Yesterday, the GoTravel24 team went up Table Mountain for a day of fun and photos. By 'went up' I mean, we got on the cable car and enjoyed the view. We're saving the hike for next time...

Dressed for show

We started quite early because we didn't want to miss the perfectly hued morning sun. On arrival I feared for my toes. I wore flip flops, like any other day, and it seemed it just might be a tad too cold up at the top.

However, Bryan, our manager, was perfectly dressed in his olive pants, shoes, top and jersey.

"Gosh, Bryan," Ulpha, our intern, taunted, "You match the mountain."

Lights, camera… audience

Once on the Table top, the photo shoot commenced. I was quite happy to let Bryan go first. You see, the last group shoot we did was a silent nightmare for me (inappropriate dress, inability to take direction, total lack of grace). I struggled through out the whole thing but Bryan whizzed by. So I observed this time.

In the middle of Bryan's turn in front of the camera, the Chinese tourists I had noticed earlier started their own series of photo shoots. When some of their speculations turned to our snap shot series, I wished my recent jaunt in Asia had included some lessons in Mandarin or Cantonese.

 
As soon as Bryan finished it was my turn. It was all surprisingly painless. The lovely thing about having a professional photographer is that dud photos kind of disappear and all you're left with is your own genuine, posing style.

Then the rest of our fabulous team, Selene our editor and our interns Ulpha and Elhaam, joined us for group shots. As we struggled to catch the right light (the sun was getting stronger) our Chinese audience grew larger. And then suddenly they couldn't contain themselves anymore.

"Excuse," a woman approached our group, not quite so gingerly. "Me take photo with you? Thank you." She didn't even wait for a reply from us; she just slotted herself in our group shot. "Cheese!" We then stood there grinning as the rest of the tour group shoved in to have their photo's taken with us. You've got to love Cape Town!

Don't feed the animals

Later, after Selene had finished her own shots we sat down for breakfast, catching views of the sea, Robben Island and beautiful Scarborough.

While I was biting into my sandwich, I suddenly felt a presence next to me. I nearly jumped out of my skin when I turned to see a dassie, only centimetres away, eagerly eyeing my sandwich.

As I gingerly manoeuvred one of the interns between myself and the intruder, Bryan (who's an absolute know-it-all) told us that the dassie is the closest living relative to the elephant.

"Yeah right," I sniggered under my breath, until I heard one of the tour guides repeating the same to a tour group of school kids.

The dassie seemed friendly, but the worrying thing was it didn't stop going after our food. It has obviously been fed before and it expected us to do the same. Domesticity now hampers its nature.

We ended the day chatting to as many of the foreign Table Mountain visitors we could find, and asked them what they enjoyed most about Cape Town. I finally got to show off my Asia survival language, this time Japanese. Fine, it was a random, "Arigato gozaymas," but it was one of the many international encounters any visitor can expect on a visit. That and a perfectly hued morning sun.

For more information on Table Mountain call: 021 424 8181 or visit their website.

The first cable car leaves at 8am and the last comes down at 6:30pm.

Visit Cape Town to see what else the city has to offer with these packages.