The mountain that's older than its own ocean

Here's a fact that took me a minute to get my head around. Table Mountain's flat top is made of rock around 500 million years old, laid down in an ocean called the Adamastor that doesn't even exist anymore. The Atlantic Ocean, the one sitting right next to the mountain today, didn't open up until 150 to 200 million years ago, when the old supercontinent Pangaea started splitting apart. So the mountain was already unthinkably old before the ocean beside it was even there.

Then there's the cloud. Locals call it the tablecloth, that layer of white spilling over the top when the wind's right, and the story goes that it comes from a smoking contest between a retired pirate called Van Hunks and a stranger who turned out to be the devil. Depending who's telling it, that contest never actually finished.

I painted it in watercolour and ink, that flat summit against the sky. There's a poster with a letter home and a postcard if you'd like one.

Shop the poster here: Table Mountain, Cape Town · Travel Poster