Cape Town Daily Photo » clifton

Red sky at night, sailor’s delight

Paul — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 17:04:22 +0000

Red sky at night, sailor's delight

The ocean that you see here is the one that stretches out before the beaches of Clifton, and the road is Kloof Road. This photo was shot from the same location as yesterday’s photo of the Twelve Apostles and Camps Bay.

We really do have beautiful sunsets in Winter.

Oystercatcher Way

Paul — Sun, 08 May 2011 18:42:10 +0000

Oystercatcher Way

Oystercatchers are birds that (to me) look much like a cross between a sea gull and a turtle dove. They’re generally completely black, or black on top and white underneath – a little like a camouflaged combat aircraft!

This particular path is a long, narrow, winding set of stairs that lead down to Cape Town’s trendy Clifton 4th beach… a buzz of a place in summer but on this clear-yet-cool autumn day, practically deserted.

After descending the many steps to the clean white sand, I decided to leave my shoes in a particular spot in order to collect them on my return. Unfortunately, on my return, they had mysteriously grown legs and walked off. I first though that someone had stolen them, but then later realised that since I’d wandered out of sight, it’s completely plausible that someone in need of shoes found them and assumed that the owner had abandoned them… the beach was after all pretty deserted!

I needed new shoes anyway.

The best beach in Cape Town

Kerry-Anne — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 22:10:13 +0000

Clifton 4th beach

I think by now you probably know that we’re quite fond of the beaches along the Atlantic Seaboard (Camps Bay, Clifton, Llandudno). Our favourite of these is definitely Clifton 4th Beach. I don’t think I need to say any more really – just take a look at the photo. Doesn’t it look idyllic?

After the sun has set

Kerry-Anne — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 22:05:32 +0000

Dusk at Clifton 4th beach

We went down to Clifton 4th Beach this evening with a few friends. I wanted to do something to mark the one-year anniversary of my brother’s death, but I wanted it to be happy and special, rather than sad and melancholy. So we took a picnic and spent a couple of hours watching the sky change colour after the sun had set.

The weather was sublime, and I even went for a swim (on my own, since no-one else had brought their costumes) just before it got completely dark. This is an experience I can totally recommend – if you live in Cape Town, you should do this at least once in your life.

It turned out to be a truly beautiful evening, spent with people I love – which is just what I’d wanted.

Girls, lifeguards and blue flags

Paul — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 16:13:18 +0000

Girls and lifeguards on Clifton beach

If you’ve been following this blog it will be no surprise to you which beach is being featured today. Clifton 4th beach, obviously.

The guy and girl sitting on the unusually high chairs are lifeguards watching over bathers. We watched for some time as about 10 people practised their lifesaving skills by dragging a “victim” from the ocean; and unlike my brief description here, watching this mock-rescue was actually fairly entertaining.

Clifton 4th is classified as a Blue Flag beach, meaning that it complies with certain quality requirements set forward by the Foundation for Environmental Education.

In this case “quality” doesn’t refer to how beautiful the people on the beach are (though if it did, Clifton would retain its status, no doubt). Instead it refers to a number of criteria in the following categories:

Bather environmental education and information
Water quality
Environmental management
Safety and services

You can read the full list of measurement criteria on the Blue Flag website.