BOOKED Trips Johannesburg and Cape Town, Souh Africa Experience Recap

Welcome to South Africa! We just wrapped up an incredible journey to Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa with 11 amazing women inspired by Trevor Noah’s memoir “Born A Crime.” Get ready for a deep dive into our unforgettable experience and hear directly from our travelers about what they loved about the experience.

First Things First: What’s BOOKED Trips?

We’re all about crafting meaningful, book-inspired adventures for women who crave more than just a typical vacation. Think immersive, small-group travel that fosters genuine connections and a sense of belonging. We bring stories to life, transforming pages into real-world experiences. We skip the tourist traps and focus on authentic, transformative journeys led by locals.

At BOOKED Trips, we believe travel should be a narrative, weaving together the author’s vision with the stories of the people and places we encounter. Before each trip our travelers receive a BOOKED box with our selected book, a curated playlist, and items from small businesses around the world that connect to the country we’re visiting. Here’s what was inside our South Africa BOOKED Box:

• • A signed copy of “Born A Crime” by Trevor Noah purchased from @eastcitybookshop, a woman-owned bookstore in Washington, DC
  • A Drum Magazine journal purchased from Drum Archive Shop. Drum Magazine changed the way Black people were represented in South African society by imagining a world beyond apartheid.
  • A passport cover purchased from Pulp Paperworks, a team of experienced bookbinders and creatives, banded together by an obsession with paper, sustainability and all of the possibilities in-between.
  • Organic rooibos and honeybush tea from Mandela Tea, a family-owned company created in collaboration with the Long Walk to Freedom project. A percentage of the profits of Mandela Tea goes directly to the Mandela Day School Library Project.
  • A Xhosa fabric makeup bag from Design Team for Zeitz Museum of Contemporary African Art Their feel-good printed fabrics are inspired by nature and everyday life on the African continent.
  • BOOKED Trips custom bookmark designed by Pretty In Ink Press and room spray designed in collaboration with Story Candles and Goods, both Black woman-owned companies.
  • A trip playlist with sounds of South Africa

On the ground our trip activities and meals are inspired by quotes and scenes from our selected book, taking travelers from the page to the place.

OUR TRIP BOOK

Our trip was inspired by “Born A Crime”, a memoir written by comedian, podcaster, and former host of the Daily Show Trevor Noah. Born a Crime is a powerful blend of humor and honesty, chronicling Trevor Noah’s childhood under the shadow of apartheid, South Africa’s brutal system of racial segregation. Born a Crime isn’t just a personal story; it’s a window into a nation’s past. Born to a Black Xhosa mother and a white Swiss father, Trevor’s very existence was outlawed under apartheid’s racial classifications. Our trip will explore the legacy of apartheid. We’ll walk the streets of Soweto, the Johannesburg township where Trevor grew up, experiencing firsthand the resilience and vibrant culture that blossomed under oppression.

Born a Crime extends beyond apartheid and celebrates the joy and complexity of post-apartheid South Africa. Cape Town, with its breathtaking scenery and undeniable charm, becomes a backdrop for Trevor’s tales of visiting his father and navigating a “rainbow nation”  still grappling with its past. Our exploration of Cape Town will echo this duality, showcasing the city’s natural wonders alongside its hidden struggles.

2025 BOOKED TRIPS SOUTH AFRICA RECAP

Maboneng Moments

“Relationships are built in the silences. You spend time with people, you observe them and interact with them, and you come to know them—and that is what apartheid stole from us: time.”

– Trevor Noah, Born A Crime

Days 1 and 2 for our BOOKED Trips South Africa experience all focused on the Maboneng neighborhood of South Africa and building relationships among our travelers and the local community. As our guide Tshepo says – Johannesburg is about the people.

Each of our BOOKED Trips experiences starts with an opening dinner and book discussion where our travelers get to connect over a meal and have an in-depth discussion of our featured trip read. We were hosted at the beautiful wood penthouse at Curiocity’s Fox Street Studios which was a former printing house. Our meal was designed by Chef Iko from the Eastern Cape in South Africa and accompanied by sparkling, red, and white wine from Aslina Wines owned by Ntsiki Biyeli, the first Black woman winemaker in South Africa.

After our opening dinner on Day 1, we started day 2 with an art walk around the neighborhood. We visited the Hide Out Bar at Curiocity’s Maboneng location in Johannesburg, South Africa. The name of the bar is inspired by the building’s history as a secret printing press and a hideout for anti-apartheid leaders.

At Curiocity we had the pleasure of getting a private reading from Zama Madinana, a South African poet, based in Johannesburg. His work has appeared in The Shallow Tales Review, East Jasmine Review, Olney, Poetry Potion, Voices of Africa, and other literary publications. Zama’s work focuses on love, politics, and social issues. In 2021, he won the third prize of the Sol Plaatje EU Poetry Award. He was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2022. His full-length poetry collection, ‘94 was published in June 2023.

After, we walked through the neighborhood and learned how art has been used as a tool for community-centered neighborhood revitalization.

Being bookish ppl, we had to stop by Collector’s Treasury, the largest second-hand bookstore in the Southern Hemisphere and ended our afternoon at Victoria Yards, a community of creative businesses from artists and artisans to restaurants and urban agriculture.

Tasting our way through Yeoville

“After apartheid fell, my father moved from Hillbrow to Yeoville, a formerly quiet, residential neighborhood that had transformed into this vibrant melting pot of black and white and every other hue. Immigrants were pouring in from Nigeria and Ghana and all over the continent, bringing different food and exciting music.” – Trevor Noah, Born A Crime

At BOOKED Trips we’re all about making stories come alive. We take travelers from the pages of some of our favorite books to the places they happened. To dive into the neighborhood that Trevor Noah’s father called home we enjoyed a multi-dish dinner at Yeoville Dinner Club in the Yeoville neighborhood.

Far off the tourist track the dinner is a local supper club that the South African Sunday Times has called “one of the most culturally significant culinary eateries on the continent” which was established by self-taught cook and Soweto native Sanza Sandile. Sanza tells hilarious stories and no one is safe from being a punchline as he talks about his culinary influences and serving celebrities like Anthony Bourdain, reggae musician Damian Marley, actor Antonio Banderas and more. 

The dinner is set in an office that he has lovingly curated into a storybook of his travels and the various influences on his cooking. Sanza’s first cooking lesson was from his grandmother who transformed what was then considered to be basic African food into delicious and unique culinary offerings. Each dish paid homage to the immigrants that made up the neighborhood and the melting pot of cultures that Yeoville represents from Nigerian, Ethiopian, Ghanaian, Zimbabwe and beyond. It is a night that lingers on as there’s always one more dish or one more drink to enjoy. With communal style seating it’s the best way to meet travelers and locals alike over great stories.

Soweto Stories

“There is something magical about Soweto. Yes, it was a prison designed by our oppressors, but it also gave us a sense of self-determination and control. Soweto was ours. It had an aspirational quality that you don’t find elsewhere. In America the dream is to make it out of the ghetto. In Soweto, because there was no leaving the ghetto, the dream was to transform the ghetto.” – Trevor Noah, Born A Crime

We spent our third day learning more about Soweto where Trevor Noah spent a lot of his childhood. Our guide Tsepho was born and raised in Soweto and was proud to show us the brilliance of his neighborhood.

The first stop was Little Rose Center, a shelter and youth center in Kliptown, one of the poorest areas in Soweto. They offer daycare services, kindergarten classes, after school programs, computer classes, dance workshops, and a soup kitchen. We donated food supplies and bought beautiful fabric goods from Little Rose Atelier, a women’s empowerment program that teaches local women how to sew and gives a donation of the proceeds to the Center. To support this important work, we made a food donation to Little Rose Center and bought beautiful bags and gifts from Little Rose Atelier.

Our next stop was the Hector Pieterson memorial where we got to speak with his sister Antoinette Sithole. Hector was a South African schoolboy who was shot and killed at the age of 12 during the Soweto uprising and massacre in 1976, when the police opened fire on black students protesting the enforcement of teaching in Afrikaans, mostly spoken by the white and coloured population in South Africa. The students wanted to learn in their native languages, Xhosa and Zulu and paid the ultimate price for that desire. Antoinette talked about her experience and how she ultimately moved to a place of forgiveness for the people who killed her brother.

Then we walked along Vilikazi Street, the only street in the world w/ TWO Nobel Prize winners: Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. We visited the Nelson Mandela House and learned more about his and Winne Mandela’s activism.

We had a delicious local lunch at Lebo’s, a vibrant local hub and backpackers founded by trailblazer and social entrepreneur Lebo Malepa. We ended the day at the apartheid museum which brought the history Trevor Noah wrote about into heartbreaking detail. This is a highly recommended stop during any visit to Johannesburg.

Johannesburg Safari

“Andrew was the only one who wasn’t afraid. He was the lion tamer, only he’d been raised by the lion—he couldn’t love the beast any less despite knowing what it was capable of.”

– Born A Crime by Trevor Noah

No trip to South Africa is complete without a safari. We partnered with a Black-run safari company Kgabo Safaris for a full day open air safari in Pilanesburg. We saw lots of animals including rhinos, giraffes, elephants, and more. 

A day in Black-owned Cape Town, South Africa 

“My mother started her little project, me, at a time when she could not have known that apartheid would end. There was no reason to think it would end; it had seen generations come and go. I was nearly six when Mandela was released, ten before democracy finally came, yet she was preparing me to live a life of freedom long before we knew freedom would exist.” – Trevor Noah, Born A Crime

Cape Town is notoriously known for being an overwhelmingly white city in a Black country, but thanks to our partners Girls Trip Tours and Curiocity we were able to craft an experience that centers the Black, coloured, and indigenous history, culture, and entrepreneurship in the city.

We started the morning at the Castle of Good Hope getting an alternative history told through the lens of brown, Black, and indigenous people with our guides Lucy and Melissa. We grounded in our bodies and were introduced to native plants to reconnect us to the land.

We visited a monument to the many children harmed by slavery and its aftermath, read the names of the many people from across Africa and Asian who were kept at the Slave Lodge, passed the Parliament Buildings, learned about Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s legacy at St. George’s Cathedral which he oversaw and where his ashes lay, and visited the Apartheid Benches.

We ended at a monument to Krotoa who was a Khoisan linguist and diplomat in the early days of the Cape Colony. She was suspected of aiding her people with strategic information and advice, particularly during the first Khoe-Dutch war of 1659 – 60.

We had lunch at @sevencolours_eatery, a Black woman owned restaurant run by Chef Nolu Dube-Cele committed to sharing the South African food she grew up on.

We ended the evening with a 14-dish dinner at GOLD, a Black woman-owned establishment that took us on a journey along the spice route, from Uganda to Zanzibar. We experienced live djembe drumming, performances, and got the exclusive opportunity to go behind the scenes in the kitchen to make our own spice blend and meet the staff.

Celebrating Wine Trailblazers

“Women held the community together. “Wathint’Abafazi Wathint’imbokodo!” was the chant they would rally to during the freedom struggle. “When you strike a woman, you strike a rock.”

– Trevor Noah, Born A Crime

We had the great pleasure of visiting various Black and Brown-owned wineries in Stellenbosch and the Franschhoek wine regions outside of Cape Town South Africa.

We had a wine tasting at Seven Sisters wines, one of the first and few 100% POC-owned and managed wine farms in Stellenbosch. Established in 2009 by the Brutus Sisters, the vineyard represents their journey to reclaim their legacy and celebrate their bond. We were personally hosted by one of the sisters Vivian who leads the brand and talked about the struggles of being a Black woman in a white male dominated industry, losing her business 4 times but still being here 20 years later.

We also had a tasting at Klein Goederust, the first Black-owned winery in the Franschhoek wine region. The winery is inspired by the legacy of family matriarch Nomaroma Siguqa, who was a wine farm laborer for 37 years.

We had a five star lunch at Hari Kitchen  @hari.kitchen , a Black-owned restaurant owned by Chef Nash, a sommelier turned chef. HIGHLY recommend during your next visit to the region for delicious views and impeccable views.

Colorful Cape Town

To get to know the Cape Malay population we embarked on a Bo-Kaap walking tour strolling along he iconic rainbow-hued houses of Bo-Kaap. Our local guide Shereen grew up in the neighborhood and shared the history and traditions of the Cape Malay people, bringing this unique culture to life. After we had a hands-on, two-course Cape Malay cooking class of roti and chili bites with Faeza who hosts cooking classes in her home and has been featured in Netflix’s Somebody Feed Phil. For those interested he also highlighted his other favorite Cape Town businesses on his website. We capped off the day with a dessert of Koesister’s and tea at DAC on Dorp an artist residency that celebrates local visual artists. 

Cape Town is a city that’s known for its beauty so we of course had to visit the Cape Peninsula. 

“Apartheid was perfect racism. It took centuries to develop, starting all the way back in 1652 when the Dutch East India Company landed at the Cape of Good Hope and established a trading colony, Kaapstad, later known as Cape Town, a rest stop for ships traveling between Europe and India.”

Inspired by the quote above we drove along Chapman’s Peak Drive, visiting Clifton beach, Camps Bay, Hout Bay, Cape Point, Boulders beach, Simons Town, Kalk Bay, and of course get those infamous pictures of the colorful beach huts of Muizenberg. We enjoyed lunch at Fran’s a coloured women-owned restaurant and stopped at Kalk Bay books for some book shopping.

We ended our trip with a champagne sunset cruise around the V&A waterfront area and a Braai, or South Africa barbecue, at Curiocity’s Greenpoint location in Cape Town. We had live music by DJ Kapula and danced our way out of a beautiful experience. 

Closing

“Love is a creative act. When you love someone you create a new world for them. My mother did that for me, and with the progress I made and the things I learned, I came back and created a new world and a new understanding for her.” – pg. 261

Big thanks to our on the ground partners Curiocity, particularly Gail and Tshepo for an amazing trip. They brought our vision to life in beautiful ways while ensuring that our tourism dollars stayed in the local communities that we visited. Our travelers had a great experience. Hear why our travelers chose BOOKED Trips – from finding a sisterhood to the intentionality of each experience.