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Travel and accommodation
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Pretoria, city of jacarandas
Known as the Jacaranda City for all the purple
blossom-bedecked trees which line its thoroughfares, Pretoria is a
lovely, quiet city. It has a long, involved and fascinating
history.
Here you will find many significant old buildings and
some fascinating museums. The Transvaal Museum has wonderful natural
history displays and is the home of Mrs Ples, the australopithecine
fossil found at Sterkfontein in the Cradle of Humankind. Also worth
visiting are the Cultural History Museum and the Smuts Museum, just
outside town.
Probably the most heartening thing about the new
government in South Africa is that, unlike many successful
revolutionaries, we have not gone on an iconoclastic,
monument-topping orgy. The Union Buildings changed overnight from a
symbol of white, neo-colonial unity to one of true unity, and the
iconic Voortrekker Monument still stands.
Ironically, though, the
bust of one of apartheid's most ardent supporters, JG Strydom, which
stood in Strydom Square near the State Theatre, toppled without any
help other than gravity and the erosive quality of time on steel
supports - on the 40th anniversary of the day South Africa became a
white-governed republic.
It's a great town - there are quite a
few open spaces where you can walk or mountain bike. Nearby is the
Premier Game Reserve, next door to the Cullinan Diamond Mine, where
the largest diamond in the world was found.
You could do a short
horse trail at the Voortrekker Monument or through the Premier
Reserve, taking a careful look at some white rhino and a number of
eland - which are pretty much the size of a big horse. You could do
a tandem skydive or a first jump at the Pretoria Skydiving Club,
which is the largest in the country. |
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| View of Pretoria from the Union Buildings. |
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A picture gallery of
South Africa |
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The Union Buildings
over looking
Pretoria by
night |
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Fort Rock
Estate
Lynnwood Road East
Willows,
Pretoria, East |
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