San hunter-gatherers were dependent on the seashore for most of their food, which is why they are sometimes referred to as “strandlopers” or beachwalkers. San middens or rubbish dumps have been found in a number of caves.

Around 2,000 years ago, the San were displaced by the cattle and sheep-keeping Khoikhoi who migrated from the north. It was this tribe that the European explorers first encountered.

Portuguese explorer Bartolomeu Dias unknowingly rounded the Cape of Good Hope in the 15th century after encountering a fierce storm, making landfall on the east coast on the 3rd February 1488, and stopping at what is today known as Hout Bay on his return journey.

Ten years later, fellow Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape and reached India – the first person to open the sea route from Europe to the exotic East.

In 1580, Sir Francis Drake described the Cape as “the most stately thing,” and “the fairest cape” in the world. The Cape of Good Hope has long been an important landmark for mariners, and Table Bay – nestling at the foot of Table Mountain – a safe anchorage while taking on fresh supplies.

European settlement of the Cape dates from 1652 when Dutchman Jan van Riebeeck arrived at Table Bay to establish a refreshment station for the Dutch East India Company and its ships. A fort was built and gardens were laid out at the foot of Table Mountain. The now-famous grape-growing and wine-making industry was founded and land given to settlers for crop-growing.

Idyllic though Cape Point may seem to summer-visiting tourists, it’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing. The weather can change rapidly without warning and there are hidden rocks on which many ships have been impaled down the ages, with heavy loss of life. Not for nothing has this area been dubbed the ‘Cape of Storms’ and ‘one of the world’s great marine graveyards’.

There have been around 650 recorded wrecks during the past 400 years, of which only five can still be seen. Among the many ships to have foundered in these waters were HMS Sceptre in 1799, the famous Lusitania in 1911 and the SAA Transvaal and SAS Good Hope in 1978.

In 1641, Captain Hendrik van der Decken was returning to Holland aboard The Flying Dutchman when his ship was struck by a storm and wrecked. Before dying, Van der Decken vowed to sail on until he reached the ends of the earth. According to legend, his ship continues to sail around the Cape, and many sailors claim to have seen The Flying Dutchman.

The first lighthouse was completed in 1860 at 238 metres above sea level. Unfortunately, the life-saving light was often rendered invisible to mariners because of mist and fog. For this reason, work began on a second lighthouse in 1913 at about 87 metres above sea level. The new facility became operational on 11 March 1919 and is still the most powerful lighthouse on the South African coast.

It could be said that the first of many measures to protect the Cape’s fragile and precious natural environment was taken as long ago as 1687 by the Dutch East India Company, when it issued a notice prescribing penalties for anyone caught deliberately burning the mountain vegetation to promote grazing.

The Cape of Good Hope and Table Mountain Nature Reserves were declared in 1938 and 1964 respectively, and the Cape Peninsula Nature Area (later to become the Cape Peninsula Protected Natural Environment) was proclaimed in 1983.

Today, much of the Cape lies within the new Table Mountain National Park which came into being in 1998 and incorporates about 24,500 hectares of land between Signal Hill and the Cape of Good Hope, as well as a 1,000 sq km marine protected area.

What the park is noted for above all else is the diversity of its flowers. There are over 1,500 plant species on Table Mountain alone, and about 2,285 on Table Mountain and the Peninsula as a whole.

The park’s most common vegetation is fynbos – a general term for a variety of mainly shrubby, low-growing plants, such as ericas or heaths, reeds or restios and proteas.

Arguably the most striking species is the large king protea. Many fynbos plants have been cultivated by horticulturists over the years and are now a familiar sight in gardens and homes around the world. Among them are pelargoniums, daisies, freesias, irises and lilies.

Although most of the area’s large land animals have long since disappeared, there remain populations of a number of small to medium-sized mammals, including chacma baboon, bontebok (a rare type of antelope), eland, Cape grysbok, klipspringer, zebra, red lynx, dassie, water mongoose and Cape clawless otter.

The park abounds with birds, from the nectar-loving Cape sugarbird, which depends solely on fynbos plants for food, to the mighty ostrich. Small numbers of the latter can be seen feeding by the roadside and on beaches around the Cape of Good Hope.

Dassies or rock hyraxes are common on boulder-strewn beaches. These comical creatures, which resemble rodents but are actually related to elephants and dugongs, have a penchant for sunning themselves on warm rocks, but immediately dive for cover if they are approached too closely.

An especially popular attraction is the colony of African penguins at Boulders, near Simon’s Town. From just two breeding pairs in 1982, the colony has mushroomed to about 3,000 in recent years, thanks partly to the reduction in commercial trawling in False Bay, which has meant there are more pilchards and anchovies available for these fish-loving birds. Visitors can view the penguins from elevated boardwalks and in some places get within inches of them.

The waters around the Cape are extremely rich in wildlife. Marine animals include the southern right, humpback and Byrd’s whales, seals, dolphins, penguins, 24 endemic rock pool fish species and 259 continental shelf fish species, 88 per cent of which are endemic to southern Africa.

A poignantly-worded plaque on Table Mountain states: “For all who have been enriched by this mountain and peninsula, who have drawn life, nourishment, protection and inspiration from this precious gem of our natural world, may it never be forgotten that as much as Table Mountain and Cape Peninsula National Park (the whole area is now the Table Mountain National Park), belongs to all of us, we are at the same time entrusted with its care and protection by those who came before and those who will come after.”

One must hope that such words are heeded so that the park’s natural treasures are preserved for all time.