Google Street View coming to Botswana

A Google Street View vehicle, with the roof-mounted camera, driving around South Africa (image: Bandwidth Blog)

Google Street View is expanding in South Africa and Botswana with the addition of five Cape wineries. Boekenhoutskloof Winery, Groot Constantia, Hartenberg, Môreson, Rustenberg Wines and Warwick are the latest additions to the most comprehensive winelands imagery database in the world. Google Street View now includes 30 Cape wineries in total.

Street View is a popular feature of Google Maps available in more than 30 countries worldwide. Adding another dimension to Google Maps, with 360 degree street-level images taken by the Google cars and trikes, Google users are able to view and navigate through streets, wine estates, vineyards, historic buildings and gardens.

“We are delighted to be updating Street View with more Cape winelands imagery and look forward to bringing our cutting-edge Street View technology to Botswana”, said Julie Taylor, Head of Communications and Public Affairs for Google, Sub-Saharan Africa.

Google will be collecting images of Botswana in the coming weeks. Using Chrevolet Captiva models they capture places across the country including Gaborone, Francistown and the country’s world-famous tourist and wildlife destinations. These include Chobe National Park, Moremi Game Reserve, Makgadikgadi and Nxai Pans, Central Kalahari Game Reserve and Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park. Collecting, processing and stitching together of data can take several months. They will be made available at a later date.

“In addition to Street View being useful to internet users and businesses in Botswana, we also want to help Botswana showcase its extraordinary national parks and wildlife destinations to the rest of the world”, said Taylor.

Staff writer