Cape Town City Tour

Bo-Kaap

Bo-Kaap is a region of the city where Muslims, along with other ethnic groups, were displaced during the Apartheid era. This colorful community is being rapidly gentrified, and students learned about its rich cultural history while taking an immersive tour guided by a Bo-Kaap resident.

V&A Waterfront

The V&A Waterfront is a beautiful shopping center and area for recreation, located in the Table Bay Harbor. At this popular tourism destination, students were able to try a variety of cuisines at the different restaurants, and shop for souvenirs and trinkets at the gift shops.

Langa Township

Langa is the oldest township in Cape Town, and since Black people were forcibly moved there during Apartheid, the township’s population has consistently increased. In townships such as Langa, environmental and institutional issues such as air pollution, extreme heat, fires, flooding, poor sanitation, and limited access to fresh food and water are extremely prevalent – especially in comparison to wealthier areas of the city. Students took a guided tour of the township and interacted with residents, artists, and business owners.

Boulders Beach

Boulders Beach is home to a colony of endangered African Penguins. Their endangerment is likely a result of habitat destruction, overfishing, marine pollution, irresponsible tourism, and global warming.

Cape Point Nature Reserve

The Cape Point Nature Reserve is home to diverse flora and fauna such as Elands, Ostriches, and Baboons – the latter of which are suffering locally due to increased interactions with humans because of development – as well as containing the south-westernmost point in the African continent. Here, students explored trails and enjoyed the beautiful Cape Point scenery and biodiversity.

Oranjezicht City Farm

The Oranjezicht City Farm, containing both private and public sections, is an educational non-profit project promoting connections to local food and culture through urban agriculture. This connectivity is essential in community building, and students learned about the local impacts that the garden has had while discussing ways that small-scale sustainable agriculture could be utilized worldwide to help marginalized populations.

Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden

The botanical gardens on the eastern side of Table Mountain provide a broad view of the biodiversity of the fynbos biome that only exists on the tip of South Africa and is home to plants and animals that exist nowhere else in the world. Students were able to explore different parts of the park and see examples of the flora that thrive there.

Table Mountain

The backdrop of Cape Town, Table Mountain is a beautiful habitat for a diverse array of flora. Here, students rode a cable car to the top and explored trails overlooking the entire Cape Town region and learned more about local biodiversity and natural resources.

University of Cape Town

Students visited the University of Cape Town to meet with Environmental Studies students, and they subsequently went on an air quality walk that led them to the Rhodes Memorial on the north side of Table Mountain.

Rhodes Memorial

This memorial was built to honor Cecil Rhodes, a prominent British developer of Africa and former Prime Minister of the Cape colony. Students also collected data on the quality of the air throughout their tour via the AirBeams and tablets. This data was corroborated by Dr. Von Holdt’s PurpleAir sensors distributed throughout Cape Town proper.

Atlantis

Atlantis is a township about half an hour outside the city where experimental projects on innovative sustainable housing have taken place. However, much of the community still lives in negligible conditions due to consistent movement into the township when space is available, even very minimally.

The Sustainability Institute

The Sustainability Institute is close to Stellenbosch, a wine-growing region to the east of Cape Town. Created as an attempt to educate elementary students in sustainability, support graduate research projects, and house impoverished individuals in an eco-friendly manner, this institute serves as an example for future sustainable neighborhood development. Students toured the neighborhood, garden, waste facilities, and more areas.