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Here are 10 reasons to visit South Africa

 When it comes to travel, Africa is one place on many people’s must-visit list. Here are  10 reasons to get yourself to South Africa that you may not have even considered…

To go on safari in search of the Big Five

Going on your first African safari feels like being on a hushed film set waiting for the key cast members [read: the big five] to arrive. And when they do, it’s with all the drama, tension and romance that is implicit on a game drive. What’s surprising is how much the bit players – dik-diks, kudu, impalas – steal the spotlight as they scramble for survival.

A crash course in astronomy

Receiving a crash course in astronomy while standing under a night sky swirling with stars in the middle of the Greater Makalali Private Game Reserve is to marvel at the magnificence of the universe. Astrotourism has become a popular safari ritual in South Africa and Ben Coley, of Celestial Events, has a seriously powerful telescope to enhance the experience.

To caper up the Cape of Good Hope

Geography lessons come to life at the Cape of Good Hope on the Cape Peninsula, a long spindly finger of land pointing south toward Antarctica. Climb to the top of the Old Cape Point Lighthouse where you can marvel up close at the rippling sandstone and swirling blue-green sea below. Be warned: baboons are everywhere so keep your car locked when you pose for that selfie near the Cape of Good Hope sign.

Explore SA’s largest art museum

The Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa – Zeitz MOCAA – is one of the world’s most important exhibition spaces for contemporary African art. It’s a great echoing cavern of steel and concrete and glass located inside a grain silo built on the waterfront in the 1920s. Huge sections of the building’s interior have been carved out to create a complex warren of more than 100 gallery spaces.

Visit the rainbow-bright neighbourhood of Bo Kaap

You have to visit the stunning rainbow-bright neighbourhood of Bo Kaap when you visit South Africa.

The boxy buildings of Bo Kaap present like a bag of Liquorice Allsorts coloured everything from indigo and fuschia to tangerine and mint green and brightening up the Cape Malay community. Turn your back on the camera-toting crowds and head up the hill to Bo Kaap Kombuis, a restaurant serving traditional Cape Malay cuisine.

Coo over the penguins at Boulders Beach

The waddling African penguins are not the only reason to make a pilgrimage to Boulders Beach, as the area is strewn with rounded boulders looming like giant sculptures. As well as providing ideal nesting territory for the endangered species, the tumbled rock formations are every bit as photogenic as the resident penguins.

Enjoy an African sunset

Table Mountain is one of the New 7 Wonders of Nature and, if there’s a defining landmark that shapes Cape Town’s skyline it is this. The Table Mountain Aerial Cableway has revolving floors so visitors get 360-degree views of the mountain and city from the top of the towering escarpment.

Experience Steampunk at Truth Coffee, Capetown

If you are a fan of steampunk, this is the cafe for you. Steampunk informs the philosophy behind Truth Coffee while paying homage to the movement with its centrepiece: a vintage espresso machine dubbed Professor Jones’ Fabulous Coffee Bean Contraption. Truth is equal parts cafe and cult and the steampunk aesthetic filters down to the fashions favoured by the staff. truth.coffee

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To surf world-class waves

Hit the beach for the ultimate surfing in South Africa.

Jeffrey’s Bay is ranked as one of the best surfing destinations in the world. Located in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa, J-Bay offers rides of up to 800-metres long and includes breaks dubbed Salad Bowls, Coins, Tubes, Kitchen Windows and Impossibles. The best time to surf here is dawn, when the sky is indigo and the seas are stretched like blue denim over the curves of the coast. Yes, it’s where Mick Fanning punched a great white during the J-Bay Open surf event, so BYO shark repellent.

The grape and the good

The Cape Town bar scene is cool and contemporary and includes a range of bars, some more dog-eared than others. The Outrage of Modesty serves cutting-edge cocktails in an old frame theatre with wacky wall art and tiered seating. Nearby, The Gin Bar is aimed squarely at gin geeks. The bar, which is hidden behind the Honest Chocolate Cafe in the CBD, has a charming sand-blasted courtyard and beautifully backlit drinks selection.

GETTING THERE

Africa Travel specialist Bench Africa has a 13-day Luxury Signature Safari Special that focuses on South Africa. Visit benchafrica.com

 

There is a SAA flight daily from Perth to Johannesburg operating an A340-300 and A340-600 (connecting with codeshare partner Virgin Australia from Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide.) Visit flysaa.com

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At the foot of the pyramids, Egypt finally tells its own story

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    Ancient Egyptian history has been scattered across the globe for decades, admired, preserved, and studied, but it’s rarely seen where it actually belongs. The newly opened Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) brings it home.

    From a viewing platform inside the Grand Egyptian Museum, the Great Pyramids of Giza rise from the desert, and for a moment, it feels like modern Egypt and ancient Egypt are shaking hands. The museum, grand in name and reality, has been a long time coming—since 1992, to be exact. Towering pharaohs, relics, and entire chapters of civilisation are on display here, all in full view of the pyramids. And because the GEM is the largest archaeological museum in the world dedicated to a single civilisation, it gets to tell Egypt’s story through its own voice, something many overseas institutions, understandably, haven’t quite managed.

    Reshaping Giza

    GEM entrance and gardens
    The GEM holds its own commanding position. (Image: Natasha Bazika)

    You might expect any building beside the Great Pyramids of Giza to fade into the background, but the GEM doesn’t bow to its famous neighbours. Perfectly aligned on the same axis and vast enough to span 70 football fields, the museum is less of an addition to Giza and more of a marker of the shift from a gateway to a cultural district.

    Inside, hieroglyphs carved from alabaster sweep across the walls and triangles appear everywhere, yet it’s a 3,200-year-old, 11-metre-tall, statue of Ramesses II who commands the room. His scale dictated the soaring atrium ceilings, which pour in natural light, unusual in museums but safe for the stone artefacts displayed.

    Hieroglyphs line the walls of the main entrance of the GEM
    Hieroglyphs line the walls of the main entrance. (Image: Natasha Bazika)

    Unlike many museums, the GEM has really considered how visitors move through it. The six-storey grand staircase leads you chronologically through Egypt’s history, from the Predynastic era to the Coptic period, flanked by statues that grow in scale and complexity as you climb. Elevators and lifts run alongside, keeping the journey accessible to everyone.

    At the top, a viewing wall frames the pyramids before you enter the main gallery to see artefacts rarely seen outside tombs, including the complete contents of Tutankhamun’s tomb, a highlight for many visitors.

    Pharaohs, artefacts and everything in between

    The GEM's showpiece Ramesses II
    The GEM’s showpiece Ramesses II. (Image: Natasha Bazika)

    The GEM holds around 100,000 artefacts across seven millennia, but the experience is entirely modern. Digital panels, QR navigation and clear bilingual signage make self-guided wandering easy, while short, glare-free labels in English, Arabic and braille are colour-coded to move you from broad themes to object-level detail.

    That said, a guide adds context you don’t get from a panel. I was lucky to have Essam Al Ebd Aziz, an Egyptologist, on board a 12-day Uniworld Nile cruise, walk me through some of the museum’s standout pieces.

    Top of the list is, of course, the Tutankhamun exhibit. Almost everything from his tomb, much of it never shown outside the Valley of the Kings, is here, from his golden funerary mask to delicate jewellery and ceremonial objects. But the GEM isn’t just about one boy king.

    GEM entrance is guarded by an 11-metre-tall Ramesses II statue.
    An 11-metre-tall Ramesses II statue guards the entrance. (Image: Natasha Bazika)

    Essam points out the canopic chest of Hetepheres, mother of Khufu, where her organs were stored in alabaster. I loved the forty little marching soldier figurines from the tomb of Mesehti, all lined up and hanging on a wall. And then there’s the statue of Metri, a scribe, with piercing blue eyes carved from lapis lazuli. All these pieces, and thousands more, now sit under one roof. And for the first time, people can see Egypt’s history in one place, told in its own voice, without leaving the shadow of the pyramids. That alone changes everything.