk back to the Lighthouse Cafe with me after the tour finishes to save yourself from being marooned on Runciman Drive...
- We've just put up our ticket prices for the first time in two-and-a-half years, from R120pp to R150pp. Obviously this is just to keep with inflation and to allow the tours to remain a sustainable enterprise for the foreseeable future, but this is still about R50 less per person than our nearest competition. In other words, we are deliberately undercharging the tours so as to keep them affordable for locals and visitors alike and to encourage guests to come back weekend after weekend.
- Book via Quicket, WhatsApp us on 076 033 8164, E-mail us on [email protected] or Message us via the buttons on our home page to secure your place.
- We have also just introduced a broad scheme of discounts you can apply for on each tour, so please do consult the list below before contacting us!
- And we've decided to partner with a different local NGO or charity for each and every one of our tour routes so that R10 of every ticket purchased goes directly to a good, sustainable, local cause. For the Simon's Town tour, we've chosen to fund-raise for Code Red Initiative and you can inspect their brilliance here:
https://www.coderedinitiative.co.za
- This is a consistently well-reviewed heritage-focused walking tour; which is to say that all you'll need to enjoy yourself is curiosity about Cape Town's past (and History in general) and enough stamina to walk just less than 3km in one afternoon (with stops and snacks).
- If you're rejoining us, please please please please please please consider dropping us a short (or extensive) review on our Facebook Reviews or Google Reviews section as it will help spread our gospel of curiosity and playful appreciation across the internet and across the spectrum of all potential visitors to the Cape. It helps us more than you can believe!
- You can also add an optional R10 donation on your ticket which will go directly to the NGO Streetscapes as part of our mission to spread love, enthusiasm, mutual support and respect for all of Cape Town's people and histories. Just think how many people we could help and the difference we could make with a few hundred tours!
- Feel absolutely free to spread the word, invite friends who've been looking for this kind of experience and badger us with every imaginable heritage query. We live for it!
Can't wait to meet ya, really! 🙂
THE CTHT DISCOUNT LIST:
1. Guests over 65 and under 18 can claim a 33% discount on each ticket, at R100pp pre-booked.
2. If you buy tickets for both the Saturday and Sunday tours on one weekend, you can claim R50 off each ticket, at R200pp pre-booked.
3. If you buy a Cape Town Heritage Tours Tote-Bag or any of our books on sale at our Half-Booked Online Shop, you can claim a free tour voucher for each piece of merchandise.
4. You can buy individual advance vouchers for our public tours at R150 each and then message in the week before a scheduled tour. But you can also buy value-packs of five for the price of 4 (R600), 10 for the price of 7 (R1050) or all 18 for the price of 10 (R1500).
5. If you bring 2 or more friends on a weekend tour you can claim R30 back on each of your tickets, at R120pp pre-booked.
6. If you share the posts promoting individual tours you can claim R30 back as well, at R120pp.
7. If you review the tours on Google Reviews, Facebook or TripAdvisor (at any rating) you can claim 50% off your next ticket, at R75pp pre-booked.
8. Likewise if you recommend the tours to a friend who then attends a weekend tour, you can claim 50% off your next ticket, at R75pp pre-booked.
See ya next weekend!
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