It’s a long weekend in Cape Town… Freedom Day on one side of the weekend and Worker’s Day on the other… means a lovely long weekend. I know I like it is a full blown vacation… just a couple of days off is sometimes exactly what you need. We have big plan for the weekend. So far we have had a massive maintenance day… you know all those little jobs around the house that never ever get done. And today we were working on our annual Sketchbook Project that has to be mailed off by Monday.
After two days at home I was ready to head for the great outdoors… and here is a quick little hike that will make you feel like you have had a real workout… and because it is in lovely Simonstown there are a least half a dozen beautiful coffee shops to recover in, not to mention penguins to visit and it is Penguin Week…
Signal School Steps in Simonstown
At the top of Simonstown Village there are two really easy walks. One is a family friendly adventure of the literally fifteen minute of effort genre and so perfect for first time hikers… and the other, climbing a stairway to heaven, or all the way to Just Nuisance’s Grave and some heavenly views.
It does look like stairs all the way, but it isn’t because there are a couple of yards of… slope!!!
Some folk will want to get ahead… but the nature of it is that they won’t get too far ahead!!!
You may have to stop to look at the view…
And you will be watched all the way…
Really watched…
When you get to the top, you will reach the Navy Base and this monument, that we have never noticed before…
In memory of men who lost their lives during World War I.
Just inside the Naval Base fence you will find the grave of Just Nuisance, or Able Seaman Just Nuisance (1 April 1937 – 1 April 1944), a Great Dane with a passion for riding trains. At one time, when his owner was threatened that he would have to get rid of his dog, on account of his train hopping, his owner instead enlisted him in the Royal Navy based at Simonstown and as a fully fledged member of the Royal Navy he was entitled to a free pass on the trains.
You can find Just Nuisance in the centre of town in Jubilee Square… and there is an annual celebration of Great Danes over the first weekend in April, in Simonstown, to commemorate their mascot.
That’s really it, perfect at this time of year when the weather is cooler, it is a quick up and down and you will be back down and ready for coffee or a swim in the sea well within an hour.
Otherwise, before we did this walk we never noticed the jagged scar on the mountainside above the town, those are the stairs you will climb, and to be honest once you know they are there, you will never not see them again when you drive past.
If you are looking for a bracing walk and to let off a little energy, not to mention enjoy an exceptional view and discover a little history, then this is a great walk… yes it is up, and there are stairs… but that is all there is… keep plodding and you will get there and it will be totally worth it.