If you’re planning a trip to Cape Town and have a love of shipwrecks on shore, you’re in luck. Visiting some of the wrecks that are visible above the water around the Cape Peninsula can be combined with your exploration of the city, and will ensure that you don’t miss any of its outdoor highlights. Some of these visible shipwrecks can be reached by road, and one or two of them will require a short boat ride.
A map showing all these wrecks can be found here. A mini travel guide to Cape Town’s shipwrecks on shore, in the form of an ebook entitled Cape Town’s Visible Shipwrecks and written by yours truly, is available here.
Table Bay to Oudekraal
SS Winton and SS Hermes
Commodore II
RMS Athens
MV Antipolis
Maori Bay to Kommetjie
MFV Harvest Capella
MV BOS 400 (also check out this post and this one) – also a dive site
SS Kakapo
Cape Point Nature Reserve
SS Thomas T Tucker
SS Nolloth
FV Phyllisia
False Bay
SS Clan Stuart – also a dive site
Bonus wreck stuff
Cape Town is well supplied with museums, many of which have maritime history items on display:
- Iziko Slave Lodge
- Chavonnes Battery Museum
- Iziko Maritime Centre
- Castle of Good Hope
- Simon’s Town Museum
- South African Naval Museum
- Hout Bay Museum
In addition to the general shipwreck artefacts on display at the museums listed above, you can check out the following specific wreck remains, some of which are not labelled or take a little bit of finding:
- The rudder of the Brunswick at Iziko Slave Lodge – see more about the Brunswick here and here
- The anchors of the Maori on Hout Bay Main Road – see more about the Maori here
- Hull plates of the Kakapo on Clovelly Beach – more about the Kakapo here
- SAS Somerset, sister ship of SAS Fleur, currently moored at the V&A Waterfront (not usually open to the public, but you might get lucky)
- SAS Assegaai, a submarine museum at Simon’s Town harbour – closed until further notice
hello clare – i believe the sas somerset was earmarked for scrapping – but my last feed back – she is still in the va – leaking oil
Yes she’s next to the aquarium at the Waterfront. Sadly listing quite badly now!