The air currents of summer play catch over the hills surrounding Rustenburg and the aircraft violently jolts in between potholes of rough air. The afternoon heat rises over the plains of Gauteng and rapidly craft cumulus of dark clouds and heavy localised rain over the largest city in South Africa. My stomach sinks at the aircraft’s sharp U-turns as we cancel our final approach, while the crew seem to analyse our landing options amidst thunderstorms. Sitting on the the last row, the cabin vibration hits my body like waves of vertiginous fall and my sweaty hands hold onto the seat tightly until I mentally cheer at the final touchdown on one of the four runways at O.R. Tambo Airport.
My flight has managed to land but many are not as successful. The announcement of a cascade of delays is announced over the loudspeakers, at times muffled by the noise of thunders reverberating across the large terminal windows. With a three-hour delay, my flight departs Johannesburg in the strange calmness of the night only later interrupted by the lights of the Southern tip of Africa emerging from the thick clouds, an hour before midnight.

Upon landing, I immediately feel like I have been transported worlds apart. A large sign reads Cape Town International Airport, which displayed across a large dome-like terminal, works as a beacon of victory amidst an atypically cold night.
I meet Lucille and Cristiaan, who did not hesitate in offering me a place to stay as soon as my plans changed and a trip to the Cape was last-minute booked.

      ‘Lucille is Charlaine’s mother, an ex-colleague of mine from my times in the Middle East. Charlaine and I once cracked bad jokes at the Forbidden City, and ate popcorn with Aromat in the safety of the air conditioned buildings in Um Mugwalina. For years, we spoke about Cape Town, about afternoons in Table Mountains and braais. It feels just right to land here tonight, despite the four-hour delay.’

To better understand the Cape, I feel compiled to understand the host family that now welcome me with the widest smile, drive me to Brackenfell -the beating heart of Afrikaner suburbia- and warm a carefully cooked dinner, despite having never met me before.
I immediately learn that Cape Town is an entity of its own. A place the ANC party has never been able to win, a place in which Capetonians show pride in the cleanliness of the streets and praise efficiency on the running of its local government and services. The city lays its streets over a carpet of dry lands dotted with dramatically tall karst walls which give the city its own twist of unattainable nature, perfectly contrasting with picturesque neighborhoods of chalets extending across the plain.

The N1 brings me straight into the Kaapstad and at the Victoria Waterfront, the architecture of silage turned into boutique hotels , the burgundy-coloured clock tower turned museum and every cliche of worldwide urban redevelopment seem to have worked right. Johannesburg has the businesses, but Cape Town certainly has the charm of a tourism haven. A little bit of Rio de Janeiro around Gardens, a little bit of Amsterdam in Waterkant, and a little bit of Sydney at Green Point.

I decide for a walk around the city and, rounding the steep slopes of Lion’s Head through boulevards that hug the rogue coastline away from the Civic Centre, into the maritime high rise suburbia of Seapoint, where a food market sells grilled seabass with chips and a large outdoor pool tempts me for a dip next to the blue Atlantic ocean.
In Clifton, the walk turns tear-jerking dramatic and the narrow road negotiates its right of way through escarpments of Atlantic-resilient rock and luxurious houses of glass balconies hanging over cliffs of wet rock and white sand beaches.
In the distance, the Twelve Apostles sneak a peek from the rockwall framing Camps Bay, which I immediately find to be the perfect setting to finish a long day of walking in the Cape Town suburbs.

I had heard of Camps Bay,  yet words never did justice to the place I now sip cocktails in.  Behind me, houses rise across the slopes of  Table Mountain, which has imposed a wall between the bustling Central Business District and this quaint zig-zagging neighborhood. The houses, one by one, rest on an undulating terrain crowned by the one of the whitest sand beaches I have ever seen, and the unforgiving South Atlantic wind, unpredictable by nature, casts a spell of horizontal rain and fog with no more than three minutes of duration each time.

Next in the cards, a visit to one of the many wine farms extending from the city Eastern suburbs to Paarl and Stellenbosch, where the rich humid soil joins the blue skies in numerous ripples of vineyards, their dry New-world flavours exported to the world as brands of top class wine.
At Groenland Wine Farm, and apres an extensive wine tasting experience, a local couple convince me into an alcohol-fuelled excursion to the town of Stellenbosch, where I rush into a lunch of fresh pasta at one of the many cafes of its pristine city centre dotted with houses built in prime Dutch architecture.

Half-drunk and indulging in a large bowl of pasta pesto, I look at the whitewashed walls that speak of long acquired European traditions, the ever blue sky only accentuating the delicate beauty of the sober lines of buildings that have gracefully endured centuries of changes in these latitudes. It is with the backdrop of pure white against clear blue that my mind finally breaks the cumulonimbus of thoughts and allows itself to roam free, the lightness of an afternoon in one of the prettiest cities I have ever visited sweetly seasoned by the appreciation of the small things, the cadence in the accent of the waitress flicking through my camera pictures as engaging as the travel questions from the music student that now leans over a pile of  books sitting across the hall under the dim rays of sunshine penetrating through the mesh window.

For a second I close my eyes and I think to myself: ‘I am where I am supposed to be’.

I leave Stellenbosch at a time in which the sun bathes the surrounding vineyards in a layer of orange fog and at night, the hangover is appeased by an oversized barbecue in a local Afrikaner joint. Inside the small place, African faunae taxidermia stare at diners who sit in wooden tables around succulent dishes of barbecue ribs and ribeye steaks. English is seldom and awkwardly spoken by waiting staff and patrons alike, which perhaps delivers a more insightful meal digging right into the heart of one of the proudest communities in South Africa.

The mighty Atlantic winds force the temporary closure of the aerial cable car at Table Mountain, the perfect excuse for an ascent through the zig-zagging trail along the Platteklip Gorge -in Converse shoes- along tourists and passers by that heavily sigh at both the demanding hike and the stunning views of the city below.

At the very top, the ‘table cloth’ gracefully dances across the plain before dipping into the cold sea, the clouds swirling in between the Seven Apostles like fine sand sliding through giant rock fingers. The wind chill cuts through my skin, rendering the thought of a warm and tropical day at Camps Bay some meters below almost impossible.
I descend from the plateau in a knee-destroying hour hike and decide for some rest at Camps Bay, strawberry daiquiri in hands once again the best choice for the late afternoon hours.

At the beach, the sky turns pastel and the water turns crystal clear. Waves crash against the white sand and surfers call it a day. As the fluffy clouds cover the mountain with a white nightgown, I grow restless at the thought of leaving the city and at sunset, when the sun waves an orange goodbye over Lion’s Head and the houses of Seapoint turn the view like a mockup of white walls and glass ready to be played, I tightly hold onto the thoughts of an entire trip and reflect on the good and the bad. Most importantly, I mentally decide upon changes in life and a future as bright as the lights of this city now floating in a dark mirrored sky.

I leave the city the next morning with a sensation of heaviness, in the distance Table Mountain lining up to the green-coloured aircraft winglet as we take off , and the vineyards of Stellenbosch looking pristine under the thin layer of morning fog as we U-turn Johannesburg bound. Indeed, the saddest view of Cape Town is the one from the plane, when one leaves the city and longs to return.