Days 1, 2 and 3 (17, 18 and 19 Jan 2011)

Monday (day 1) after many months of planning this great adventure our day of departure has arrived. Can you believe that I actually slept through the alarm this morning despite all the excitement! The bleep bleep just became part of a really weird dream!

Off from the Royal Well bus stop (really big thank you to Carole for taking me)and we’re waving goodbye to Cheltenham for eight weeks. Terminal 5 Heathrow, we board our 747 and off we go – no turning back now!

Tuesday (day 2) Johannesburg – yes we really are in South Africa. After a short drive through Johannesburg we arrive at our hotel.

We are staying in a Protea Hotel just out J’burg in Sandton. This is probably the better area to stay in – neither of us have felt threatened whilst here, though it is fair to say that we haven’t ventured too far away from the hotel at night. There appear to be good restaurants, though this area isn’t cheap. The majority of the buildings are fairly new with a mix of design. Most of the buildings are new, skyscrapers, but much thought appears to have been given to the detail of the buildings making the centre an attractive place to be. One particular building caught our eye, the Michelangelo building. A very imposing building built in a slightly art-deco style. This building is home to the Nelson Mandela Square in a courtyard setting in the middle. At one of the entrances is a bronze statue of Mandela, which must be at least thirty feet high and is a favourite tourist photo spot.

J’burg was once the financial and business capital of South Africa but in recent years the Stock Exchange and big financial houses have all moved out of the city centre to Sandton, a new, purpose built town.

Wednesday (day 3) and we have booked a tour to Soweto. Wow what a full and emotional trip. We started off with a tour of Johannesburg. TK, our guide, talked us through the history and how Johannesburg got its name – after four gentlemen who founded the city all called Johannes. We then travelled on to Soweto. Now, we had heard such horror stories about this black township that we thought we were in grave danger of being attacked, mugged or even murdered. What a surprise then, driving around to find an attractive developing town, home to Winnie Mandela and Desmond Tutu. You can see still the tin huts so often presented by the media but this is such a small part of, what is now, a delightful township with houses we would be proud to own. The residents are hardworking people using their skills and talents to make livings and the area is beautifully kept.

Today we also visited the Hector Peiterson Museum and monument. I cried is all I can say!

From there we moved onto the Apartheid Museum. Again, it was incredibly emotional when reading excerpts from transcripts and documentation explaining how apartheid worked and the oppression of the black people: how people were categorised – black, coloured, Asia; how they could be changed from one category to another at a whim and then whole families split up; how they could be stopped for no apparent reason and if found without their identity card they would be taken immediately and imprisoned.

Thursday(day 4) we decided to book TK again to take us to Pretoria – another area we had been warned against!

Here there are so many fine, historical places to visit: the Voortrek Monument – dedicated to the four Johannes mentioned earlier. Inside the monument there is the most wonderful, carved frieze around the wall depicting the struggle along their routes to their final settlements; the Melrose Monument, where the Peace Treaty of Vereeniging was signed on 31 May 1902; the Union buildings, the current parliament buildings: a truly impressive building with equally impressive gardens and finally President Kruger’s house, where he lived from his election to President until his exile at the beginning of the 20th Century.

I can’t possibly give you all the detail of the history of all these places – that, my friends, I leave to you to find out for yourselves. I have far too much to do exploring and having fun. What I will say is that, contrary to the guidebooks, which describe Johannesburg as a jumping off point to other parts of South Africa, this is a city with much history and soul. We had three days – one for orientation and two for historical/cultural tours – I would suggest that anyone visiting spends three or four days just to allow time to take in the museums and tours. We felt a little rushed. I would recommend allowing two to three hours for the apartheid museum alone.