Drakensberg Nature Reserves
- Royal Natal
- Cathedral Peak
- Mnweni
- Monks Cowl
- Injasuti
- Giants Castle
- Highmoor
- Kamberg
- Lotheni
- Vergelegen
- Sani Pass
- Cobham
- Bushmans Nek

Drakensberg Attractions
- Bushman Rock Art
- Hiking Trails
- Hot air ballooning
- Horse trails
- Helicopter & Microlight flights
- Restaurants
- Arts & Crafts
- Drakensberg Boys Choir
- Canopy Tours
- Midlands Meander
- Fly Fishing
- Game Viewing
- Golf
- White Water rafting
- Birding
- Quad Biking
- 4x4 Offroad trails
- Battlefield Tours
- Wine Tasting
- Museums
- Bicycle tours
- Abseiling
- Wellness & Spas

Drakensberg Towns
- Bergville
- Ladysmith
- Winterton
- Estcourt
- Mooi River
- Weenen
- Underberg
- Himeville
- Rosetta
- Nottingham Road
- Balgowan
- Howick
- Lidgetton
- Currys Post
- Karkloof
- Lions River
- Fort Nottingham
- Hilton
- Dargle

Drakensberg Accommodation

Drakensberg Links

Drakensberg - Bushman Rock Art

The Drakensberg offers a large selection of Bushman Rock Art sites.

The Ukhahlamba - Drakensberg Park was declared a World Heritage Site was declared a World Heritage Site for its masterpieces of human creative genius in the form of some 35 000 Bushman rock art paintings.

Bushmen survived in the Drakensberg for thousands of years where they lived a simple stoneage, hunter-gatherer existence. These small, wiry people lived off the land collecting berries, roots and honey and hunting game, especially the Eland. This antelope, besides providing meat also featured prominently in the Bushman's religious beliefs - symbolizing all that was good.

The Bushman created their rock art using a combination of charcoal, ochre, blood and lime together with binding agents to render wild game, hunting, battles and trance dance rituals on the walls of their caves.

Tragically, during the early to mid 1800's these intrepid hunters became the hunted. First by Shaka Zulu expanding his "empire". Then white settlers, using firearms, quickly depleted the wild game. The Bushmen, to survive, were then forced to hunt cattle belonging to farmers and local African tribes. A bow was no match for the power of the gun. And a civilisation that had much to teach us about "sustainability" was systematically and mercilessly destroyed.

The Drakensberg has the world's richest treasure trove of stoneage rock art. With artistic skills honed by a tradition of total intimacy with their environment, the Bushmen expressed their life experiences in art painted in the caves and overhangs in the mountains. The rock art are drawings of infinite detail, sensitivity, movement and meaning.

Natural weathering of the exposed softer sandstone layers under the harder basalt created caves in the Drakensberg where Bushmen lived. Many of the paintings were drawn onto the relatively softer sandstone substrata and have deteriorated considerably over the years.

The top three Drakensberg destinations to see Bushman rock painting are: Game Pass Shelter in the Kamberg, Main Cave at Giant's Castle and Battle Cave at Injasuti. KZN Wildlife operates guided tours from all three of these locations daily.

There are literally thousands of other places in the Drakensberg where you can view Bushman paintings. But if you're looking for destinations other than the "big three" mentioned above, then you're going to have to get your hiking boots on. Recent legislation has recognized this amazing outdoor art gallery, and that each painting is an irreplaceable treasure. As such they are protected and you need to be accompanied by a bushman rock art guide.

Top Bushman Rock art sites in the Drakensberg

1. Game Pass Shelter, Kamberg This site inspired a lot of the ground-breaking work done by South African academics (Lewis-Williams & Dowson) in unlocking the mysteries or "decoding the past". There's a multimedia centre at the bottom where they show you a 20-minute video based on their work. Very useful. It makes the paintings, when you get up to Game Pass Shelter, that much more accessible. It's about a 3-hour round trip up to Game Pass Shelter and back down to the bottom. The scenery is stunning. The path follows a river and has you criss-crossing behind waterfalls. The last bit is very steep though and unless you're one of these triathlon types, you're going to be panting when you get to the top. But it's worth it. The rock art friezes are fabulous. They're big and colourful. And they'll stab anybody in the eye.
2. Main Caves, Giant's Castle Now anthropologists and the like may argue that this is the most important site in the Drakensberg. Yes, there are six or seven hundred paintings in the caves - an extraordinary density. But they're small, monochromatic and intensely symbolic. The uninitiated are usually unimpressed. They do have a display (using Madame Tussaud-type models) which shows what a Bushman cave would have looked like. That's quite interesting. Tours leave every hour on the hour. It's a fourty-minute walk from the Giant's Castle rest camp to the caves. Nice walk but nowhere near as demanding as the one up to Game Pass Shelter.
3. Battle Cave, Injasuti This one's interesting because the paintings are stylistically different. Tours need to be booked in advance and leave at 8 a.m. And it's a five to seven hour hike up to Battle Cave and back. And that doesn't leave you much time for looking around the cave and studying the bushman rock art paintings.