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Thompsons Private Cape Peninsula Tour

Cape Town, Western Cape, South Africa

A view of Hout Bay as we continued after the cruise to seal island

Ostrich farm on the side of the road

The view from Table Mountain

As part of our visit in Cape Town, our travel agent arranged a full-day private tour of the Cape Peninsula for us with Thompsons Tours. Our guide for the day was Mark Bayman. He arrived a few minutes before our scheduled departure time, and we met him in the hotel lobby. He was an excellent tour guide. He was friendly and knowledgeable about everything. There's no question that our day was greatly enhanced by everything we learned from Mark.

After we left the hotel, he told us his suggested itinerary, and we chatted about that for a bit. We then proceeded to start the tour of the Cape Peninsula by driving to Table Mountain. Unfortunately, they were closed due to gale force winds at the time. Mark was flexible and said he'd keep calling them throughout the day, hoping we would be able to go later on.

Abandoning Table Mountain for the time being, we continued on the tour and went to Hout Bay. We had about 45 minutes there, where we could either look around or take a cruise to Seal Island. Mark recommended the Seal Island Cruise by Drumbeat Charters. We paid for our tickets ourselves, and left shortly afterwards.

From there, we continued our drive towards Cape Point. We stopped along the way at an ostrich farm on the side of the road. Mark continued to narrate most of the drive, telling us all sorts of great information. Our next major stop was at The Cape of Good Hope and Cape Point. We stopped first at the Cape of Good Hope, and Mark took some pictures of us there.

We then drove to a visitors area at Cape Point. We had the option of taking the 'Funicular' up to see the lighthouse, or walking up. We were in good health, so we walked up. Mark accompanied us for the walk. At the top, he also took us to an area off the beaten path where we were able to see the new lighthouse in addition to the old one. The views here were fantastic.

We were then left for lunch at Two Ocean's Restaurant where a reservation had been made for us. The food there was pretty good, but the views were even better. Cape Point is a beautiful part of Cape Town.

After lunch, we continued our drive up the eastern side of the cape peninsula, stopping at the Boulders Beach Penguin Colony where we learned some interesting facts about the penguins. It was getting near the end of our day, but Mark had good news for us - Table Mountain was open. We drove back there, and he waited for us while we went up to the top and went for an hour-long walk. The R180 fee for the cable car was not included as part of the tour.

On the way back to the hotel, we discussed where we could go for dinner. Mark gave us some great suggestions, and we decided to go to Belthazar at the V&A Waterfront. He dropped us off there, and pointed out the best place to get a taxi to go back to our hotel.