Soggy Weather Proves Bad Month for Tourists

Posted to the web 6 October 2008 Cape Town's prolonged and wet Winter has put a dampener on tourism figures for two of the city's top tourism landmarks. The tourism industry says visitor numbers are down for both the Table Mountain Cableway and Robben Island. Robben Island has also been plagued by corruption, mismanagement and the ongoing woes of the ferries that take visitors across Table Bay to the island. While visitor numbers to the cableway grew from 772 000 in 2005/6 to 840 000 in 2006/7, they dropped again to 785 000 for the year ending June. Robben Island's figures were 251 895 last year and at just 170 546 so far for 2008, seem set to drop. There were 16 days in September that they could not ferry people to the island, compared with just four in September 2007. Sabine Lehmann, chief executive of the cableway, said:... [read full story]