Cape Point
Cape Point (dt. Cape tip ) is a cliff on the southern end of the Cape Peninsula in South Africa that forms the top. It is about two kilometers east of the Cape of Good Hope , with which it is often confused.
Cape Point forms the eastern end of the Cape Peninsula, but is not the southernmost point, as some photos or maps suggest. The Cape of Good Hope is two arc seconds (approx. 60 m) to the south. Cape Agulhas is the southernmost point of Africa .
The question of whether Cape Point is the point at which the Atlantic and Indian Oceans meet cannot be answered clearly. In purely topographical terms, the southernmost point of the African continent is 150 kilometers further east, at Cape Agulhas , also known as the Needle Cape . However, since a cold Atlantic and a warm ocean current from the Indian Ocean meet off Cape Point (at a distance of 200 km from the mainland), Cape Point is often referred to as the point where the two oceans meet. The bay east of Cape Point always has a higher water temperature than the western sea side.
The Cape of Good Hope is completely natural: apart from the road that leads there, a small parking lot and turning area for cars and buses and a sign with the coordinates of the place, there are no facilities there. Cape Point, on the other hand, has a tourist infrastructure and the Two Oceans Restaurant is also located here .
The destination can be reached on foot via stairs or with the small Flying Dutchman funicular . The latter leads from the parking lot to close to the older of the two lighthouses . This was built on the highest point of the cliff at 238 m above sea level in 1859. However, since this first lighthouse is too high and too far from the coast, its light was lost in the fog that too often forms at its height. At 900 hours a year, the cone of light was relatively seldom visible from afar. This led to the sinking of a ship named Lusitania in 1911 , with over 700 people on board (not to be confused with the ship that was sunk by a submarine in 1915). Therefore, a new lighthouse was built at a height of only 87 meters above sea level, closer to the water, at the so-called Diaz Point . A hiking trail leads from the old lighthouse to the new one along the steeply sloping cliff walls. At the end of the path there is a viewing platform with a view of the new lighthouse.
Since the air at Cape Point is largely unpolluted, a climate observation station was set up here, operated by the South African Weather Service and the German Institute for Meteorology and Climate Research (IMK) (formerly a Fraunhofer Institute ) and part of the Global Atmosphere Watch network.
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Coordinates: 34 ° 21 ′ 24 ″ S , 18 ° 29 ′ 51 ″ E