Travel + Leisure is one of the world’s most influential travel publications.
Each year they publish their must-visit places. Cape Town’s Camps Bay has just been included among the greats in its ’25 Most Beautiful Beaches in the World’.
This travel acknowledgement is a great source of pride for South Africa, and to me, who virtually grew up here. This picture by David Kuijers of Camps Bay’s beachfront with its iconic landmarks and palm trees is on my office wall!
This is what T+L has to say about Camps Bay:
“Truly beautiful beaches tend to be remote-island destinations far from urban buzz.
A big exception is Camps Bay Beach, right in vibrant Cape Town.
Backed by iconic Table Mountain, the beach offers a huge expanse of feathery sand and beautiful blue water.
There’s plenty on tap in the Mother City beyond sun and surf: exploring the cobbled streets and colourful facades in the Bo-Kaap neighbourhood, hiking or riding the aerial cableway to the top of Cape Town’s famous flat-topped mountain, and braving Chapman’s Peak, the hair-raising ocean drive through rocky cliffs tumbling into the South Atlantic.
Safaris, famous vineyards, whale-watching, and shark-diving all make easy day trips.”
It’s where I go at sunset to blow the cobwebs out of my head at the end of a day, to celebrate the sun setting in the west, and to give thanks for the pure air that blows in from Antarctica, some 4,000 km’s away, with no land mass between continents to sully this gift.
It’s what photographer extra-ordinaire Andrew Baxter looks down onto when climbing Lions Head, taking in the Atlantic ocean on the right and The Twelve Apostles range that runs south, down the spine of Table Mountain – which you see in reverse in his bottom picture, that looks north.
Camps Bay is my go-to place of solace and invigoration. I feel immensely priveleged to share it with you.
Last two images courtesy of Andrew Baxter, top image coutesy of ‘Camping in Ohio’, and middle sunset image courtesy of Oliver Knist