Our Three-Week Adventure in South Africa #5
Getting Around in Cape Town & Apple Pay
Cape Town is a big city. Referred to as the “Mother City” by South Africans, it has a population of over 4.5 million (2020) and covers 950 square miles. It is the second largest city in South Africa after Johannesburg and the location of the South African parliament. Though we would need a car during our second week, we saw no reason to have one during the two separate weeks we spent in Cape Town as Caroline assured us we could take Ubers everywhere.
Indeed, that’s exactly what we did. Both girls had AT&T’s international cellular service and I had the same with Verizon so we could keep in contact when separated and so we could phone restaurants and use our phones to order Ubers and - in my case - use Apple Pay when possible. On previous international trips, I had often purchased a local SIM card but typically had issues. This was my first experience using Verizon’s 1-month service ($100 for 4 weeks vs $10 per day) and it worked surprisingly well. We only got it for my phone but I will never travel abroad again without getting it for both my wife’s phone and mine!
We did take Ubers everywhere as Caroline had promised and they were amazingly inexpensive. $2.30, $2.05, $4.59. One ride was $8.46 but the majority were always less than $4! And the cost is automatically charged to your designated credit card. Likewise, when paying for restaurant meals, bar drinks, groceries, everything, touchless Apple Pay using my iPhone was accepted. I only had to use a physical credit card twice during the whole trip! This is both safer and more secure and I couldn’t have done it without the cellular service. Yes, most places had wi-fi, but you couldn’t always count on that.
#pemburytours #southafrica #southafrican #capetown
