You're in Africa, so you want to see game, especially the Big Five. Well, we've got plenty of it - and not too far from Joburg either.

THE nearest place from Joburg for the Big Five (elephant, lion, leopard, rhino and buffalo) is the Pilanesberg Game Reserve, a malaria-free reserve in the neighbouring province of North West.

The 55ha Pilanesberg Game Reserve is set in an ancient, extinct crater, with spectacular rocky outcrops, grasslands, wooded valleys and a large central lake. Besides the big five, there are some 7 000 animals, including the nocturnal brown hyena, the cheetah and the sable. Bird watching is excellent with over 300 species recorded.

There are lodges, safari tents and chalets dotted throughout the reserve. It's a two-and-a-half hour drive to the reserve, or you can fly in to the Pilanesberg Airport.

Get all the details on the reserve from the website.


The 3 000ha Plumari Game Lodge is a malaria-free, Big Five wilderness area with around 1 000 head of game including elephants, white rhino, leopard, hippo, buffalo, giraffe, zebra and most antelope, including the Namibian Gemsbok.

A special feature of the lodge is its elephant experience where you can wake up the two resident elephants, feed them, then take a two-hour walk through the bush with them.

You can chill on game drives, hiking trails, bird watching, or splash in a plunge pool. The lodge has one of the largest collections of ox-wagons and carts in South Africa. Nearby are 1 000-year-old San carvings, and you can gasp at stone-age tools and artefacts in an onsite history museum.

You can stay in chalets and there is a restaurant on the site. The drive to the lodge is around 45 minutes. Go to the website for the details.


The Ngonyama Lion Lodge is only 50km from Joburg, and offers visitors 1 500ha of bush stocked with around 30 mammal species including 14 lions, white rhino, buffalo, giraffe, hippo, black wildebeest and zebra. Antelope include the rare roan and sable antelope, tsessebe, eland, waterbuck, kudu, oryx and red hartebeest. Nocturnal animals include the brown hyena, black-backed jackal and genet. The only animal of the Big Five missing is the biggest one, the elephant.

While taking a break from game spotting, get your adrenalin rush with a spot of pool, volleyball, swimming or table tennis. Then get your energy refill from the Monate Restaurant. There are chalets for those wanting to overnight at the lodge.

Get all the details from the website.

Hooked on Africa's big cats and need to get more of them? Then you must visit the De Wildt Cheetah Centre in the foothills of the Magaliesberg mountains. The centre was established in 1971 with the aim of breeding endangered species. Over the years more than 750 cheetah cubs have been born at De Wildt, dramatically increasingly the numbers of this vulnerable species.

The breeding programme includes other endangered animals such as the wild dog.

It is estimated that the current cheetah population in South Africa hovers around 1 450 - some 500 in captivity, 350 in protected areas, and 600 roaming on farmlands.

The programme also focuses on conservation of free-roaming cheetah.
Efforts are made to capture the cheetah and to relocate them into suitable protected areas.

Three-hour guided tours of the centre are conducted, and you can even adopt a cheetah. On Tuesdays and Thursdays you can observe the fastest animal on earth being taken out to run.

You can stay at the De Wildt Cheetah Lodge, a rustic stone house set in expansive gardens.

The centre is around an hour's drive from Joburg. Learn more from the website. http://www.dewildt.org.za/index.htm

If you only have a day available and want to see the cats, try the 208ha Lion Park in Honeydew, where you can get up really close to some 80 large lions and assorted other animals like cheetah, wild dogs, hyena and several species of antelope.

The lions are bred and trained for sale, filming and educational purposes. The park was established in 1966 by Chipperfields Circus, with retired lions.

The park is 26 kilometres north-west of the city, and you'll be allowed into the cub enclosure to handle the cute cats. You can also feed two tall giraffes by stepping up on to a platform to get nose-to-nose with them; and best of all, you can get up really close to the kings and queens of the jungle in one of four enclosures.

You can drive through the park, viewing the springbok, blesbok, zebra, ostrich, gemsbok and impala from your car, and drive past the wild dog and cheetah enclosures.

There is a tented camp in the park, where you can fall asleep to the roar of lions and the nervous laughter of hyenas.

The park has several pure white lions, which are not albino lions but rather lions carrying a recessive gene that controls their pigmentation.

The park is open every day and is about a half-hour's drive north-west of the city. Day and night game drives are available. There is a restaurant in the park.

Get all the details on the Lion Park website.