UKC

Looking for recommendations for easy climbing in Cape Town. I'm travelling through so only have a day spare. Atmosphere and quality more important than grade. 

I climbed Jacobs Ladder on Table Dec 2018 and hired Tristan Firman. He was a great guide and climber. There's a lot of climbing around CPT.

his website is https://www.trystanfirman.com/

Depends what you mean by easy.  I'd agree that Jacob's Ladder is hard to beat as an accessible one-day activity - it's an unforgettable route in beautiful setting - but it is one of the world's more improbable VSs and you need to be pretty steady at the grade (including traversing) over a spicy drop. 

There are plenty of easier and less intimidating alternatives though (like Arrow Final that also goes off Fountain Ledge and ends right by the cable station).  There are also some amazing scrambles (Kloof Corner, for instance) and some adventurous hiking routes up less frequented parts of the mountain.   

Certainly you won't regret spending a day on Table Mountain.  It's truly a special place.

Edit:  looked at your profile - you'll be fine, enjoy!

Thanks Dave and Ryan, Jacob's Ladder looks perfect for what I'm after. 

Apologies, I wan't meaning to suggest Jacobs as 'easy'. More that it was a good route with the guide and to check out the climbs in the area. Tristan offered a lot of different routes and locations. 

I'd love to have Table on my doorstep!!

Happy climbing

No apology necessary!  I did have TM on my doorstep, for three years.  I used to take visitors up Jacob's Ladder and also considered it an easy introduction...  

I still get back when I can, and couple of years ago I did it again with an old friend.  We decided we'd just romp up it alpine-style, carrying packs.  Strange how much steeper it had become since the last time we'd done together 21 years earlier! 

climbing.co.za is the place to go to ask for route suggestions and company to climb those with. The SA climbing community is very tightly knit and climbing.co.za's where they'll hang out.

It's a little less rowdy than UKC, though, and, consequently, a little less entertaining to lurk in. Still, a grand forum non the less.

EDIT: If you want the true adventure, climb Bombay Duck on the lower tiers on your way up, then walk up to the ledge and climb Jacob's. Then talk your way into an abseil down the long commercial static lines (if they're still there and still amenable to charismatic climbers) and walk the rest of the way back down to the lower cable station. That'll easily give you the two must-climb classics in one day. (They're both graded SA 17 if I remember correctly but, honestly, they're such great routes you should find a guide to lead them and climb them anyway if that seems steep for pure trad., to you.) These two are entrenched in my "greatest routes of all time" list.

Further thoughts: don't ignore Lion's Head, either -- particularly for properly easy routes that feature all the exposure, adventure and ambience of their harder peers.

"White Face" is the obvious classic. (And it actually isn't a sand-bag, even at the grade of SA 12 (subject to rusty memory).) Four good pitches with unique views. There's also Aquanaut which is a little harder, at 15. And my favourite "beginner" route of all time -- something which I think had "Atlantic" in the name and involved two memorable moments: the first required the placement of a cam at the back of a horizontal crack that was so deep I nearly lost my helmet to it, the second involves climbing "airy jugs" out of a little cave-stance and seems terribly improbable until one actually has those "airy jugs" below them and realises that the moves were really a doddle despite the exposure.

Lion's Head features very short approaches so you could probably do less walking and more climbing, there. Take a helmet because rock-fall is definitely a thing.

This is awesome, airy jugs is just what I need! I'm currently on St Helena in the middle of the South Atlantic ocean, loads of rock and all of it falling down. Nevertheless we have been trying to forge routes through the choss and lichen, great fun but nerve racking. 

The problem is that one day is nowhere long enough to explore TM!

Atlantic Crag is really good (but so are Touch and Go, Triple Indirect, Roulette...!)

Lion's Head has some really good granite slabs too (probably better than the sandstone bit). 

Is anyone in CT on 12th or 13th of Feb fancy a day out (Sorry, I know its during the week and not very convenient!)

I'd also recommend Jacobs Ladder! I was in Cape Town on business a few years ago and managed to get out for a days climbing on the weekend. I hired a local guide (sorry cant remember his name but I realised afterwards he was a bit of a local climbing celeb). We started off with a climb low on table mountain and then did Jacobs ladder to finish, awesome route, not a hard grade but amazing position! Due to our guide knowing the guys that run the abseil we managed to get to use their ropes for free on the way back down and save a long slog around the back of the mountain!