Today Overtone Music presented South Africa's first Zimfest (Zimbabwe Festival) - a music festival created to raise money for humanitarian efforts in Southern Africa.

Kerry-Anne and I shot through to the Goodhope Centre (perhaps an aptly named venue) at about 11am this morning to catch the opening act, Matthew Gair, singer, songwriter, and guitarist (that's not him in the photo, though).

The rest of the day was filled with superb performances by CODA, Failing Forward, The Little Kings, Tristan Waterkeyn, Louise Day Band, Hot Water, Cold Hand Chemistry, Nomfusi Gotyanan, Freshly Ground, Jacsharp, Overgraze, The Rudimentals, Autopilot, Ike Moriz, The Plastics, Shy Guevaras, The Dirty Skirts, Betray The Emissary and New Altum.

Please visit our Cape Town Daily Photo Extras blog to see about 60 photos taken during the course of the morning.

I overheard a colleague who lives in the coastal town of Langebaan mentioning today that the flowers are in full bloom and looking beautiful as ever. The Cape's West Coast is renowned for its flower season, which starts every year around mid to late August. Vast fields of flowers come alive with colour, compelling thousands of city-dwellers to pack their picnic baskets and head up the coast to spend a day among the flowers.

I took this photo in a field near our house. Believe me when I say that it's rather bland in comparison to what's in store a couple of weeks from now (when we'll eventually have the opportunity to take a drive up the West Coast). In fact, we would have driven up to visit the flowers tomorrow, but there's something far more exciting happening at Cape Town's Good Hope Centre... To those of you who are attending Zimfest - see you there. And to those who don't know what I'm talking about, stand by, I'll show you the photo(s) tomorrow. :)

We live in a city where it can be storming wildly one day, and the next day the weather is clear and quiet, just as though nature had never lost her temper.

After the past weekend's rain and heavy winds it must be hard to imagine that we've just had two days of perfectly clear weather. As quickly as bad weather arrives, it vanishes without a trace, leaving in its stead a crisp, clear and smogless skyline.

Ah, the beauty of Cape Town...

I was hoping to get a photo of the pink city skyline this evening, but ended up working a little later than normal. I snapped this shot as I was about to leave our parking garage.

We've recently heard of a few American visitors to Cape Town mentioning how much our city reminds them of San Francisco, with the exception that San Francisco has "the dial turned way up".

The amount of innovation within the Web community of Cape Town is simply astounding. This evening local web-entrepreneurial hero Vinny Lingham, CEO of Synthasite (a Cape Town web-based startup company) presented a talk to some of Cape Town's web entrepreneurs, explaining how to go about seeking venture capital to help turn small under-funded startup companies into the next Google or Facebook.

If you are thinking about investing in a Cape Town-based startup I'd suggest that you don't wait too long. Over the next couple of months and years I think we'll see Cape Town's web entrepreneurs attempting to turn that virtual dial "way up", making a couple of lucky investors very, very happy in the process.

I landed upon a headline report on the Cape Argus website stating:

"Hundreds of commuters were left stranded this morning after Metrorail closed eight rail stations from Muizenberg to Simon's Town due to damage caused by turbulent seas and huge waves crashing over the railway lines.

We live too far from the Muizenberg coast to verify whether or not commuters were stranded this morning, but I would imagine that after the past weekend's storms and raging seas the train lines would have certainly been knocked out. Click here to see exactly how close the rail lines are to the sea. Beautiful, but crazy!

I took the train photo a couple of months ago, so no, I wasn't aboard a rogue train today.

A round-up of storm coverage:
- Saturday afternoon at Three Anchor Bay and Sea Point
- More photos of the Sea Point area, after the storm had struck (thanks to www.6000.co.za)
- Stormy seas and giant waves at Kalk Bay
- Zoopy video of wave damage at Kalk Bay's Polana and Harbour House restaurants
- Storm damage and flooding in Strand and Gordon's Bay

We weren't quite as brave as the New Orleans residents who stayed behind to face Gustav: instead of heading out to storm-ravaged Kalk Bay ourselves today, we asked the crew from Zoopy to bring back a photo or two for us, since they're far more intrepid than we are. :-)

This is not an indoor pool, no. It's the interior of Polana, a restaurant at Kalk Bay harbour, after huge waves struck the area earlier today. Windows broke, tables floated out into the harbour, and as you can see, the restaurant was completely flooded.

There are more photos here and here. The Zoopy crew apparently took plenty of video footage, so we'll let you know as soon as that's been loaded onto their site.

You can read reports of the storm damage throughout the Western Cape here and here.

Thanks to the guys and girls at Zoopy!

Update: There are some fantastic photos of the giant waves in Kalk Bay on Luke Hardiman's blog. You can compare those with these: Kalk Bay harbour when it's not stormy.

Kerry-Anne and I popped in at Col'cacchio Pizzeria at Tyger Valley's Willowbridge Mall this afternoon. Col'cacchio probably serves the closest thing that you'll get to real Italian pizza this side of the equator.

Instead of ordering one of the pizzas from the menu, today we opted to select ingredients and compose our own pizza. After a bit of deliberation we decided to share a bacon, black mushroom and avocado pizza.

Now I did intimate above that the pizzas at Col'cacchio are very, very good - but to be honest the one we had today wasn't that great. The lesson we learned was that if you deviate from the menu and select your own toppings for a pizza, beware, you may regret it (or, of course, you may devise the most wonderful, awesome, divine pizza known to mankind).

Don't you just love the cardboard envelope in which the bill was presented?

According to the weather services, Cape Town is in for one of the worst storms in 7 years this weekend, with swells of up to 10m expected along the Cape coast.

We went out to Sea Point this afternoon to get a few shots of the ocean in full rage. As it turned out, we weren't the only ones who had that idea: visit Cape Town Daily Photo Extras to see more photos of the stormy seas, and of all the people who braved the cold to see Nature showing her spectacular power.

The new Green Point Stadium (being built in preparation for the 2010 Football World Cup) seems to be progressing nicely. We're going to try to get into the visitors' centre in the next few weeks so that we can get some shots from the viewing area.

Green Point Stadium will be hosting five first-round matches, one second-round match, one quarter-final and one semi-final during the World Cup in 2010. If I can save up enough money, I'll be at all of them. :-)

Apparently winter is giving one final show before spring and summer take over for a few months. Although we observe Spring Day on 1 September, spring really only starts somewhere around the 21st of September. It's a bit of a standing joke that, no matter how beautiful the weather's been up until then, it rains on Spring Day every single year.

A photo with a difference today...

It's been an exciting few days technology-wise in Cape Town - we've had quite a lot of visitors here during the last week, and a few special tech events have taken place, including Wordcamp SA and yet another 27Dinner.

This photo was taken at a little mini meet-up we had at Asoka on Monday evening. On the left is none other than Matt Mullenweg, founding developer of WordPress - Matt was in town for Wordcamp SA, which was held over the weekend. On the right is the publisher of one of my favourite South African blogs, Nic Haralambous, whom I met in real life for the first time this week (do visit his blog, SA Rocks, if you haven't already). And in the middle is me, of course - a lucky girl, some might say. :P

It's really nice of the Cape Town City Council to let us know that the road ahead is still working. :D

Jokes aside, you'll find these signs all over now as our roads are being prepared to receive the onslaught of traffic over the 2010 FIFA Football World Cup period, and during the expected tourism boom beyond.

Kerry-Anne and I are looking forward to this simply because we enjoy meeting visitors. However, for many others, an increase in tourism means a permanent job, a stable income and food on the table.

So in as much as you're blessed to experience the wonders of Cape Town, we're blessed and glad to have you visit.

Who would have believed that little old Cape Town could make it to third position on Hasbro's Monopoly World Edition? Voting started earlier this year, and the mass of votes from Capetonians, along with many others around the world, allowed us to overtake great world cities like Paris and Sydney in the rankings.

The final positions were unveiled on 20 August, with Montreal declared the top city. Riga achieved second, with Cape Town in third position (followed closely by Belgrade and Paris).

So it seems as though Hasbro and their Monopoly World Edition will help put Cape Town solidly on the map for many households. :)

The Monopoly game in this photo is the South African edition and has been passed down from Kerry-Anne's parents to us. It's apparently seen the family through many cold and rainy winter days - as I'm sure you can tell by the well-worn box.

A friend of ours took up her position in breaking the record for the largest ballet class in the world this morning.

The record was first set in Cape Town in 2003, where I believe 550 dancers participated in a class. In 2006 this record was broken by 551 dancers attending a class in Pretoria (near Johannesburg, South Africa).

The Cape Town organisers expected between 600 and 700 dancers to arrive today; so when 983 excited dancers arrived at the Canal Walk shopping centre they were caught just a little off guard!

Well done Cape Town, and better luck next year Pretoria! ;-)

Kerry-Anne dragged me over to one of the clothing stores in the Tyger Valley shopping centre to see this t-shirt hanging in the window.

The irony about this shirt is that I reckon someone with an adequately inflated ego would actually love to own it. The problem that I have with this statement is that in reality I'd love to own it myself... ;-)

I've heard the saying, "red sky at night, sailor's delight, red sky in the morning, sailor's warning" several times before, and kinda had it in the back of my mind that it's never seemed to ring true for Cape Town.

I received an excited call from a colleague on Wednesday evening saying that I should really look outside and take a photo of the setting sun. So I grabbed my camera, drove to a viewpoint, and snapped this beautifully cloudy red sunset (click the photo to see the big version).

The following day's weather was terrible - it rained buckets in the morning. This led me to think of the saying, and how it should have been a "sailor's delight". Today, Friday, I type this post as the sun is setting. The sky is again a brilliant red hue, so I just took a look at WeatherSA and guess what I found? Saturday:"Cloudy, rain mainly afternoon (60%)"!

So I'm thinking that perhaps the saying should go "red sky at night (in Cape Town), sailor's warning, red sky in the morning (in Cape Town) sailor's delight". Our red-sky mornings really do turn into beautiful days. :)

After a week or so of absolutely perfect spring weather, it suddenly turned unexpectedly cold and gloomy today. Well, to be fair, not entirely unexpectedly - it is Friday tomorrow after all, and one certainly can't expect good weather over a weekend...

Hopefully this cold front will blow over quickly though, and we'll have more glorious blue-sky days to look forward to.

I was fortunate enough to attend a few of the Gartner sessions this week. For those who don't know, in it's simplest form, Gartner is a group of IT research analysts who try to predict future of IT and provide advice to IT professionals.

I was rather surprised at the large turnout that the event had. The tickets weren't cheap (though not unreasonable) and yet the various rooms (each hosting different topic tracks) were pretty full every time (as was the lunch hall at 13h00).

It would seem as though Cape Town's IT industry is booming. If anybody knows, I'd be interested to find out whether or not ticket sales for this event have increased over the last couple of years.

Thanks Daryl Plummer and Frank Kenney for the comedic, yet well thought out and informative talks you gave on SOA and BPM. We'll remember to watch out for the Black Mamba. ;)

I, shamefully perhaps, haven't been paying too much attention to the Tri-Nations rugby matches. South Africa is currently third on the log after being solidly thumped (16-0) by New Zealand at the Newlands stadium on Saturday.

Our next match is against Australia on 23 August where we really need to pull off a victory. After such a disastrous loss on Saturday, we fondly think back to our past glory during the 2007 World Cup, hoping that our boys will take courage, demonstrate their skill and find the determination needed for victory on Saturday.

We're behind you all the way, guys!

Edit: The score was actually slightly worse, 19-0. See the comments below.

Lyonesse Villa is located on the slopes on Table Mountain, close to Constantia Nek (for those not too familiar with the layout of Cape Town, this is the back of the mountain - the side you usually see in photos is the front).

The views are absolutely incredible from here, and there are balconies all along the front of the villa to take advantage of this.

If you click through to Cape Town Daily Photo Extras, you'll see a whole lot of photos of the 2-acre indigenous garden. Seeing the wealth of colours and textures in the garden made me realise again just how diverse and beautiful the Cape Floral Kingdom is.

This is the last in our series of posts about Lyonesse Villa (see #1, #2 and #3, and visit Cape Town Daily Photo Extras for more photos of the house and garden). Thanks to our hosts, Ric and Robyn, for treating us to a superb weekend away!

As you might have seen yesterday and the day before, Paul and I spent the weekend at the gorgeous Lyonesse Villa in Constantia. At last, Paul has finished processing most of our photos, and we can show you the rest of the property. Today we're doing the interior - the accommodation and living areas - and tomorrow we'll show you some outside shots to give you an idea of the villa's location.

Each room is furnished in its own particular style and colour scheme. This lounge is one of my favourite rooms in the house (probably because I'm rather partial to pink!), and I spent part of Saturday afternoon curled up on the corner couch with my book.

Visit Cape Town Daily Photo Extras to see photos of some of the other rooms, as well as a few close-up shots of the furniture and artworks that give the villa its character and style.

As Paul mentioned yesterday, we were badly in need of a break, and so we were thrilled to be invited to stay for a couple of nights at what must surely be one of Cape Town's top accommodation establishments: we're spending the weekend at Lyonesse, a jaw-droppingly beautiful villa in Constantia.

This is just one of the bedrooms in the 850m2 house; there are eight in total, as well as eight bathrooms. I've lost count of the number of TVs... and I've lost Paul several times too.

We had breakfast served to us at the 12-seater dining room table this morning; we spent the afternoon wandering around the 2-acre indigenous garden (photos of that will follow in the next day or two); and we spent the evening playing Wii Sport in the downstairs room. Apart from all the bedrooms and bathrooms, there's a fully stocked bar, an extensive library, a huge swimming pool, and a kitchen full of Gaggenau appliances.

I can't wait to show you the rest of the house, but it's taking Paul some time to resize and watermark all the photos we've been taking, so you and I will have to be patient, I'm afraid.

This weekend has started pretty well. It's been a long time since Kerry-Anne and I have been away for the weekend, so when the opportunity arose, we took it gladly. I'm not quite yet going to tell you where we are, but it's safe to say that we're still in the shadow of our beautiful Table Mountain and quite literally in the lap of luxury.

It's pretty late in the evening, so I'm about to head off to the huge four-poster bed shown in this photo. Watch this space tomorrow to find out more about where we are and how absolutely beautiful it is.

It really is. I wasn't entirely convinced by all the hype... until I had a cup, and discovered to my delight that it was perfect.

I spent the evening with a group of bright, enthusiastic and creative women at Origin Roasting in De Waterkant. It was my first time at Origin, but it won't be the last - the atmosphere was great, the staff were friendly, and the coffee was absolutely awesome.

If you're on Facebook, have a look at their group, and if you're in the Green Point area, do yourself a favour and pop in for a cup of coffee.

I stopped at Three Anchor Bay this morning on my way to a seminar, and spent a bit of time watching the waves rolling in. The swell seemed unusually large, and it reminded me of this article I read the other day about the potential effect of climate change on Cape Town's coastline. It seems to validate our theory of buying property a few blocks up from the beachfront... ;-)

We went to another bloggers' party this evening at Long Street Café (look for the red neon sign in the photo). There's quite a thriving (and growing) tech community in Cape Town. In fact, two Cape-based start-up companies have just been nominated for Industry Standard Innovation 100 awards: Synthasite, the free website builder, has been nominated in the Community-Social category, and Springleap, the t-shirt design company, was nominated in the Retail category.

If you think they're worthy, do vote for them!

I took this photo as Kerry-Anne drove past the Kayamandi settlement (on the outskirts of Stellenbosch). I'm not sure what precisely the text is trying to convey, and if anyone can help and explain I'd be most appreciative.

From what I've been able to find out, Gilbeys Distillers used to bottle alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks in Devon Valley, near Stellenbosch. It would appear as though Gilbeys closed its doors some time back and that a couple of its senior executives bought much of the bottling equipment, hand-picked many of the good Gilbeys staff, and started Rostberg Pty(Ltd), a company specialising in the bottling of wine.

Now, this still doesn't explain what the text on this wall is all about - but for some reason I really like the photo. Perhaps it's simply the colouring and incomprehensible black text... I'm not sure.

Even though this little device (known for its reflective ability as a Cat's Eye) was developed in Britain in 1933, Cape Town's roads only had them installed in the 1980s. I remember one night as a kid being fascinated by the hundreds of newly installed reflective eyes watching us as we drove home along one of our national highways.

Since then they've helped keep me, and many others, safe on poorly-lit roads. I only wish that there were more of these little helpers on more of our back-roads, as they're often the most poorly lit areas.

I find it really disconcerting not being able to see bends in the road ahead, or, when it's raining, not knowing whether I'm veering over into another lane or not. Well done Percy Shaw, this really was a simple yet brilliant invention.

The Land Rover, affectionately know as the Landy, was one of the first "all-terrain" non-military 4x4 vehicles to be sold. Introduced by the Rover Company in 1948, the Land Rover concern was sold to several companies over the years and is currently owned by India's TATA Motors.

I've been told more than once that if you're planning on travelling up through Africa then an old Land Rover is probably the best vehicle that you could take. The reason is simple: the Land Rover is so pervasive in Africa that no matter which village you end up in, you're bound to find an old Landy from which you can salvage parts to fix your broken-down vehicle.

The Blue Gum tree is part of the Eucalyptus family. This Australian tree was originally introduced to South Africa by a British botanist, Sir Joseph Banks. The Blue Gum grows extremely rapidly and is able to consume 2,000 litres of water per day! Interestingly, I believe that the tree was originally introduced into the Johannesburg area for the production of timber for our mining industry.

I've noticed over the past few years that many large Blue Gum trees have been removed from the area in which I live. The negative impact that this tree has had on our environment has caused it to be regarded as an invader that should be removed.