Devil's Peak
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Devil's peak is part of the mountain in Cape Town. When looking southwards at the mountain from the harbour, or when looking at the standard picture postcard view of the mountain, the skyline is from left to right (east to west): The spire of Devil's peak, the flat mesa of Table Mountain, the dome of Lion's Head and then Signal Hill.
The original Cape Town settlement, and what is now the City Bowl, is in the natural amphitheatre formed by these features.
Devil's peak, like the rest of these, is formed from Table Mountain Sandstone. Underneath this there is granite and shale, but you won't find either of these on the slopes of Devil's peak.
Devil's peak stands 1000 meters (3821 feet) high, less than Table mountain's 1087 meters. One can walk to the top, but the ascent is nicer and safer outside of the cold, wet, slippery winter months of May - August. The vegetation on the slopes is typical Cape fynbos.
On the south side of Devil's peak you will find the Rhodes memorial, to Cecil Rhodes, and the University of Cape Town looking out over the Southern Suburbs of Cape Town, the Cape Flats towards Stellenbosch, Somerset West and the distant Hottentot's Holland mountains.
Devil's peak supposedly gets its name from the folk-tale about a Dutch man called Jan van Hunks, who was a prodigious pipe smoker that lived at the foot of the mountain circa 1700. He was forced by his wife to leave the house whenever he smoked his pipe. One day, while smoking on the slopes of the peak, he met a mysterious stranger who also smoked. They each bragged of how much they smoked, and so they fell into a pipe-smoking contest. To cut a long story short, the stranger turned out to be the Devil, and Van Hunks eventually won, but not before the smoke that they made covered the mountain, forming the table cloth cloud.