SUNSHINE TOURS
Tours in Pietermaritzburg

The largest proportion of the Drakensberg area falls in the province of KwaZulu-Natal. The Zulu people named it 'Ukhahlamba' and the Dutch Voortrekkers 'The Dragon Mountain'. The Drakensberg Mountains, with their awe-inspiring basalt cliffs, snowcapped in winter, tower over riverine bush, lush yellowwood forests and cascading waterfalls, form a massive barrier separating KwaZulu-Natal from the Kingdom of Lesotho. Combining sheer natural beauty with a wealth of biological diversity, this 243 000 hectare mountainous region known the uKhahlamba-Drakensberg Park has been preserved and venerated for eons since the San people or bushmen roamed these slopes. Tens of thousands of paintings depicting their daily life can be found on the rock faces, and in December 2000, the park received international recognition and was declared KwaZulu-Natal's second World Heritage Site. Afternoon visit to the Great Pyramids of Giza, the only present-day survivor of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, built from over 2300 000 blocks of stone, each weighing about 2.5 tons. Nearby, the mystical Sphinx keeps watch over the Giza plateau. Visit the High Dam, a huge rock-fill dam, which captures the world’s longest river. The temple has a majestic aura, particularly at sunset when it turns to gold. Take a horse-drawn carriage through Edfu to the famous and best preserved ancient Greek-built temple. Horus Temple dedicated to the falcon God was built on a rise to escape the annual flooding of the Nile. Return to your Nile Cruiser and enjoy the changing scenery as you cruise to Esna and later to Luxor, considered to be one of the world’s greatest open-air museums. Travel by coach to the West Bank and visit Thebes Necropolis and the Valley of Kings, a vast City of the Dead for generations of Pharaohs, where magnificent tombs were carved into the desert rocks, richly decorated and filled with treasures for the afterlife. Very few of the rock-cut tombs escaped grave robbers during ancient times. The most famous of the sixty-two tombs is the tomb of Tut-Ankh-Amun unearthed by Howard Carter. At Deir al-Bahri, the Temple of Hatshepsut was built for the only woman who ruled Egypt. See the Colossi of Memnon; it is all that remains of the Temple of Amenophis, destroyed by the annual flooding of the Nile. Its impressive features are probably the most overwhelming of all the Egyptian monuments. Visit the Luxor Temple discovered beneath the shifting desert sands.