Condé Nast Travel, one of the world’s premier travel magazines, conducts an annual Best in the World reader survey. This year found our wonderful Knysna voted into #2 spot on the Top Cities in Africa.
It’s debatable whether we’re a town or a city as population may be below 100 000 but semantics will never change the fact that Knysna is the prettiest place in South Africa and one of the best in the world. It’s one thing for us locals to believe that about our home and totally another to have people around the world believe so too! 
We achieved a 72.2 rating which was broken down into -
- Ambience: 85.5
- Friendliness: 83.9
- Lodging: 78.0
- Restaurants: 72.1
- Culture/Sites: 68.3
- Shopping: 49.0
Ratings for other cities in the top 5 was -
- Cape Town (South Africa): 84.8
- Marrakech (Morocco): 69.1
- Fez (Morocco): 63.9
- Cairo (Egypt): 44.5
Click here to view photo galleries of Knysna.
Agent for rock 'n roll, social activist, avid blogger and owner of Love Knysna. Projects include Knysna Keep and Knysna Crime Watch which seek truth and transparency from Knysna's leaders. Knysna Schools is a directory for parents seeking information. Knysna Website Design aims to bring Knysna businesses and organizations online cheaply. 
Hi Mike,
Good to hear from you.
Great news about our rating by Conde Nast travel.
Have a little problem with your stats – Marrakech at 75.1 appears to be no. 2 if we got 72.2?
Philip
Thanks for that correction. Marrakech was in fact 69.1.
The most obvious comment is that Knysna isn’t a city. As a small town it is not directly comparable with metropolises like Cairo. Knysna does of course earn a well deserved feather in its cap as a wonderful place to live, and a great holiday destination. But self evidently, it does not offer as much as major cities do.
The big question is at what population level do we become a city? In many countries around the world, that figure is 100 000. Maybe you can email our municipal manager for the definition of a South African city? I will keep an eye on the forthcoming census results.