Cape Town Climate

The weather in Cape Town is top notch. Particularly if you are visiting from the UK, Germany or Holland :)

Cape Town has the bulk of it's rain in winter (June to August) and these are also the cooler months. Although even it winter the rain doesn't often stick around longer than 3 days.

Snow
What's that?
Cape Town doesn't get snow. At most we get a few days of frost a year (early morning). Table Mountain (1086m) gets snow about once ever ten years, and the Hottentot Holland mountains get snow most (but not all) years. These mountains are about 1 hour away from Cape Town.

My guide to temperatus follows...

Winter day-time temperatures
Average: In the lower 20's C (70's F)
Typical Low: 15C (60F)
Typical High: 28C (82 F)
Think of the weather in the UK in Summer - just slightly shorter days. It gets dark in winter around 6pm.

Summer day-time temperatures
Average: In the upper 20's C (80's F)
Typical Low: 20C (68F)
Typical High: 33C (91 F)
Sun goes down around 8pm in summer.

Winds:
North-West typically brings the rain. More prevelant in wetter winter months, but we get rain in summer too.
South-East - this is out good weather wind (except when it's a Black South-Easter when it does bring rain). This wind can be very strong, and often picks up in the early afternoon and blows viciously until the late evening. More common from December to February. (See the beach tips for which beaches to visit when this wind is blowing).

My favorite weather websites:

• weather.iafrica.com (5-day forecast)
  
• www.weathersa.co.za (defaults to a 2-day forecast, but if you register (free) you'll get a 7-day forecast)
• www.myweather.org.za (current weather info at various stations around the peninsula)
• capetownweather.blogspot.com (plenty weather info here as well as cape town webcams).
  

In summary:

• I recon Februrary and March are probably the best times to visit. However if you are hear for 10 or more days you'll probably get good weather in that period of time just about the whole year round.