One day in Cape TownThree layers of one city
Start mid-morning under the oaks of the Company's Garden with "From the Company's Vegetable Patch to the Painted Houses": Long Street, Greenmarket Square and the climb into the Bo-Kaap, just in time for bobotie at Biesmiellah. Stroll down to the Castle of Good Hope for "From the Castle to Mandela's Balcony": the Grand Parade, the District Six Museum and Parliament. Rest on a bench along Government Avenue, then head back to the Castle for "Curses, Ghosts and Ships That Never Make Port". It ends at the top of the Bo-Kaap, next to Bo-Kaap Kombuis: Cape Malay curry with mountain views.
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Morning
From the Company's Vegetable Patch to the Painted Houses
- Company's GardenThe vegetable garden the Dutch East India Company planted in 1652 to supply its ships is now the great green heart of the city, with Table Mountain as a backdrop.
- Long Street and the Palm Tree MosqueWrought-iron balconies, bars and bookshops, and among them an 18th-century house that two former slaves turned into a mosque.
- Greenmarket Square and the Old Town HouseThe city's oldest market square, its 18th-century town hall and the afternoon in 1989 when the police dyed it purple.
- The Auwal MosqueSouth Africa's first mosque began in a warehouse on Dorp Street, and it was here that written Afrikaans was first taught… in Arabic script.
- Bo-Kaap and Wale StreetThe most photographed painted houses in Africa, and the story of the families who lived in them long before the cameras arrived.
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Lunch
Try Bobotie at Biesmiellah. Wale Street con Pentz Street, Bo-Kaap
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Afternoon
From the Castle to Mandela's Balcony
- Castle of Good HopeFive stone bastions raised by the Dutch East India Company with enslaved labour: the oldest building in South Africa.
- Grand Parade and Mandela's BalconyFrom that honey-coloured stone balcony, Nelson Mandela addressed the nation a few hours after leaving prison on 11 February 1990.
- District Six MuseumA whole neighbourhood of more than 60,000 people wiped off the map by apartheid, and an old Methodist church that keeps its memory alive.
- Slave LodgeFor more than a century this Company building held hundreds of enslaved men, women and children, a stone's throw from the town's garden.
- St George's CathedralThe ‘people's cathedral’, from whose steps Desmond Tutu led the great march of 1989 against apartheid.
- Houses of ParliamentThe building where apartheid was written into law is also where, on 2 February 1990, its end was announced.
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Early evening
Curses, Ghosts and Ships That Never Make Port
- Castle of Good Hope: Ghosts of the FortressA curse hurled from the gallows, a dungeon called ‘the Dark Hole’ and a bell that, so the story goes, rang by itself.
- Church Square and the Slave TreeThe cursed governor's grave, a plaque worn almost smooth in the paving and eleven granite blocks bearing the names of those who were enslaved.
- Heerengracht and the Flying DutchmanWaves broke here when Van Riebeeck landed, and from these waters came the legend of the captain who swore to round the Cape even if it took him all eternity.
- The Lutheran Church on Strand StreetFor years the Cape's Lutherans worshipped in a building that was officially a warehouse. Today it is one of the oldest churches in the country.
- Tana Baru and the Circle of KramatsThe Muslim cemetery where Tuan Guru lies, defended by thousands of people in 1886 and, tradition says, part of a sacred circle that protects the city.
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Dinner
Try Cape Malay curry at Bo-Kaap Kombuis. August Street, 7, Bo-Kaap