The southernmost point of South Africa is Cape Agulhas, the Cape of the Needles. Its name isn't derived from its needle-shaped appearance, as some websites claim. It was so named because Portuguese sailors around 1500 discovered that magnetic north, indicated by the compass needle, corresponded to true north there.
It's also the separation, or the meeting point—doesn't that sound better?—of the Indian and Atlantic Oceans. This meeting creates fireworks! The warm water of the Agulhas Current, flowing south along the east coast of Africa, collides with cold water from the Atlantic Ocean. This causes the Agulhas Current to turn back toward the Indian Ocean, although rings of warm water are cut off from the main current and flow into the cold Atlantic Ocean. Moreover, where the ocean currents meet, strong westerly winds usually blow, and all this combined creates very high waves around the cape. In winter, when storms occur, these can reach a height of 30 meters. No wonder there are so many shipwrecks around Cape Agulhas.
However, the climate of the Cape region is rather mild and Mediterranean, with moderate temperatures and moderate rainfall year-round. Geologically, the region consists of a sandstone plateau. The sandstone is the habitat of fynbos , a rare and highly diverse vegetation type, with some 9,000 different plant species.
