Elsies Peak walk ...

Today Gigi and I joined our good friend Phoebe Barnard and recent Swiss imigrants Res, Birget and Norma Altwegg for a walk up Elsies peak behind Glencairn heights on the Cape Peninsula.

Afterwards Phoebe and Rob treated us to a great brunch.


View from Elsies Peak southwards down the Cape Peninsula




'Shift Click' (Explorer) or 'Ctrl Click' or 'Click the mouse wheel' (Firefox) on the image to open it in full size in a new window or tab respectively



Glencairn beach left and Simons Bay beyond that

The South African Naval base, Simonstown harbour







From the top of Elsies Peak looking northwards along Fishoek Beach to Clovelly and further to Muizenberg where the mountain dips steeply into False Bay

Elsies Peak is one of our best whale watching spots as one can watch all the underwater activity




Here is our group sitting above Sunny Cove looking down over Fishoek beach



















I photographed a few flowers on the way back

Saltera sarcocolla















A yellow composite, probably some or other species of Osteospermum

Being pollinated by a monkey beetle















Unknown plant with a smart red and black beetle either sucking nektar or eating the petals












A botterblom Gazania pectinata


















A beautiful young flower of the pincushion Leucospermum conocarpodendron

There were lots of these beautiful shrubs growing on the southern slope of Elsiespeak














A more mature flower of Leucospermum conocarpodendron

















This is the flower spike of what I believe is a species of Watsonia


















Here it is in close up


















... and this is one of the many species of blue/purple mesembs
















Norma asleep on Res' shoulder

Climbing mountains is tough work for a two year old
















We ended the day on the lawn enjoying the first of the Kirstenbosch
Summer Sunset concerts

Todays group was Goldfish

Not entirely our style of music but the vibe was good