There are kilometres of tunnels under Cape Town.
Deep under the busy streets of Cape Town, kilometres of historic tunnels channel water from Table Mountain into the sea. And the water runs all year round.
The water catchment system dates back to Cape Town’s colonial past. The Dutch first built open canals in the 1600s. In the 1700s, the water became polluted and the tunnels were arched over and closed.
These underground water channels were decommissioned in the 1800s. But water from Table Mountain still flows through the canals into the sea. The river that runs down Table Mountain was called Camissa or “the place of sweet waters” by the indigenous Khoi.
The tours are guided by Matt Weisse of Good Hope Adventures.
Video: Ashraf Hendricks
To get underground, you have to climb through a manhole in the city centre into the dark tunnels about 2 to 3 metres in width. As you walk below the streets of Cape Town, you can hear a train passing nearby, cars driving over manholes, and sometimes the voices of people.
Tour guide Matt Weisse, of Good Hope Adventures, tells stories of the history of the tunnels, and how they were built.
You have to climb through a manhole to get underground.
It can get quite humid underground, says Weisse, but on the day we visited there was a cool draft blowing through the tunnel. Visitors are advised to wear a mask because it can be quite smelly underground. When we visited, the water running through the tunnel was clear, but Weisse says it can get quite dirty.
The walls and the arched roofs are brick. Cockroaches scurry about. Spiders are mostly motionless in their webs. Other creatures in the tunnels include frogs and crabs. Without lights, you can barely see anything at all.
The water running through the tunnels from Table Mountain never dries up. Even during the water crisis of 2017, the canals did not dry up. “So there is water, we must just know how to work with it,” Weisse says.
Many critters have made these tunnels their homes like spiders and frogs.
“We run out of water because we waste the water. We don’t manage it properly. We use our drinking water for watering our gardens, for washing our cars. Our dams can only service so many people. The city is growing.“
When he’s alone underground, he says, it can be quite eerie. “You hear the water, you hear the people and cars at the top, thundering noises, and you don’t know what it is.”
“There is something spooky about this place.”
Water from Table Mountain flows through this tunnel all year.
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Fun South African Fact: South African fish migration is so huge you can see it from space.
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A British man on safari walks into a bar far out in the reaches of a game reserve in Southern Africa, he stays at the bar for a while shooting the shit with the bartender and drinking like a fish, he offer to buy the barkeep a round and since no one else is within 2km of their small oasis of liquor the barkeep obliges. The englishman goes off to the bathroom to have a good old go at the porcelain, he\’s back and ready for a few more whiskeys. He\’s just sat down when suddenly in the distance he hears a scream. He looks over his shoulder and dismisses it as nothing, he turns to the barkeep and orders a drink, takes a sip and hears the scream again. He looks at the barkeep who just shrugs it off. A minute or two later he and the barman hear it again and go outside to take a look. They see a lone figure running towards them screaming, he spots them and lets out a cry, RUN!!!!! HE\”S COMING!!!!!
The barkeep and the Englishman both look at the terrified bedraggled sight before them, and try to calm him down, but he\’s completely inconsolable. They give him water and finally manage to get a word out of him but he struggles free from their grasp and run away screaming.
A few minutes later the same thing happens with a whole group of men running in and screaming, he\’s coming, he\’s coming the barkeep grabs hold of one of the men as he tries to sprint past the bar and tries to get information out of him, again no response other than terrified gibberish.
The barkeep and his customer are starting to get worried, they start to pack up before another group of horrified natives run up to the bar most of them flee but one tries to hide behind the bar, the barkeep pulls out a shotgun and points it at the terrified man\’s face, finally managing to coax some words out of him. \”He\’s coming for us, Vernon Koekemoer is coming for us, we have to hide!!! We have to get out of here.\” He gets up and tries to run but the barkeep grabs him, feeling trapped in a panic he grabs the barkeeps shotgun and blows his own head off. The Englishman and the barkeep look at each other starting to really panic now.
They look out of the window and off in the distance they see a tornado coming towards the bar, at the bottom of the tornado they see the hugest beast of a man they have ever seen, as he gets closer they spot that he is riding a rhinocerous and using a crocodile as a riding whip, with each smack of the crocodile across the back of the rhino the louder is screams and the faster it runs, the tornado following it getting ever larger.
The 2 look at each other and start to fortify their position, they\’ve got a gun and they\’re waaay to drunk to run, so they start piling bar stool and tables and anything they can get their hands on to make sure they\’ll be safe when he arrives. They\’re not gonna make it, they can see the man slowing down his rhino, by now the crocodile is nothing but reptile paste on the bruised rump of the half dead rhino, the rhino drops down dead from exhaustion and crashes to the ground right outside the bar the tornado loses it\’s last breath in a cloud of dust as the huge man crashes his way through the make shift barricade and charges up towards the bar where the 2 men have taken shelter, he grabs a bottle of the hardest liquor on the shelf and down the entire litre in 1 gulp, he peers over the bar sobbing and sees the 2 defenders cowering down behind the crates of beer, they look up at the mans\’ face and he stares at them with a look of complete and utter hopelessness, he stares at them for a half second and half screams, half sobs, \”Oh my god what are you still doing here!!! WE HAVE TO GET OUT OF HERE NOW!!!! Vernon Koekemoer is coming!!!!\”