Cape Town

Take a fabulously scenic drive along the mountain side above Muizenberg and Kalk Bay Bay along the north-western corner of False Bay  and take in the elevated views of the coastline with its rocky shores, tiny fishing harbours and blue waters stretching away towards Gordon's Bay and Cape Hangklip. This 7 km long mountain road offers an alternative route to the more congested Main Road along the seafront and provides some excellent view-sites as well as access to some wonderful hikes up to the Silvermine Nature Reserve. This road falls under the category of 'Suburban Passes'

Camps Bay Drive is a tricky road, where your attention will be devided between the amazing views of mountain and sea juxtaposed against trying to get your vehicle around the many dangerous corners on this road. Many of these have negative cross-flow, which is bad news for speed and maybe this is a good thing, as this is a busy road carrying heavy traffic. It is a road that has developed over a period of 200 years, with the upper quarter being a modern four lane road, but the bottom three quarters is narrow, bumpy and very twisty. The road descends from Kloof nek at 234m ASL all the way down to the coast at 11m ASL, producing an average gradient of 1:18, but some of the sections are as steep as 1:7

Chapman's Peak Drive dates back to the early 1900's and is without question one of Cape Town's Top 10 tourist destinations. Its popularity is due to the incredible scenery on offer, viewed from a road which has been literally hewn out of the almost vertical cliff faces on the Cape Peninsula's western side.

The 10 km long pass connects Hout Bay in the north with Noordhoek in the south and was converted into a toll road in 2003 to cover the high costs of maintaining the road to a safe standard. Along its length you will drive through more than 80 bends, corners and curves and see some impressive modern engineering, including massive steel catch nets and two semi-tunnels. Many sections of unstable rock-face have been reinforced with shotcrete.

This pass is loaded with drama and history dating back to 1910 and is best appreciated driven slowly. It must have seemed an impossible task building a road on such an inhospitable and dangerous cliff face, but the road building pioneers did the job!

The more observant viewers will notice that we have not included our standard vertical profile nor simulated fly-past clips in the first video. The reason for this is that Google Earth simply cannot 'read' the road correctly and the results are too distorted to provide an accurate simulation. This is the only pass in South Africa, where this has occurred.

This fairly long suburban pass links Hout Bay in the west with Constantia on the eastern side of the Cape Peninsula. It traverses some of the most beautiful woodlands in the Cape and passes many exclusive wine and equine estates. It is smack-bang on the main tourist route and carries heavy traffic. There are no safety shoulders on the road, making it dangerous for cyclists and pedestrians. At the summit at Constantia Nek there are some historical buildings and a timeless restaurant considered to be the oldest restaurant in South Africa.

Grey's Pass in Cape Town's city centre is comfortably the shortest official pass in South Africa with a length of 97m. It also walks off with the winner in the category "Lowest Altitude Gain" of just 1 metre. This "pass" in no way conforms to our definitions of a mountain pass in any respect, but it is an officially listed pass, so we are documenting and indexing it. It takes another statistical record, in that it is the first pass that we show in its full length with no editing necessary (and that includes filming it in both directions).

Kloof Nek Road falls under the category of a suburban pass and Cape Town has no shortage of those! The road is steep and dangerous and has something of a reputation for fatal accidents. It connects the city centre with Camps Bay through the obvious neck between Table Mountain and Lions Head. It was built in 1848 when Kloof Nek was used primarily as a look-out post for soldiers and the road was used as a supply route to Camps Bay.

This attractive 5 km stretch of coastal road is located on the western side of the Cape Peninsula and connects Kommetjie and Noordhoek with the tiny settlements of Misty Cliffs and Scarborough in the south. It is has plenty of twists and turns, but a small variance in altitude, making it an enjoyable road for cyclists. The views to the west are wonderful of the Atlantic surf thundering onto the rocks close to the road and at the northern end the distinctive shape of the Slangkop Lighthouse with its crescent shaped white beach seals off the northern views.

This beautiful coastal drive contains 18 bends, corners and curves but none of them are of a serious or dangerous nature, providing speed limits are adhered to. The road surface is getting old and a bit bumpy from various repair works and the road is also fairly narrow over most of its length. Overtaking is awkward and dangerous due to the many corners. Sit back, relax and take in the stunnng scenery. Expect slow, tourist paced traffic.

Despite the romantic, historical connotations of its name "Ou Kaapse Weg" ('Old Cape Road'), this is actually a relatively modern road, which was opened in 1968. There is a jeep track that runs more or less paralell, but higher up the northern side of the pass, which is purportedly an old wagon road road used to cart ore from the silver mine lower down the mountain in the late 1800's, and which is still accessible to hikers who walk the many beautiful routes available on both sides of the pass within the Silvermine Nature Reserve.

The pass is a major one covering a distance of 10,6 km and in that length contains 26 bends, curves and corners including 3 full horseshoe bends and another 3 corners in excess of 90 degrees. The pass offers a modern, well bult road with superb views over it's entire length of both False Bay and the Atlantic Ocean with the Steenberg Mountains and Silvermine Nature Reserve with its winter waterfall keeping travellers entertained through the middle section. It gives access to Fish Hoek, Noordhoek, Kommetjie, Simonstown and the Cape Point Nature Reserve. 


 

Rhodes Drive is a 7 km mountain drive along the eastern slopes of the Table Mountain range and connects Constantia Nek in the south with the suburb of Newlands. This is one of the most scenic wooded drives on the Cape Peninsula and traverses some of the plush suburbs of the Southern Peninsula. It is also the only access road to the world famous Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens. From dense indigenous forests, to towering old pine trees, majestic mountains, hiking trails, picnic spots and world class botanical gardens - it's all there along the wonderful Rhodes Drive.  

Signal Hill road is an out and back scenic drive/pass that starts at Kloof Nek and climbs very steeply under the eastern flank of Lions Head, to level off along the spine of the ridge. It runs due north providing superb views of the city bowl and further towards False Bay. As the road curls around Lions Rump (Signal Hill) you will experience rapidly changing views of first, the main harbour, then the V&A Waterfront, Green Point with the Cape Town Stadium as its focal point, then Sea Point. Nelson Mandela's incarceration on Robben Island brings back memories of another era in our history. It lies only 3 nautical miles out into the blue waters of Table Bay.

A short, twisty and steep mountain pass that winds up the side of the Slangkop mountain offering sweeping views over the rugged Atlantic coastline with perfect views of the Slangkop Lighthouse. The pass is old and the tarred surface is not as smooth as more modern roads. It climbs 102 metres over 3,58 km producing an average gradient of 1:39 with the steeper sections presenting at 1:14. Since the new shortcut via Ocean View was built, this old road has quickly become one of the Peninsula's roads 'less travelled'. Don't miss out on this one - it's a real gem!

This road falls under the category of a suburban pass and after a short steep ascent from Kloof Nek it climbs rapidly via two 180 degree hairpins to level out at the lower cableway station. Thereafter it runs more or less on an even contour line all along the north face of Table Mountain. Some years ago, rock slides caused the the road to be closed at the 4,1 km mark, leaving the remainder of the eastern section open only to hikers and cyclists. The road provides unparalleled views of Cape Town, the harbour, Robben island and the Cape Flats. It is usually extremely congested with tourist vehicles wanting to access the cableway and hiking trails.  

This old farm road has been modernised over the years and today carries bumper to bumper traffic to the northern suburbs around Durbanville. It's a popular alternative to the N1. The 4.9 km long tarred road (designated as the M13), ascends 134m producing an average gradient of 1:37, but the curvy part near Hillcrest is quite steep at 1:8. The pass plays host to a number of quality wine estates, including Bloemendal, Nitida, Hillcrest and Durbanville Hills. The little pass is also colloquially known as Tiekiedraai for its very sharp corner near Hillcrest.

The road has plenty of variety in the form of wine farms, an open air cinema, several popular eateries, wedding venues, an antique shop, and a large active open quarry carrying heavily laden trucks which operate 24 hours a day. A blanket speed limit of 80 kph applies, which is monitored via speed cameras.

Victoria Road is a long road that stretches from Sea point all the way to Hout Bay. This lovely coastal road is featured several times on this website as it includes at least two passes in its total distance. This specific pass starts at the western end of Camps Bay at Bakoven and ends about 8.5 km later at the natural neck between the last buttress of the Twelve Apostles and Little Lions Head above Llandudno. It is a road which is appreciated and revered by locals and tourists alike and is well engineered with properly banked turns and smooth curves. It is a joy to drive, ride or cycle whilst offering fabulous views of the Atlantic coastline and the 12 Apostles.

Vissershok translates from Afrikaans into English as Fishermen's Cage. This small pass has some serious gradients and connects the north-western suburbs of Blouberg (Cape Town) with Durbanville and forms part of the semi-urban M48 route. It's 4.8 km long and sports an average gradient of 1:28 with the steepest sections on the western side getting as steep as 1:7. This road has a poor safety record with many fatal accidents having occurred. The road is narrow, unevenly surfaced and has no safety shoulders. Despite these dangers, it is a perennial favourite training route for cyclists. Large numbers of heavy trucks utilise the road to access the active quarries in the valley - namely Contermanskloof and Cotswold quarries. Drive with caution.