Cape Town Townships: Private Guided Tour

You will be collected from your Cape Town area hotel or guest house at approximately 09H00 and driven for approximately 20-minutes to one of the city's oldest townships known to the locals as Langa (meaning ‘Sun’ in Xhosa). The township is named after a very respected chief Langalibalele, who was a renowned rainmaker that spent time in jail on Robben Island in 1873 for rebelling against the Natal government.

Upon arrival in this township, originally developed for black South Africans who were evicted from their homes in District Six under the Group Areas Act, your driver will introduce you to the local tour guide. The local guide will accompany you on a short walking tour (0.5 miles or less than a kilometer), affording opportunities to interact with locals.

The walking portion will start at Gugasthebe, a tourist information center, where various non-profit organizations teach skills to the local youth. Then, you will visit what used to be a detention center during apartheid, before proceeding to the local shebeen or tavern, where you will learn how the local beer, Umqombothi, is brewed, and enjoy a beer tasting with locals. This will be followed by a visit to the municipal beer hall built in 1945.

Afterwards, you'll visit the township's entrepreneurial business women who prepare barbecue (braai) meat on the streets of Langa, old and new hostels to see the transformations done by the government in order to better residents' living conditions, an area crèche, and a newer housing development. In Langa market, you will spend a few minutes with a traditional doctor, or Sangoma (optional). The walking township tour will end at the public library.

Then, you'll board the vehicle to explore other places of interest around the township before heading to a second township called Gugulethu, known to the locals as 'Gugs'. Gugulethu comes from Xhosa name ‘igugu lethu’ meaning 'our pride'. It was established in 1960 because Langa was overcrowded. The tour will drive to area attractions and stop for lunch at the Mzoli meat place (at your own expense). Here you will have an opportunity to eat and drink with the locals.

At the end of the tour you will be dropped off at your hotel at approximately 1pm