Stellenbosch

Yesterday I left my hostel on Long Street in Cape Town to come out to Stellenbosch for 5 days. On the way out here, we passed Khayelitsha and Langa, two of Cape Town's biggest townships. Only 24% of Khayelitsha's residents have access to electricity, 17% to water, and perhaps most devastating, 32% to education. The pictures below are not of great quality since they were taken from the freeway going 110 km/hr, but if you click on them, you can see a bigger version. Later in my stay in Cape Town I will be going out to the townships. What really got to me driving past, though, was that each time we'd come to a freeway interchange, I thought the township would end. But then on the other side of the interchange, they'd start back up. The expanse of townships went on and on.




Below are some pictures from around Stellenbosch. The city is about 60,000 residents during the school year (20,000 otherwise), so it's a pretty small city. The majority of the people speak Afrikaans, and a lot of the signs are only in Afrikaans. I have learned how to say "please" and "thank you" in Afrikaans and hope to learn to count to 10 before I leave South Africa. This region is well known acros the world for its vineyards. I think I may go on a tour of a vineyard and wine cellar before I leave here on Monday. The architecture here is very colonial - it reminds me of New England. Almost all the buildings are white, some have thatched roofs, and many were built before 1800. It almost seems like a theme park. I wonder if they have codes regarding historical preservation - like if it's a requirement that even new buildings look "historical." Something I will have to find out.


A park near my hostel. There are mountains here, too! :)


Tourist information office - thatched roof.


I think this was a seminary of some sort, but I'm not sure because the sign was only in Afrikaans.


One of the few building of color in the town.


A street near the University of Stellenbosch campus. I think this is primarily student housing.


The University's sports complex. I wish the Gophers got to play sports on a backdrop like this one.



I had to be the typical tourist taking pictures of wildflowers on the UStell campus. :)



Pedestrian/bike bridge and trail near campus.


The trees along their main street are wrapped in red fabric - I assume that's for their wine festival taking place this weekend.


A church - of which denomination, I'm not sure. I could only really photograph its steeple because the lower part of the building was blocked by a huge wall.


Even the more modern buildings here have a distinct look to them. Historical preservation code in place?

In other news, my friend Tim sent me this link. He had seen the story on BBC - "Zeros will be knocked off the Zimbabwe dollar, making 10bn dollars one dollar" on Friday. Funny, because this hyperinflation has been going on for awhile now, and I just recently mentioned it and suggested "knocking some zeros off" on here.