#South Africa

Last weekend I went to South Africa’s Eastern Free State to attend the annual Cherry Festival in Ficksburg. I took the weekend off, more or less. I didn’t take many photos and hardly thought about blogging.

About two years ago I wrote a post called The Best Croissant in Jozi, about a quaint restaurant called Amamus Café in Parktown North. Sadly, Amamus closed a year or so ago. For some time I’ve been meaning to write a post about my new favorite croissant in Jozi – from French Corner Bakery and Coffee in Bryanston.

Condé Nast that Johannesburg is the world’s unfriendliest city

Raymond, a street vendor in Newtown.

1) What I hate about Joburg: The traffic

This is my 499th blog post, and the third of my celebratory Jozi top five series.

Upon arrival in Johannesburg, nearly every first-time visitor (myself included) goes to the Apartheid Museum. Don’t get me wrong – the Apartheid Museum is fantastic and everyone should go. But there are so many other great museums and galleries in Joburg, many of which are unknown even to locals. Here are my five favorites.

In the second installment of my “top five” series, I present my five favorite parks in Joburg.

An editor once asked me to review a description of Joburg for an expat website. The description said something like, “It’s difficult to spend time outdoors in Johannesburg because there are no safe parks in the city.” I nearly laughed aloud when I read this, as it’s such complete nonsense. There are so many lovely parks in Joburg that I struggled to narrow my choices to five. All of the parks listed here are safe in my opinion, as long as you don’t go alone or at night.