Johannesburg, South Africa

This little bit of information is something I really felt I should attempt to share, the reasoning behind this is I am originally South African and from Johannesburg, with 26 years of experience of the city I reckon I should have a good understanding of the place, especially as a tourist due to the last 10 years of my life visiting Joburg as exactly that....

Johannesburg has always got one of two very wrong perceptions from everyone I meet that has either not been there or has not got their international head screwed on. These are either an African Village with people using lions as pets and riding elephants to work OR the scariest place on earth... Both of these are very wrong!!!

Joburg is essentially very similar to any other very large 'capital' city, it has its built up areas, down town, expensive locations, scary places, cultural landmarks and will soon have the reputation of holding a world cup and the landmarks that brings with it... Of course apartheid has given it a bad name to many, this having ended in '94 and the place turning into a rainbow nation has very almost abolished heavy racism, but there are of course some who hold grudges, but you do not get to see this unless you know people on a one to one basis, in their own homes... The violence is rife in areas, a number of my friends have been hijacked, but this is mostly in dodgy areas in which you shouldn't be travelling and any local tourist adviser will openly tell you this... I have personally experienced much scarier things on the night beaches of Thailand or running through the Favelas in Rio....

However I must say Joburg is not the place in South Africa I would suggest to my friends to go visit if they wanted to party and live the sunshine life, that would most definately be Cape Town or Plettenburg bay... Joburg is where you go to see some culture, learn about apartheid, see the monuments, visit Soweto (the largest shanty town), get to know the real South African people and now of course visit Soccer Stadium.....

I have had the luck of living in this awesome city for a long time, and now visiting it yearly. With a good group of friends in the area I have the local knowledge on tap and when it comes to going out there really are some sexy joints... A nice chilled night may start in the very nice Grill House in rosebank, for a steak and a couple of South Africa's best reds, followed on by a short drive to Attic in ParkHurst for a couple of beers and then an ending to the night in Tokyo Star just up the road... It is simple, take radio taxis everywhere and stick where you feel safe and you will have an off the hook night, the trouble comes exactly as it does anywhere else in the world, when you get to drunk and start wondering the streets alone, stumbling and basically attracting attention... Silly Silly, and I am the worst at it, but have had a few hundred nights out in this place and never had a "bad experience" worse than getting pushed in a club for drunkenly stumbling....

There are a number of smarter clubs which I would easily compare to Mayfair style London clubs, such as Manhattans.

If you want the "African" experience make sure you visit Moyo, the food here is immense and there is definitely a push for that African feel.

If you want to get a feel of an old school, South African pub, make sure you visit the Radium Beer Hall, there is nothing that special about the place, except good cheap food like Lorenzo Marks prawns straight from Mozambique, good live music, Castle draft and a local feel... in fact it's perfect... and the pizzas are pretty immense to...

My overall view is that I love Johannesburg, and feel everyone should visit it once in their lifetimes, for all my UK friends what I would suggest is to make it a 4 day add on to your wine tasting. sun soaking trips to cape town, Durban and the game farms....

X