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Johannesburg, South Africa

Johannesburg, city in northeastern South Africa, capital of Gauteng Province. It stands on the southern slopes of the Witwatersrand, a rich gold-mining region that serves as South Africa’s industrial heartland. Johannesburg is the largest and most important city of the Witwatersrand’s string of ten towns, from Springs in the east to Randfontein in the west. The large black townships of Soweto and Alexandra lie within Johannesburg’s metropolitan area.
Johannesburg stands at an altitude of 1,750 m (5,740 ft). This moderates the climate, producing a mean temperature of 10° C (50° F) in July and 20° C (68° F) in December. Rainfall averages 850 mm (33 in) a year. The sun shines an average of nine hours a day in summer and more than seven hours a day in winter. The origins of the name Johannesburg are uncertain, but the city may have been named for Johann Rissik, acting surveyor general of the South African Republic (former Afrikaner state in the Transvaal region), and Christian Johannes Joubert, head of the South African Republic mines department.
Click here to read more about Johannesburg from Encarta Encyclopedia.

 
 

Johannesburg, South Africa
City of Johannesburg

 

Pilanesburg National Park
Pilanesburg National Park

 

 

Tapologo. Photo by  Zahra Foundation. http://www.zahrahelps.org/tapologo.asp
Tapologo HIV/Aids Hospice

   
 
Lesedi Cultural Village
Lesedi Cultural Village
 
Exterior view of the Apartheid Museum. Photo by Stephen Hobbs
Apartheid Museum
 
Soweto, South Africa.  Photo by András Osvát
Soweto
   
 

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Links to more Johannesburg information

More on Tapologo:
Selina's Story (one woman's story)
Defiant in the Face of Death (article)
Zahra Foundation

Pilanesburg Map (Interactive Map of the Pilanesberg Game Reserve)

Johannesburg travel guide from the Travel Channel

MES (non-governmental organization that works in the inner city of Johannesburg)

Weather in Johannesburg

http://wikitravel.org/en/South_Africa (from Raisa)

If you have other Johannesburg links you'd like to see on this page, please send them to me (Julie) and I'll add them!
southafrica2009@q.com

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