When Dutch settlers stood on the summit of Table Mountain in the 17th century, one thing unnerved them about the place: its strange lack of trees. According to Hoerikwaggo Trails organiser Trevor Sandwithe, they brought tiny bits of home with them in the form of seeds. As the foreign trees took root in the red African soil, Table Mountain was changed forever.
Flash forward 350 years: trail guide Grabeth Nduna, 31, stands on the same spot the settlers stood. The trees are gone, having been cleared away as ecosystem-unbalancing pariahs. Nduna squints into the early morning glow, his breath a plume of fog as he addresses a group of Unesco (UN Education, Science and Cultural Organisation) delegates who have come to the mountain to learn about how environmental preservation can walk hand- in-hand with employment efforts for disadvantaged youth.
Unesco is the group that originally designated Table Mountain a heritage site.
In the hand of each delegate is a walking stick, fashioned from the black wattle plant by previously unemployed women workers in Imazamo Yethu and Masiphumele.
Black wattle (Acacia mearnsii) came to the mountain from Australia 200 years ago. It has since been clear cut because of its greedy water consumption, but instead of discarding the wood, Hoerikwaggo Trails has decided to whittle it into a metaphor for "different people walking the same path of conservation", according to the programme's manager Steven Lamb.
Nduna, a tall, soft-spoken man from a small farm village in the Western Cape, later moved to Port Albert, had worked with livestock and as a waiter in restaurants before he joined the Hoerikwaggo Trails programme.
He says he would always see Table Mountain from a distance, but could only dream of the summit.
"I often told myself I would find myself on top of it and now I live that dream."
The UN delegates Nduna guided last week were in town for the Regional Youth Workshop in Kirstenbosch, a meeting of minds designed to show those who work in the world heritage preservation industry how to provide good jobs and training for underprivileged young people.
The group, about a dozen in number, met around the small bronze model of the mountain at the upper cableway station, rubbing the sleep from their eyes and wearing clothes that belied various degrees of outdoors tramping experience.
Leila Maziz, Unesco consultant from Marrakech, Morocco, gripped her wattle stick and glanced nervously at her Converse All-star sneakers.
"I'm here to see how beautiful nature can remove all doubt about the value of protecting heritage," she said. She groaned slightly upon hearing that the day's hike would be 9km.
Satyendra Peerthum, historian and manager of Aapravishat, a national preserve park in Mauritius, arrived wearing a smart tweed blazer. Throughout the hike, he interjected questions about the history of the slave trade around the mountain, and checked his mobile repeatedly. "Don't get much coverage up here, do you?" he mused.
The motley group walked from the flat top of the mountain down through the low scrubland on the back side and descended through the lush, overgrown Orange Kloof to emerge at Constantia Nek.
The wet grasslands above Constantia Nek have only recently been opened to foot traffic, having been closed for many years to reduce fire danger.
Antonio Ginquini, one of the other Hoerikwaggo guides, said he had "developed a love for the mountain coming from the Cape Flats, and now I get to be here, teaching people about nature".
As he spoke, he noticed a yoghurt cup that a careless hiker had left on the trail. He stooped, picked it up and said: "... and appreciating what God made for us."
Ginquini, 25, said the trail guide job was the best he'd ever had, allowing him to be out in nature rather than cooped up indoors, and that it gave him a chance to meet new people each day, most of whom "are in a good mood because they are stress-free on holiday".
Table Mountain's complex history makes it a difficult monument to preserve fairly. According to Sandwithe, many Capetonians objected to some of the tree-clearing efforts because the European-introduced foliage is a part of history, too. In the end, preferences for the site's natural ecosystem won out.
Another controversy conservationists have faced is the establishment of footpaths and cordoned-off vegetation areas. For decades, hikers could tramp wherever they wanted and many now bristle at the little fences preventing them from stamping on the mountain's tender shrubbery.
In naming the Hoerikwaggo Trails conservation project, organisers walked the same fine line between pre- and post-colonial history. "Hoerikwaggo" itself is the Khoisan name for the peak and means "the mountain in the sea".
"The name shows respect to the original hikers who walked on Table Mountain long before us," says manager Lamb. "The current name is a colonial reference, so our trails have the Khoisan name, even though it is more difficult to pronounce, because as people learn how to say it, they learn history."
Conversely, the programme's staffers are referred to as the fynmense - "good people" - with a tip of the hat to the Afrikaans word for the terrain, fynbos.
"We are trying to create a place where people and nature intersect in a real way," said Sandwithe. "Historically, access to the mountain was restricted, often by economic discrimination, to certain large parts of the population."
Nduna agreed that the tours allowed people from different backgrounds to connect. "You make friends with people from other places and they become interested in who you are and where you are staying," he said.
By carefully choosing the attitude it espouses and the names it uses, the Hoerikwaggo programme has struck a balance that acknowledges the mountain's wrinkled, often troubled history.
For this American reporter, one thing stands out. In this country, people hike like they mean it. You folks are clearly not messing about.
Presented as a casual stroll on the mountain to allow the delegates to get a feel for the Hoerikwaggo programme, the gruelling 9km march wore a bit heavily on some members of the group. Water breaks and rests grew more frequent as the day wore on. By the end, water, yoghurt and granola seemed like a feast.
But to their credit, everyone finished with a smile. The guides, of course, could have hiked it again three times over without being winded, but even the Mauritius conservationist, Peerthum - with his cell phone and jacket - completed the journey cheerfully. A circle of the victorious formed in the parking lot where all exchanged thank yous and high-fives.
Several of the Unesco hikers, who previously were frantically checking SMS messages, snapping photos or chatting with one another, arrived at Constantia Nek with a certain relaxed quiet about them - the hiker's high.
Gingquini explained the appeal this way: "If you're in an office, you can't be out in these lands. But being on the mountain, you get a lot of time to talk to yourself."
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