Our Welcome Johannesburg Walking Tour (Main Street) is perfectly positioned as a quick and easy 2-hour walk, providing a thorough introduction to Johannesburg. Only two hours and slightly more than 1km, it will give you all the background insight to make the most of your visit to this astonishing city (and to South Africa as a country).
The tour focuses on the historical background from ancient and pre-colonial times, up till the formation of South Africa as a country in 1910. It explains how Johannesburg came into being without delving into recent history. It answers the fundamental questions of where you are and leaves you inspired about how complex and diverse South Africa is as a country.
This tour ambles along Main Street between Gandhi Square and the Magistrate’s Court in Marshalltown. It is a beautiful, semi-pedestrianized space that is also an outdoor city museum. A mixture of contemporary urban spaces, landmark architecture and historic displays, makes for the most vivid discovery of the Johannesburg story.
We unpack the story from ancient and pre-colonial times, through to the discovery of gold in 1886, the resultant gold rush and the birth of the City of Migrants. It positions Johannesburg within the context of the Scramble for Africa and the eventual formation of the country, South Africa.
It is a comprehensive storytelling experience, starting out with the 1886 gold rush, before taking the guests back hundreds of years to precolonial times, from the Mapungubwe Kingdom to the formation of the Zulu Nation, the migrations of Mzilikaze and the Boers (immigrants of mostly Dutch descent), to the establishment of the so-called Boer republics.
Returning to gold, we explore British Expansionism and the conflict for control of the gold that resulted in the devastating Anglo-Boer War (South African War). We learn how the original Victorian shanty town grew into the splenderous (but exploitative) British Empire City. And how these events resulted in the formation of the Union of South Africa as a country in 1910.
We start our exploration at Gandhi Square and walk along Main Street, ending at the Leaping Impala sculpture in front of the erstwhile Anglo-American offices, adjacent to the Magistrates Court. Along the way we stop at a replica of the Mapungubwe Rhino, view the Rand Club from outside and explore historic Hollard Street – once home to one of Joburg’s stock exchanges, the Cullinan Building and the modernist Hanging Tower. We also delve into mining history at the Mining Headgear and marvel at the Art Deco Wonder that is 44 Main Street.
Rates:
Available as a private tour, at a minimum of R2200 for up to 4 guests, or R550 per person if you are more than 4 guests.
Any food, drinks, or shopping along the way for guests’ own account.
BOOK NOW:
To book your tour, send an email to gerald@localplaces.co.za or a WhatsApp to + 27 82 894 5216.
Please do not phone as we are mostly busy hosting guests.
Send a message and we will contact you as soon as is possible.
We will respond to your booking request and provide an online payment link for you to pay by bank card to secure the booking.
TERMS & CONDITIONS
Guests participate in all LocalPlaces – JoburgPlaces tours at their own risk. Neither JoburgPlaces, nor its guides, accept any responsibility whatsoever for any injury, accident or death that may occur while participating in a JoburgPlaces tour, whether in a public or a private space.
A tour booking is only secured upon payment.
Provisional bookings will automatically be cancelled if not paid within 48 hours from making a booking.
Bookings cannot be cancelled once paid for any reason whatsoever and no refunds will be offered for cancelled bookings.
Bookings can be postponed to another date if postponed more than 30 days in advance of the booked date. However, bookings cannot be postponed for any reason whatsoever within 30 days of the tour date, as we would lose the opportunity to take another booking for that slot.
STARTING POINT
We will stipulate the starting point for your tour in your booking confirmation letter. Most (but not all) tours start at the at JSE Newtown, 17 Diagonal Street (cnr Pritchard). We provide detailed directions of the safe route to drive if you come with your own car and need to park. However, we recommend that you Uber there.
SAFETY
We care for all our customers’ safety as our reputation depends on our guests feeling safe and enjoying their experiences. We have been doing tours safely in downtown Johannesburg for 13 years. Regardless of what your hotel receptionist, concierge or even other residents in the suburbs of Johannesburg, may tell you, it is safe to come on a walking tour in town. We would not recommend that you set out and go and explore on your own before having done a walking tour. As a tour will orientate you and give you the local streetwise knowledge of how to navigate the city and what to avoid. Gerald lived in the inner-city of Johannesburg for 10 years and loved walking around. Charlie lives in Maboneng on the eastern edge of the inner-city and loves it too!
Our starting point is carefully chosen so that we can meet safely in the foyer of a building and with our directions in the confirmation letter, you will know how to get there easily and simply. JSE Newtown is in Diagonal Street on the edge of the Southwestern Improvement District, opposite Bank City, the offices of First National Bank. It is the most beautiful, easily walkable and safest part of the city, with many security guards working for the many bank offices and for the improvement district in the area.
For private tour bookings, it is possible to arrange pick up and drop off from your hotel or accommodation, possibly for an additional fee, depending on location.
JOIN OUR GROUP:
If you urgently want to know about already scheduled open tours in a current week, which you could join, please WhatsApp us directly on +27 82 894 5216. We also run a WhatsApp Group where we post news on upcoming quick encounters, tours and events. send a message to us requesting to join this group.
WhatsApp us on +27 82 894 5216 or email us on gerald@localplaces.co.za to check availability.