Catching our breath at Cape Point

The Cape Doctor, our prevailing summer wind, is unseasonally battering the Peninsula this week, and contributing to the heavy rains across the country. We should be seeing the start of winter's cold fronts, but perhaps they will only arrive at the end of autumn to make sure we don't forget how to conserve our precious water supply.
Cape Point is the windiest place in Africa, we are told, with an average 35km/h sweeping its barren peaks and plateaus - as evidenced by the stance of the cedar trees at the Info Centre - horizontal! Today was strong, at 12m/second (I will leave it to the maths boffs to work that out in km/h) and heavy cloud hung overhead as we gathered at the entrance gate to the reserve. Down at Buffels Bay the sun was shining and we set off for Kanonkop along a slightly easier route than usual, winding round the contours of the ridges. We kept looking upwards and asking ourselves whether that ridge in the distance that seemed impossibly high and far away could be our destination, even though we have done this walk a number of times in fine weather. Perhaps the persistent battering of the wind in our faces gave us amnesia, but after plodding on for an hour and a half, barely getting to look left or right at the fynbos, we did reach the top of that impossibly high and far away ridge, complete with ancient cannon atop a rock.
We struggled to find shelter from the elements and huddled against the rocks to have our coffee break. It seemed that everyone was using up the remnants of Easter's indulgences, and pickled fish and hot cross buns were on the menu. I would imagine we are all bunned out now.
Kanonkop stands at 243m above sea level, and it is pretty much all downhill on the False Bay side, steep and rocky with quite a bit of clambering, and it took us a good hour for the descent. The wind was almost gale force on the sea side and there was quite a bit of leaning into the wind and against rocks to brace ourselves against it. The air was chilly and I even put on two jackets, although it didn't remotely match the wind chill recently experienced in Yorkshire. It was agreed that we hadn't walked in such unpleasant conditions before.
Having descended to the road, the steep 2km trek back up to the Info Centre where the cars were was not an attractive proposition, but there was nothing for it but to put one foot in front of the other and plod uphill. After a 7km walk over three and a half hours, we still agreed that it had been a good morning on the mountain!