中国第十三亿人口日，2014-01-06

【Aiden in English】

        About a month at sea, the cruise was going well. It was too well. The sky was always cloudless and the sun was always shining brightly, but not today. The day of Cape Town, South Africa was cloudy and foggy. The damp air and the ever blowing winds from the Atlantic Ocean didn't help either.

        We scheduled to ride a cable car up to Table Mountain. But if it was too windy, we would have to do the alternative, which didn't sound so good.

        Table Mountain aka Tavern of the Seas got its name from the flat surface and the similarities to a table. Unfortunately, the Table Mountain National Park was closed due to the wind. The Plan B was to drive up Signal Hill instead. That also sounded a problem for Mom and I because not only that nothing couldn't be seen at the top, but also we had another shore excursion after this trip that took us to the same place for the sunset.

        Just as I thought, we couldn't see a single thing at the top of Single Hill. So we went to Plan C and drove halfway down Signal Hill and parked on the side the road (talk about a lot of bad ideas). The view there wasn't nearly as good as the one from Table Mountain, but in this case, all you could see from Table Mountain were nothing but clouds at the moment. I guess no matter how advanced humans are, and Mother Nature is what decides weather in the end.

【红霞译文】

        海上航行近个把月来，游轮一路顺风，叫人忘乎所以。天空总是万里无云，阳光一向明媚灿烂，但今天除外。我们到达南非开普敦的当天，晴转多云，多云见雾，空气潮湿，呼呼不停的大西洋海风爱莫能助，根本无法驱散浓云密雾。

        我们原计划乘坐缆车登上桌山，可是因为风力忒凶，迫使我们临时另做打算，结果直接影响到整个行程。

        “海角之城”的桌山平地突起，其外形象台桌子，故而得名。不巧的是，桌山国家公园因为大风天气关闭一天，我们不得不实施第二套游览方案，改去邻家信号山欣赏开普敦依桌山傍桌湾的奇特景致。这下问题来了，且不说登山远望是否靠谱，我和妈妈事先早有旅游安排，傍晚时分要专程来到信号山观看日落，两个原本互不搭尕的活动意外地冲突起来。

        不出所料，即使爬上信号山，我们也难以实现攀登桌山放眼桌湾的梦想。面对突发状况，我们急中生智，和盘托出第三套计划(诸多馊主意之一)，驱车半山腰安营扎寨，虽然赶不上桌山无限风光，但至少可以叫我们抒发“会当凌绝顶”的豪迈情怀。人类神通广大，无所不及，但大自然偏不以人的主观意志为转移，“天不为人之恶寒而辍冬，也不为人之恶辽远而辍广”。