page_title: L'Agulhas
section_title: Lighthouse
hierarchical_section_title: L'Agulhas / Lighthouse
caption_attribution_description: English: Lighthouse at Cape Agulhas in the Western Cape of South Africa on a cloudy day in summer.
context_page_description: L'Agulhas is the most southern coastal village and holiday resort in Africa, located within the Cape Agulhas Municipal area at the southernmost tip of the African mainland. It is situated next to the town of Struisbaai and about 30 kilometres south of the regional centre of Bredasdorp. The name "Agulhas", Portuguese for "needles", is said to have been given to the cape because the compass-needle was seen to point due north, that is, with no magnetic deviation. The Agulhas Bank is reputed to be the richest fishing area in the Southern Hemisphere. Some of the older residents and documents refer to the town as by its former name Cape Agulhas or Cape L'Agulhas or simply Agulhas which were the names that referred to this town before it was changed to L'Agulhas to avoid confusion when the Bredasdorp Municipality changed its name to The Cape Agulhas Municipality.
  Tourist interests and activities include: A visit to the Lighthouse with a view from the tower and a walkway along the seafront to the new most southern African monument and a place where two oceans meet at the foot of Africa. A little further along the walkway is the shipwreck of Meisho Maru.
context_section_description: The Cape Agulhas Lighthouse, the second-oldest working lighthouse in South Africa, is at the southern end of the town. Designed by Colonel Charles Cornwell Michell in homage to the Pharos of Alexandria, the lighthouse was lit on March 1, 1849. Some 150 ships lay scattered along the South African coast, many due to the treacherous Agulhas Reef. It is in memory of the countless lives lost and to warn passing ships of the pending danger that the Cape Agulhas Lighthouse was designed and built. The lighthouse was declared a National Monument in 1973.
caption: The Cape Agulhas Lighthouse
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