In the vast, semi-desert Northern Cape with huge spaces and awe-inspiring landscapes, you still find odd little towns and villages rich in memories of strange characters, diamond thieves and personalities as colourful as the sunsets. Kimberley, the capital, tells the story of diamonds and at Upington you'll learn about Klaas Lucas, the Khoi Khoi chief who ruled this part of the world.

Travelling through the Bo Karoo you'll encounter small towns centered around the sheep farming activities and in the Kalahari you'll find a huge landscape of red-coloured sand dunes and waterways covered by bush.

Please view accommodation options and game lodges or see the Northern Cape Travel Guide.

Cities and towns of the Northern Cape:

Barkly West
Situated on the Vaal River, Barkly West was once a thriving diamond digging community of which many reminders can still be seen.

Calvinia
Calvinia, founded in 1851, lies at the foot of the Hantam Mountains and is the region’s key growth point and one of the country`s largest wool-producing areas.

Carnarvon
Karoo town in an important merino sheep farming district and good stop-over when travelling the long distances in this desolated part of the country.

Colesberg
Colesberg is a traveller`s oasis on the main Cape Town-Johannesburg route, the N1, offering many attractive accommodation establishments and entertaining, educational distractions.

Danielskuil
Part of a Griqua missionary and of historical importance, a geological phenomena in the form of deep cavity was formed in the dolomite limestone.

De Aar
De Aar is the second most important railway junction in South Africa and at a time home to Olive Schreiner, the famous author and feminist who wrote Women and Labour.

Fraserburg
Fraserburg is situated on a high plateau north of the Nuweveld Mountains and has a very rich historical heritage. Also a palaeosurface on the farm Gansfontein outside town, of several trackways of large, four-footed, five-toed mammalian reptiles 190 mill

Griekwastad
Griekwastad is situated in the Northern Cape, between Kimberley and Upington. It is by far de best crossing point on your tour between the other provinces and the world famous Witsand Nature Reserve

Hondeklipbaai
A favoured holiday destination for farmers, fishermen and divers, a quaint village built next to a spring, at the foot of the escarpment.

Kakamas
Originally build by a church and named after the Khoi word for 'poor pasture', the name today reflects poorly on a fertile valley in the lower Orange River, graced with vineyards, cotton and lucerne fields

Kamieskroon
Set among granite rock formations of the Kamiesberg Mountains, taking its name from the 330 m peak crowned with a huge, cleft rock. Photographic workshops, Namaqua flowers in spring, a hiking paradise in unique surroundings

Kathu
Kathu orginated because of mining activities. It has one of the five largest open-cast iron ore mining operations in the world. Kathu has one of the country's most beautiful golf courses as well as the luxurious Gamagara Lodge.

Kimberley
The city was founded arround a big hole about 800m deep when diamond diggers and about 30000 workers excavated the diamond pipe during the late 19th century.

Kuruman
Water, mountains and dense vegetation, the "oasis of the Kalahari". Set on the Ghaap Plateau, it is blessed with a permanent and abundant source of water in the form of a mineral spring (The Eye), delivering some 20 million litres a day

Loeriesfontein
Where Namaqualand, Bushmanland and the Hantam meet. Quiver Tree Forest, one of the world's largest, these trees store water in their trunks and can live up to 400 years

Loxton
This little town came into being in 1899 to serve the sheep-farming community around it. Streets are lined with cypresses, pepper trees, and beefwoods and in spring, when pear trees are in blossom, they transform surroundings into a fairytale picture.

Nieuwoudtville
Jewel of the Hantam! Bulb Capital of the World! That's how the people describe the town at the top of the Bokveld Escarpment, with 100m water-falls, a myriad of succulents and a vast variety of plant life.

Prieska
Prieska is situated on the south bank of the Orange River and is renowned for its semi-precious stones and large array of succulents including the weird half-mens.

Springbok
Springbok lies about 600 km north of Cape Town offering many attractions, historical sites, museums and fine restaurants.

Upington
Bound by the Orange River and the Kalahari, Upington is the principal city in the Northern Region, an ideal winter holiday resort with all the modern conveniences on the major routes to Namibia and Kalahari, Augrabies, Fish River Canyon and Northern Cape