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With its warm, dry summers and mild, green winters, Cape Town and its surrounds have year-round pursuits and the city is fast becoming one of the outdoor capitals of the world. For a hiker, mountaineer, or biker, Table Mountain is Paradise Found. There are more than a hundred walking routes over the mountain and its attendant Devil's Peak, Lion's Head and Signal Hill, surrendering views of city, sea and indigo peaks. Or, take the cable car, for the same effect. At higher altitudes, try drifting over the wine-lands in a hot-air balloon. The winter months of June to August lend themselves to long walks, wine-sipping and whale-spotting as Antarctic right whales come to have their young in the bays and coves of the peninsula. At sea-level, there's kayaking in False Bay or off Cape Point while divers can explore a number of marine reserves around the peninsula. . Winter's also the season for picking up great travel deals. September sees the wild flowers set the land on fire and May has the vineyards ablaze. Recently voted Africa's leading destination for the second time by the World Tourism Organisation, this city at the southern tip of Africa is the scenic gateway to the continent and straddles the inter-continental divide with cosmopolitan aplomb. The Cape Metropolitan area is home to four million people. You'll hear local languages like Afrikaans and Xhosa spoken but English is the most widely used of the eleven official languages. Since its establishment in 1652 as a way-station for European sailors rounding the Cape of Storms, Cape Town has long been known as the Tavern of the Seas. Three hundred and fifty years later, it retains this reputation. The city's diverse cultural heritage is reflected in the dining, shopping and sightseeing on offer. Malay, Indian and Indonesian slaves bequeathed the spicy food of the East, the distinctive mosques that dot the city and the annual New Year Coon Carnival, a vaudeville parade of white-faced, racoon-eyed minstrels, banjos, whistles and drums. The restored Victorian buildings of the city centre recall an English colonial past but today they house antique dealers alongside African jazz clubs. Jazz is a local speciality and in recognition of this fact, Cape Town is the venue for the international North Sea Jazz Festival every year. | 
