Sunday Morning at 44 Stanley Avenue
How have I never blogged about 44 Stanley Avenue, the coolest shopping and dining complex in Joburg, which is only five minutes from my house? The entrance to 44 Stanley Avenue. I guess it's wrong to say I've never blogged about 44 Stanley; I've mentioned it countless...
Photos From Braamfontein’s Indwe Park
I've been dreadfully uninspired lately, struggling to think of anything I want to blog about despite having a long list of great ideas (many of which you, my readers, provided in September). I'm finding it hard to feel positive about life at the moment. But on...
My Top 5 Moments in the Great State of Maine
Given this week's political nuclear bomb blast, it feels like a weird time to publish a light-hearted post about my recent (pre-election) jaunt through the United States. But I'm hoping you've have had enough of the U.S. election horror show -- I know I have -- and...
Four Years of the Blogitects
I was planning to blog about something else today -- I've been traveling in the U.S. and haven't posted for weeks and I have a ton of travel content to catch up on. But this week marks the four-year anniversary of the day I met Thorsten, the other half of the...
Americans in Joburg: Why We Vote
In 2020, I published a blog post with tips for Americans living in South Africa who wanted to vote in the U.S. presidential election. I thought about simply resharing that post this year. But then I realized: 1) I want to write a U.S. election post that will be fun...
Hidden Joburg: The Home of Edoardo Villa
A couple of years ago I started a "Hidden Joburg" series -- a quest to visit all 28 places in the book Hidden Johannesburg, by Paul Duncan and Alain Proust. Then I got sidetracked. I published my last Hidden Joburg post in December 2022. But finally, almost two years...
Jozi People: Sipho Mackenzie, Fashion Pioneer
I recently bumped into Sipho Mackenzie at a party. Although we'd met a few months before, I was so dazzled by Sipho's look (the youngsters would call it a lewk) that I couldn't immediately place him. Sipho, who had been relatively dressed down at our first meeting,...
Clivias in Bloom at Random Harvest Indigenous Nursery
A few days ago, during a fit of low motivation, I asked my Instagram followers to suggest potential topics for Joburg-related blog posts. Thank you again to everyone who submitted suggestions -- you made my week! I received more than 30 viable ideas and found it hard...
Mtunzini: A Beachy, Foresty Place in the Shade
Our recent visit to St. Lucia was a stop along the way to the final destination of our KwaZulu-Natal road trip: Mtunzini, a coastal town off the N2 highway, where we spent five days hanging out on near-empty beaches and wandering through tropical forests. A kilometer...
Two Days in St. Lucia, KwaZulu-Natal
St. Lucia, the tourist town along South Africa's northern KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) coast -- not to be confused with St. Lucia the Caribbean island -- has near-mythical status among South Africans. The town is completely surrounded by iSimangaliso Wetland Park, South...
Afro-Latin Flavors (and Fun) at Artüro in Melville
Artüro, a new-ish restaurant on 7th Street in Melville, appears Mexican at first glance. As someone who is always on the lookout for Mexican food in Joburg, I was excited to check out Artüro after spotting a photo of a platter of tacos on the "I Love Melville"...
Stuurmansfontein: A Corbelled House in the Great Karoo
It was a blustery winter afternoon on my 50th birthday. The Blogitects were headed to Stuurmansfontein, an iconic corbelled house in the middle of the Great Karoo, and I was super excited. But the sun was sinking fast and I was also starting to freak out. Thorsten was...
The Blogitects Roadtrip to Augrabies Falls
As mentioned previously, Thorsten and I (a.k.a. "the Blogitects": one blogger + one architect) recently got back from a roadtrip to the Northern Cape to celebrate my 50th birthday. I had never properly explored the Northern Cape, South Africa's largest and least...
Sleeping in a Retro Campovan in Kameel, North West
I last visited Kameel, a tiny hamlet in South Africa's North West Province, in February 2020 as part of my (never finished) #10SouthAfricanTowns project. At the time, I was certain I'd be back in Kameel before 2020 was over; it's a perfect stopover point on the way to...
Heather Mason
I’m an American writer/blogger/photographer living a quirky life in Johannesburg. Follow along as I explore Johannesburg, South Africa, and the rest of the world.