Amid the worst drought on record, the city has threatened to turn off the taps on its nearly 4 million residents. Our correspondent spent a week there while he could still get a shower.
Cape Town might have dodged Day Zero, but a new hyper-consciousness of water use looks set to be the new normal — and not just for the drought-hit African city.
The combination of a lack of rainfall and an explosion of urban growth has pushed the city's reservoirs to their limits and is forcing officials to consider turning off the taps.
Richard Poplak: What's actually behind Cape Town's water crisis