We joined a tour group of 22 other travelers in Johannesburg and will be with them for the remainder of our time in Africa. All but 2 in the group are from the US (the other 2 are from Canada). This will be the most Americans we have been with since we started our trip. Even on the cruise ship, there were only 5 other Americans, and we only got to meet 2 of them.
Johannesburg, or Jo’burg as referred to by many locals, is South Africa’s largest city. It is also the world’s largest city not located on a river, lake or coastline. The city itself has a population of over 4 million and covers an area of about 200 square miles. The metropolitan area covers over 635 square miles with an estimated population in excess of 10 million.
Johannesburg is the wealthiest city in South Africa with the largest economy in Sub-Saharan Africa, due initially from gold and diamonds, but now more from finance and manufacturing. It was interesting to find out that South Africa does not import any cars, and they have all the same brands of cars we have in the US, both domestic and foreign. The import taxes are so extremely high here that all car companies have manufacturing facilities in country. The only exception is for very exotic super car brands like Ferrari, Lamborghini, etc.
Jo’burg is not considered a tourist destination city but rather a transit point to the rest of Africa through its O.R Tambo International Airport, the largest and busiest airport in Africa.
Downtown Jo'burg
Johannesburg has an idea climate. At an elevation of 5,751 feet and a subtropical highland climate the city enjoys warm, dry sunny days with late afternoon thunderstorms and average daily temperatures in the upper 70’s in the summer and bright sunny mild days in the winter with lows in the 40’s. The city is very green, with over 10 million trees. It is considered the largest man-made forest in the world. Jo’burg has some 70,000+ Jacaranda trees which in October are covered with purple-blue flowers adding color throughout the city. (The following 2 photos are not mine, they were downloaded from the internet)
For those interested in beauty like this check out this link.
http://www.zengardner.com/ten-beautiful-avenues-of-trees-around-the-world/
http://www.zengardner.com/ten-beautiful-avenues-of-trees-around-the-world/
We visited Pretoria, a city of over 500,000 located within the metropolitan landscape of Johannesburg. Pretoria is one of the three capital cities of South Africa, it serves as the executive or administrative capital; the other two being Cape Town (legislative capital) and Bloemfontein (judicial capital).
Views of Pretoria from the gardens in front of the Union Buildings.
The Union Buildings house the office of the president, currently Jacob Zuma.
Statue of Paul Kruger in Church Square. He was the 5th and 4-time president of South Africa from 1883 to 1900.
Old Government building constructed on Church Square in the late 1800’s symbolizes the European influence from colonial times.
We visited Soweto, an English acronym for South Western Township. Soweto was separated from Johannesburg under apartheid (1948 – 1994) as a totally black community. Soweto is known primarily for two things, the hometown of Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu and for the Student Rebellion and shootings in 1976.
Seweto is home to over 850,000 all living in small closely spaced homes mostly built in the 30’s and 40’s to house migrant mine works and then Blacks forced out of White areas of Johannesburg under apartheid.
Vilakazi Street in Soweto has the distinction of being the only street in the world to have produced two Nobel Peace Prize winners, Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu. This is Desmond Tutu’s home. He no longer lives here but the wall was constructed for security purposes.
Just a few houses up the street is Nelson Mandela’s home, a very small 4-room brick house just like all the rest in Soweto. It was built in 1945. The Mandela family moved here in 1946. Mr. Mandela lived here until his arrest and inprisonment in 1962. He returned for 11 days after his release in 1990. The house was restored in 2009 and is now a museum.
On June 16, 1976 a peaceful student rebellion over the government requirement to change the language of instruction for half of the subjects taught in Non-White schools from English to Afrikaans (a Dutch-based language) ended in the police shooting of from 200 to 700 students. A tragedy by any measure, but a turning point in the struggle for Blacks against the oppression of apartheid.
A bright spot seen in Soweto was the colorful repurposing of these two abandoned cooling towers as art and a bungee jumping platform.
Next stop Botswana
