05.2013 May Day at Zoo Lake

To mark the mid-week May 1^st holiday earlier this month, we decided to head down to Zoo Lake. There are lots of pretty parks in Johannesburg, some of which have incredible views of the inner-city skyline (as in the picture on the banner of this blog). Zoo Lake does not have such views, but it is still currently my absolute favourite Joburg park.

The lake at Zoo Lake. There's a zoo here too...somewhere

This is a real people's park - you can lounge around on the grass, play sports, have a picnic and of course fire up a braai and all the while there are guys driving around on mopeds with ice-cream vending sidecars. There are no strict 'no ball games, no barbecues, do not walk on the grass' etc type rules. The only things not allowed are ghetto blasters, stereo sound systems and the like, a rule which I totally agree with and which I think most of the people visiting the park would agree on too.

Ice-cream sidecar

Overall though it's the cosmopolitan mix up of Zoo Lake that makes it so special. You can find all kinds of people here, it's truly a rainbow park. Within the twenty metre radius of our lounging spot on the grass there was a huge Arab family having an elaborate picnic and playing a hotly contested game of cricket, a group of trendy black students enjoying a highly animated game of sherades, a very loved up old white couple canoodling and a big multi-racial white, Indian, black, Asian kick around with a football.

It's a shame that Winter Is Coming and there won't be so much relaxing in the park going on in the next few months, but I'll bet as soon as spring arrives this place will be packed again - can't wait!

How I got there: We came here by car from Bolton Road (next to the Rosebank Mall). It is down a hill and then some, so if walking from Rosebank, you'd need to walk about 40mins plus.