Tag Archives: Africa

So Long Southern Africa!

Posted on by

Like Sands Through the Hourglass...

Like Sands Through the Hourglass...

I feel like we owe Africa another trip. Five weeks here just doesn’t do this wonder corner of the world justice. We’ve had a chance to pop around a bit in Southern Africa, but I feel like we just peeped through a keyhole and the place has a lot more to offer.

That said, Southern Africa is a land of great countryside and crappy cities. That’s really true through out the world, but everything here seems to be amplified. The countryside is greater and the cities are much worse (Cape Town excluded) than almost everywhere else we’ve visited. And in terms of wildlife, S. Africa has the world beat, there’s an amazing diversity of things to see here.

To top it all off, it’s one of the few places we’ve traveled so far where the American Dollar is still strong! Thank goodness the currencies of Southern Africa are falling in value faster than the dollar, because you’ll need them all. Because transportation is so spotty and semi functional in this part of the world to get around you’ll either need to hire a car and drive yourself around or book yourself on a package tour – and neither option is cheap.

Travel in Southern Africa is one of the parts of the trip I have to admit I wasn’t super excited about, but it’s really exceeded all of my expectations, and I have to recommend you look into it.

Wild Wild Windhoek

Posted on by

Windhoek - Its Off the Hook!

Windhoek - Its Off the Hook!

Windhoek is the medium size capitol of a very small country, – Namibia only has 1.2 million residents – it’s also Namibia’s financial and transportation center. If you are coming to Namibia, at some point you will pass through Windhoek.

Namibia was once a German colony and while it hasn’t been directly connected to Germany since the first World War, there are a surprising number of German speakers here. As a white person walking the streets we became use to people addressing us with “Gutentag” rather than “Hello”.

One welcome example of the German influence is the surprising number and quality of German bakeries in town. There are some high quality pretzels in this town!

It’s not a bad experience, it’s a very walkable city, and crime isn’t that bad here. But, chances are slim you came all the way to Namibia to visit Windhoek. The real sights of Namibia are out in the countryside, go to Etosha or Fish River Canyon or the Dunes as soon as you can. Windhoek is best used as a stopover to these points.

One thing that may stick out is the rather surprising tendency to name major streets after dictators – for example: the middle of town is the intersection of Robert Mugabe Avenue with Fidel Castro Street. Other than that it’s a pretty normal medium sized African town.

The Walls of Johannesburg

Posted on by

The Safest Place in Joberg - The Mall

The Safest Place in Joberg - The Mall

Johannesburg is very sketchy, the crime statistics are scary and in a place where even locals don’t go out at night tourists have to adapt. As a consequence of crazy crime, the security business is booming – everyone has high masonry walls around their homes and at least one of the following on top: razor wire, barbed wire, electric fencing, or crushed glass. Every home has a sign advertising the security firm they use and many include an “Armed Response” sign as well.

In a city where it’s not safe to go out after dark almost anywhere, and many places where you can’t go day or night hostels in Jo’berg take on Orwellian proportions. Their goal is to have everything you need on site so you don’t have to leave for any other reason than to go to the museum of the airport. And when you need to go there, they also operate their own in-house taxi service to get you from A to B. The message here is: do not interact with locals.

So why would you go to Johannesburg? Good question, well, it’s a huge transportation hub, and home to the busiest airport in Africa. If you come to South Africa, you are almost certainly going to land here, or transfer here – welcome to Johannesburg.

The Malls of Johannesburg
Here is a near complete list of “Safe” places to go in Jo’berg: The Mall, the other Mall, the Casino, and the Apartheid Museum. In our few days in Jo’Berg we spent a ridiculous amount of time at the Mall. In four days time we probably spent more time in shopping malls than we have in the last four years.

Jo’berg, the home of the happy (and safe) shopper.