Date: 2016/10/31 / Author: ReaVaya Admin / Category: Site Seeing - Destintions
Origins center and Planetarium
Return to the Joburg Art Gallery Station. As a rule, you should wait
no longer than 20 minutes for the C3 circular route buses. Next stop is
the Origins Centre and Planetarium at the University of the
Witwatersrand. Once in the bus, you will see ordinary Joburgers going
about their business in one of the busiest intersections of Joburg, the
corner of Twist and Noord streets.
Here, the large 18m Rea Vaya buses often have to make way for
informal traders selling their fare on lopsided tables and carton boxes;
informal recyclers pulling along overloaded trolleys filled with
plastic bottles and cardboard; pedestrians of all ages; delivery
vehicles and ordinary traffic, all scuffling to squeeze through this
one, average-sized street corner – an ant’s nest kicked-over frenzy of
activity in Joburg mixed with the sound of an occasional lone vuvuzela
and the hoot of many taxis.
Enjoy the quirky names of the businesses in this area: Siesta Butchery where the meat is “too nice”, Multiple Nappies, Genesis Supermarket and Time for Change Mini Butchery.
The bus makes a short detour through this area before retracing its
route past the art gallery, the Hillbrow bathhouse and ConHill, and then
continuing down De Korte Street into Braamfontein. This is one of
Joburg’s finest inner city precincts, consisting of mixed-use office and
retail spaces as well as plenty of accommodation, mostly catering for
its large student population. As a result, you will find a lot of
nightclubs and take-away hangouts.
If you fancy a bite to eat, you can get off in De Korte Street,
crossing De Beer Street to have lunch at Narina Trogon Restaurant, an
interesting place that emulates the eateries of New York City in both
décor and gastronomic experience.
If not, continue in the bus until you reach Wits’s Yale Road
entrance, on the corner of Jorissen Street, where you will disembark.
The Origins Centre is inside the university grounds, immediately to the
left as you enter. The museum uses the latest technology to illustrate
the earliest origins of humanity in Africa, and has spectacular artwork
from our earliest times on display.
The Origins Centre also has the largest collection of rock art in the world. For more information, visit the centre’s website.
Just a short stroll further down the road, but still on the Wits East Campus, is the Joburg Planetarium. Its doors have been open to the public since 1960, when it became the first full-sized planetarium in Africa, and the second in the southern hemisphere. The planetarium offers various shows and courses. For more information, visit the website.