Simon's Town sits on steep Table Mountain Group sandstone slopes running down to the harbour, with granite in places along the shore.
Access and slope determine feasibility here more often than the formation does.
What Is Under Simon's Town
The formations below are what a rig actually meets on a Simon's Town property, and between them they govern the depth, the casing requirement and what the hole will realistically give you.
| Formation | Where it sits | What it means for drilling |
|---|---|---|
| Table Mountain Group sandstone | The mountain spine and the slopes on either side of the valley | Hard fractured quartzite. Deeper holes, fracture-dependent yields and excellent water quality where a structure is intersected. |
| Valley and dune sands | The flat valley floor and the low ground between the mountains | An unconsolidated aquifer with a shallow water table, drilled shallow with screen and gravel pack. |
| Cape Granite Suite | Underlying parts of the lower slopes | Weathered mantle over fresh rock, with the depth to fresh granite varying over short distances. |
Send your street and what the water is for, and get an itemised quote for Simon's Town.
Get a Simon's Town Borehole QuoteWhat That Means for Your Borehole
- Valley-floor and mountainside properties are entirely different projects, despite often sharing a postal code.
- Salinity rises toward the coast on the sandy ground, and over-pumping accelerates it.
- Mountainside holes are deeper and less predictable, but generally return better water when they do produce.
Where We Work Around Simon's Town
- Simon's Town village and the naval base side
- Glencairn and the Welcome Glen valley
- Murdock Valley and Boulders
- Froggy Pond and Seaforth
- The steeper mountainside stands
- Smallholdings toward Red Hill
What to Watch For Here
Steep terrain rules out rig positions on a fair number of stands, and level working space at the hole is scarcer than access to the property.
Glencairn valley is the better ground locally, with sand fill giving shallower water than the surrounding slopes.
What the Water Is Used For
- Irrigating coastal gardens and lawn
- Rinsing salt off paving, walls and vehicles
- Pool top-up, subject to what the analysis says
- Standby supply through restrictions and outages
- Keeping mature planting alive through summer
Wellpoint or Borehole?
On the sandy valley floor, yes, and it is a common and sensible choice for irrigation there. On the mountain slopes, no - hard rock near surface gives a driven point nothing to work with.
Water Quality in Simon's Town
Sandstone water off the mountain is soft, clean and often tea-coloured from natural humic staining. Valley-floor sand water carries more iron and, nearer the coast, more salt. Two different analyses and two different treatment answers within the same suburb.
A water analysis is what turns that from a general expectation into a number for your specific hole, and treatment should be specified against the result rather than against the area's reputation.
Registration and Abstraction
Boreholes and wellpoints inside the City of Cape Town must be registered with the City. Separately, the National Water Act governs how much you may abstract: reasonable domestic use and small-scale garden watering generally fall under Schedule 1, while larger abstraction may require registration or a water use authorisation from the Department of Water and Sanitation. Requirements change, so confirm your position before drilling rather than after. Requirements change, so confirm your position before drilling.
Related Services
For the drilling process itself, the geology across the rest of the country and how a quote is put together, see Borehole Installers South Africa.
Borehole Prices in Simon's Town
Drilling is charged per metre, so depth drives the total. The ranges below are framed for local ground conditions and access.
| Item | Indicative range | What moves it locally |
|---|---|---|
| Drilling, per metre | R500 - R1,300 /m | Sandstone is slow and deep; the valley sand drills fast and shallow. |
| uPVC casing, installed, per metre | R400 - R800 /m | Screen and gravel pack on the sandy ground; weathered-zone casing on the slopes. |
| Mobilisation and site establishment | R3,000 - R10,000 | Access and site conditions move this; a site visit settles it before quoting. |
| Water survey | R5,000 - R12,000 | Targets structure rather than depth. Worth most where yield is fracture-dependent. |
| Yield testing | R3,500 - R15,000 | Establishes the sustainable rate that pump selection depends on. |
| Pump, supplied and installed | R15,000 - R45,000 | Greater depth means more head, which means a larger pump and heavier cable. |
| Storage and booster | R12,000 - R35,000 | Needed wherever peak demand exceeds the borehole's sustainable rate. |
| Typical complete project | R75,000 - R210,000+ | Everything above, excluding treatment, which depends entirely on the water analysis. |
These are indicative ranges, not a quotation. They are compiled from published South African supplier and contractor pricing to give you a starting point for budgeting. They are not our rate card, and no figure here is a commitment.
Treat them as a broad guide only. Published borehole pricing in South Africa varies enormously - different 2026 guides quote per-metre drilling rates for the same province that differ by a factor of three - because depth, geology, access, specification, distance and fuel costs all move the number. Depth in particular is not known until the hole is finished. Figures generally exclude VAT unless noted, and change over time. Only an itemised written quote against your actual site means anything.
Simon's Town Borehole FAQs
Can a rig reach a Simon's Town property?
On some, not on others. Steep terraced stands above the main road frequently have no route in and no level working space, and both are needed.
A site visit is the only way to establish it, and it should happen before a quote rather than on the morning the rig is due.
Where is the best borehole ground near Simon's Town?
The Glencairn and Welcome Glen valley generally, where sand fill gives shallower and more consistent water than the surrounding sandstone slopes.
Slope properties can produce well where a fracture is intersected, but the outcome is far less predictable and the holes are deeper.
Does it matter where in Simon's Town the property sits?
More than almost anywhere else. A stand on the sandy valley floor drills shallow into an unconsolidated aquifer; a stand on the slope above it drills deep into fractured sandstone.
Cost, depth, water quality and the wellpoint question all change with that. A quote that has not established which one you are is not a quote.
Why is the water from a Simon's Town borehole brown?
Where the water comes off Table Mountain Group sandstone, natural humic staining from fynbos catchment colours it like weak tea. It is cosmetic.
Where it comes from the valley sand, a rust colour is more likely to be iron, which stains surfaces and does respond to treatment. The analysis tells you which you are dealing with.
NEED A BOREHOLE IN SIMON'S TOWN?
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