The top of Table Mountain

How much does it cost to go up Table Mountain?

Hiking up has no gate or ticket on the main routes. You pay only if you ride the cableway, enter through Kirstenbosch Garden, or book a guided hike; cableway prices change with the season and time of day, so check tablemountain.net.

• Hiking: Platteklip Gorge, India Venster, Kasteelspoort, the Pipe Track and Lion's Head have no gate or ticket; you simply walk up. Table Mountain National Park is mostly open to everyone, with tickets only at separate gated areas such as Cape Point and Boulders.
• The cableway: tickets are sold one-way and return, online or at the ticket office, with a Fast Track option. A one-way ticket costs less than a return, so hiking up and riding down is also the cheaper way to use the cableway.
• Kirstenbosch routes: Skeleton Gorge and Nursery Ravine start inside Kirstenbosch Garden, so you enter through the garden first, with its own entry ticket.
• Guided hikes: a paid tour, booked on GetYourGuide. A private hike costs more than a group hike, and most hikes do not include the cableway ticket down, so check each listing.
• On top: short guided walks are included with your cableway visit; food, drinks and the shop are paid as you go.

Current cableway prices are on tablemountain.net; they vary through the year and by time of day, so check before you go.

How does the Table Mountain cableway work?

Round cars with a rotating floor carry you between the Lower Cable Station on Tafelberg Road and the top in about 5 to 6 minutes. They run from about 8 or 8:30 am until early evening, later in summer, weather permitting; check tablemountain.net on the day.

Each car holds about 65 people, and the floor turns a full circle on the way, so everyone gets the view of the cliffs, the city and the bay. Wind is the usual reason the cableway stops; it can close for an hour, an afternoon or the whole day, and the top is much windier than the city. The cableway posts its status on its website and app, and it asks hikers to be prepared to hike down if necessary. Platteklip Gorge is the way down. The cableway also closes for about two weeks each winter for maintenance (27 July to 9 August in 2026), while the hiking trails stay open.

Hiking up and riding down is the most popular plan for hikers: buy a one-way ticket down at the top. Most guided hikes do not include it, including every hike listed on this site. For the non-hikers in your group, the cableway and hop-on hop-off bus ticket (4.6 from 3,517 reviews) combines a return cableway ticket with a day on the sightseeing bus, whose red route stops at the Lower Cable Station.

How long should I spend at Table Mountain?

Plan 1 to 2 hours on the top, or half a day if you walk to Maclear's Beacon. If you hike up Platteklip and ride down, a half day of about 4 to 5 hours covers it all.

An hour lets you walk the short loops near the cable station, look over both edges and have a coffee. Two hours adds a slow circuit of the Klipspringer Walk and a meal. Hikers usually arrive tired and hungry, so they sit first and walk later. On a clear day it is worth staying: the light over the Atlantic and the Twelve Apostles gets better through the afternoon, as long as the wind stays down and you keep an eye on the last car.

The Upper Station has TEN67 Eatery, VIEWS by De Grendel, the KLOUD Bar and the Dairy Den for ice cream, plus a shop, toilets and Wi-Fi. The restaurant opens with the first car and closes 30 minutes before the last car down. For the full timing of a hike day, see how long it takes to hike Table Mountain. If you would rather come down from the top by rope, the abseil and hike (5.0 from 4 reviews) walks up Platteklip Gorge with a guide, then lowers you 112 m on the rope above Camps Bay.

What are the walks on top of Table Mountain?

Three short marked loops start near the Upper Station: the Dassie Walk (15 minutes), the Agama Walk (30 minutes) and the Klipspringer Walk (45 minutes). The longer walk to Maclear's Beacon, the highest point, is 5.5 km return and takes about 2 hours.

The short walks are on flat stone paths with railings at the busiest lookouts. Guided 30-minute walks leave hourly through the day from the Twelve Apostles Terrace, included with your cableway visit. Maclear's Beacon sits at the eastern end of the plateau, about 3 km from the cable station: a pile of stones built in December 1844 on the instruction of the astronomer Thomas Maclear, who used it to measure the shape of the Earth. The path to it is rocky but level, with a few wet patches; go only in clear weather, because the tablecloth can hide the path.

Hikers coming up from Kirstenbosch reach the back table near the old reservoirs and can walk across to the beacon on the way to the cable station. The Skeleton Gorge to Maclear's Beacon hike (5.0 from 18 reviews) does exactly that, with a guide who is a qualified wilderness first aider.

Is Table Mountain a 7 wonder of the world?

Yes, in one sense: Table Mountain is one of the New7Wonders of Nature, confirmed in 2012. It is not one of the ancient Seven Wonders of the World, nor one of the New7Wonders of the World, which are buildings.

The New7Wonders of Nature were chosen by a worldwide public vote run by the New7Wonders Foundation. Voting closed on 11 November 2011 with provisional results, Table Mountain was confirmed on 3 May 2012, and it was officially inaugurated with a plaque on 2 December 2012. The cableway points out that Table Mountain is the only one of the seven located in a city.

The full list of the seven is on the New7Wonders website: the Amazon (South America), Ha Long Bay (Vietnam), Iguazu Falls (Argentina and Brazil), Jeju Island (South Korea), Komodo (Indonesia), the Puerto Princesa Underground River (the Philippines) and Table Mountain (South Africa).

What are the exact 7 wonders of the world?

There are three separate lists: the ancient Seven Wonders of the World, the New7Wonders of the World (famous buildings, chosen in 2007) and the New7Wonders of Nature (natural places, chosen in 2011 and 2012). Table Mountain is on the third.

• The ancient Seven Wonders: a list from the ancient Greek world. Only one still stands: the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt.
• The New7Wonders of the World: buildings and monuments chosen in a public vote in 2007.
• The New7Wonders of Nature: the Amazon, Ha Long Bay, Iguazu Falls, Jeju Island, Komodo, the Puerto Princesa Underground River and Table Mountain.

When someone says Table Mountain is one of the seven wonders, they mean the New7Wonders of Nature.

What animal is on top of Table Mountain?

The dassie, or rock hyrax: a rabbit-sized, round, brown animal that basks on the rocks around the Upper Station, especially in the morning. Its closest living relatives are elephants.

Dassies are used to people and easy to photograph, but feeding them harms them, so please don't. Look out also for Cape girdled lizards and agamas on warm rocks (the Agama Walk is named after them), small klipspringer antelope on the cliffs, and birds of prey such as the jackal buzzard riding the wind along the edge. Grey rhebok, porcupine and mongoose live on the mountain too, but you are unlikely to see them near the station.

Chacma baboons live in the national park, mostly on the southern peninsula and the lower slopes, and are rarely seen on the plateau. The rule for every animal is the same: keep your distance, keep food packed away and never feed them. The Table Mountain ghost frog, found only in a few mountain streams here, is one of the rarest animals in the park; you are very unlikely to meet it, but it is a good example of how much here lives nowhere else.

What is special about Table Mountain National Park?

It protects one of the richest plant areas on Earth, right beside a city. The park has been part of the Cape Floral Region World Heritage Site since 2004, and the Cape Peninsula has about 2,800 plant types, around 158 of them found nowhere else (a 2026 checklist).

The Cape Floral Region is the smallest and richest of the world's six floral kingdoms, and about 80% of its plants are fynbos. The park runs from Signal Hill and Lion's Head over Table Mountain and down the peninsula to Cape Point, roughly 221 km² of land plus a marine protected area. Most of it is open to everyone; only a few areas, such as Cape Point and Boulders, have gates and tickets. Park information is on the SANParks website.

No other of the New7Wonders of Nature sits in a city, and that is what surprises most visitors: you can hike from a suburb into wild mountain fynbos in minutes. For a view of the whole park in one sweep, a helicopter flight from the V&A Waterfront (4.8 from 2,013 reviews) circles Table Mountain, Lion's Head and the Atlantic coast. For how to explore it on foot, see the Table Mountain routes and the mountain overview on the homepage.

See the whole park at once: a sightseeing flight from the V&A Waterfront over Table Mountain, Lion's Head and the Atlantic coast, from 12 to 50 minutes depending on the route you choose. A good plan for a windy day when the cableway is not running, or for anyone who would rather not hike.

★ 4.8 (2,013) · 12 to 50 minutes · Full refund up to 24 h ahead

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