Upington

Rural Upington is the lone urban outpost in the wild fringes of South Africa’s Northern Cape, encompassed by rolling vineyards, dusty deserts and grassy plains, while its town centre itself bursts forth with riparian greenery along the Orange River. While summers can be sweltering, Upington is an ideal winter destination where visitors can look forward to a locale peppered with swaying palms and hardy kokerbooms, and if their timing is right, socialise with the resident local wine makers and truck-driving country folk at the Kalahari Kuierfrees. Of the sights within the city, why not wander beneath the shady date trees that line the avenue to Die Eiland, sign up for an Orange River Wine tour, as well as ensure a viewing of the curious Camel and Rider statue and Donkey monument that set the city’s honorific art works apart from most of the other towns in the region. But your Upington tour guide will tell you that the town’s biggest draw are its wealth of natural gems that lurk just on the peripheries, from wildlife spotting at the Spitskop Nature Reserve and Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, the roaring Augrabies Falls, to the hot springs, rugged ridges and sultry canyons of the Kalahari Desert.