Gaborone
Gaborone is one of Africa's youngest capitals, a city that didn't exist in any modern sense until 1964, when 2,000 workers began laying 2.5 million concrete blocks on the flat Botswana plain. Within three years, a government, a university district, and a pedestrianized main street had taken shape — a rare case of a capital built almost from scratch, to order, by a newly independent nation.
Today the city wears that origin lightly. The Main Mall still anchors daily life, the Three Dikgosi Monument anchors civic memory, and the Gaborone Game Reserve — savanna and wetland within city limits — reminds you where you actually are on the continent.
How Gaborone came to be
The land here was Tlokwa territory, a settlement called Moshaweng, named for Chief Gaborone whose village sat just across the river. Cecil Rhodes arrived in 1890 and chose the spot for a colonial fort. For most of the following century the administrative heart of the Bechuanaland Protectorate was not even inside the territory — it was run from Mafeking, in what is now South Africa.
That changed decisively in 1964, when the decision was taken to build a proper capital before independence. Construction began in mid-year; by 1966, when Botswana became a sovereign republic on 30 September, Gaberones was functional. Sir Seretse Khama, the country's first president, oversaw that transition. The city was renamed Gaborone in 1969, earned city status in 1986, and has been growing — and building institutions, from the University of Botswana in 1982 to the National Botanical Garden in 2007 — ever since.
Who and what shaped it
People who shaped it
Landmark buildings
Plan your visit
On the map
When to go
Botswana's dry season, roughly May through August, brings cool nights and clear days — the most comfortable window for walking the city. The summer months from November to March are hot and punctuated by afternoon thunderstorms, which break the heat but can be heavy.
Right now
Background & history adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA) · specs from Wikidata (CC0) · weather from Open-Meteo · map data © OpenStreetMap contributors · photos from Wikimedia Commons / Unsplash with per-image credit. No third-party reviews or social posts reproduced.