Simon’s Town, South Africa: Self-Guided Walking Tour

Looking for things to do in Simon’s Town? This historic seaside town on False Bay is known for its maritime character, coastal setting, and access to marine wildlife, making it a distinctive stop on the Cape Peninsula. Neywo offers a free audio guide for Simon’s Town with 109 narrated places, so you can explore at your own pace.

What to See in Simon’s Town and Cape Town

The Neywo guide for Simon’s Town includes places across the wider Cape Town area, from historic buildings and museums to landmarks on the Cape Peninsula. These are some of the most important stops to discover.

Castle of Good Hope

The Castle of Good Hope is a striking pentagonal fort between Cape Town Harbour and Table Mountain. The Dutch East India Company built it between 1666 and 1679, replacing an earlier fort of clay and wood built in 1652 by Jan van Riebeeck.

Its five bastions were named Leerdam, Buuren, Catzenellenbogen, Nassau, and Oranje. The entrance was changed in 1682, and the clock tower above the gateway was added in 1684. Inside, the fortress contained a church, bakery, workshops, living quarters, shops, cells, and other facilities—a complete settlement within its walls.

Groote Kerk

Groote Kerk means “Great Church” in both Afrikaans and Dutch. The first church on this site was built in 1678, while the present building replaced it in 1841 and retained the original tower.

Inside, the pulpit created by Anton Anreith and Jacob Graaff was inaugurated on 29 November 1789. The church also has South Africa’s largest church organ, installed in 1954.

St. George’s Cathedral

St. George’s Cathedral is the Anglican cathedral of Cape Town and the seat of the Archbishop. Known as the people’s cathedral, it became a sanctuary and meeting place for people of all races during the apartheid years.

The cathedral’s foundation stones were laid in 1901, but construction was not completed until 1978. Sir Herbert Baker designed the building in a neo-Gothic style, with pointed arches and stone vaulting. It stands at 5 Wale Street in the city centre.

Cape of Good Hope and Cape Point

The Cape of Good Hope is a rocky headland on the Atlantic coast of the Cape Peninsula. For centuries, it mattered to sailors because ships travelling south along Africa’s western coast began to move more eastward than southward after rounding the cape.

The headland forms part of Table Mountain National Park, which also includes Cape Point. Coastal trails cross the surrounding nature reserve, combining rocky scenery with the area’s maritime history.

Cape Point lies at the southeastern corner of the Cape Peninsula. Its highest peak rises 243 metres above sea level and is made mainly of sandstone. Rocky formations, beaches, and coves shape this mountainous landscape.

Bo-Kaap Museum

The Bo-Kaap Museum is a museum in Cape Town and one of the narrated places included in the Bo-Kaap route. It forms part of an area explored through mosques, cobbled streets, and historic neighbourhood landmarks.

Slave Lodge

The Slave Lodge is one of Cape Town’s oldest buildings and has stood for more than three centuries. Built by the Dutch East India Company at the end of the seventeenth century, it was first used to house enslaved people.

The building later served as government offices and the Old Supreme Court before becoming a cultural history museum within the Iziko Museums of South Africa.

Iziko South African Museum

The Iziko South African Museum was founded in 1825 and was the first museum established in South Africa. It has stood in the Company’s Garden since 1897.

Its collections cover African zoology, palaeontology, archaeology, and the cultures of southern Africa. They include fossils almost 700 million years old, as well as insects, fish, and a major butterfly collection.

South African National Gallery

The Iziko South African National Gallery is the country’s premier art museum. Its collections range from Dutch, Flemish, French, and British works of the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries to lithographs, etchings, early twentieth-century British paintings, and contemporary South African art.

The institution began in 1871, after Sir Thomas Butterworth Bayley donated his private collection to establish a public art institution for the Cape. The present building was completed in 1930.

Grain Silo and Zeitz MOCAA

At the V&A Waterfront, the former Grain Silo houses the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa, also known as Zeitz MOCAA. The silo had been out of service since 2001, and its conversion began in 2014 under the direction of London architect Thomas Heatherwick.

Zeitz MOCAA opened on 22 September 2017. It presents temporary exhibitions and a permanent collection of contemporary art from Africa and its diaspora, alongside an art education centre, artist residency, fellowship programme, shop, coffee shop, and rooftop restaurant.

Central Public Library Cape Town

The Central Public Library Cape Town is a public library with lending and reference services, as well as specialised art and music sections. Its collection includes books, CDs, DVDs, audiobooks, and magazines. Library members can also use more than 90 computers and free Wi-Fi.

Cape Medical Museum

The Cape Medical Museum focuses on the medical history of the Cape. Its displays cover dentistry, hospital care, traditional African medicine, and pharmaceutical developments.

The museum began in the 1980s through the work of volunteers led by Professor J. C. De Villiers. It is a Provincial Museum of the Western Cape government.

Cape Town Holocaust Centre

The Cape Town Holocaust Centre was founded in 1999 and was the first Holocaust centre in Africa. It remembers victims and survivors of the Nazi regime while also reflecting on genocides before and since the Holocaust.

Located in the Gardens neighbourhood on the grounds of Gardens Shul, the centre presents archival photographs, film footage, documents, multimedia displays, and recreated environments. It forms part of the South African Holocaust and Genocide Foundation.

Other narrated places

The wider audio guide also includes the Church of the Good Shepherd on Robben Island and Lichtenstein Castle in Hout Bay. Lichtenstein Castle is a mock castle on the Karbonkelberg, modelled after Lichtenstein Castle in Baden-Württemberg, Germany.

Simon’s Town is part of the Western Cape in South Africa. For more city sightseeing nearby, you can also explore Cape Town or continue to Langebaan.

Explore Simon’s Town with Neywo

Neywo’s free audio guide for Simon’s Town includes 5 walking tours and 1 bus route, with 109 narrated places in total. The walks range from 1.45 to 3.49 km and take between 84 and 95 minutes:

• Cape Town’s Colonial Heart: Castle to Groote Kerk — 2.15 km, 95 minutes, 11 stops
• Company’s Garden: Cathedral, Parliament and Museums — 1.45 km, 84 minutes, 12 stops
• Bo-Kaap: Mosques and Cobbled Streets — 2.44 km, 88 minutes, 10 stops
• V&A Waterfront: Forts, Nobel Laureates and Art — 3.49 km, 85 minutes, 7 stops
• District Six and the Civic Centre — 3.27 km, 90 minutes, 8 stops

The bus route is:

• Bus 101: Civic Centre, the Gardens and Vredehoek — 3.1 km, 13 minutes, 5 stops

Download Neywo and explore without joining a group or following a schedule. The app tells the story of each place as you reach it, at your own pace. Narration is available in 11 languages.