Freedom Park

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Freedom Park is a cultural institution housing a museum and a memorial dedicated to chronicling and honouring the many who contributed to South Africa’s liberation. The museum aims to preserve and narrate the story of the African continent, and specifically South Africa, from the dawn of humanity, through pre-colonial, colonial and apartheid history and heritage, to the post-apartheid nation of today. It is a long walk, spanning some 3.6 billion years.

Email: info@freedompark.co.za
Call: +27 (0)12 336 4000
Web: freedompark.co.za
Address: Koch Street & 7th Avenue, Salvokop, Pretoria, 0002

Willem Prinsloo Agricultural Museum

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The history of the development of agriculture in South Africa as well as a collection of vehicles of yesteryear (eg donkey and horse carts, ox-wagons, coaches, carriages and spiders) are displayed in the main building. Various old agricultural implements will bring back pleasant childhood memories to many visitors.

Visitors can explore the 1880 and 1913 house museums and outbuildings, as well as two Ndebele homesteads from different eras. Indigenous farm animals include the Nguni and Afrikaner cattle, Kolbroek pigs, Speckled Persian sheep and indigenous chickens like the Ovambo, Koekoek, Venda and Naked Necks.

Visitors are offered unique public and curriculum based educational programme. Guided tours are presented to school groups of all grades as well as adult groups by highly qualified guides.

Email: prinsloo@ditsong.org.za
Call: +27 (0)12 736 2035
Web: willemprinsloomuseum.co.za
Address: R104 Old Bronkhorstspruit Road, Rayton, Cullinan, 1000

National Museum of Cultural History

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Exhibitions include rock paintings and engravings of the San people;thousand year old Iron Age figurines from Schroda in the Limpopo Province (described as “the best known artifacts indicating ritual behaviour in the Early Iron Age”); the Art Gallery presents an overview of South African culture through time, using cultural objects, crafts, sculpture and paintings and an exhibition on Marabastad is a true example of a cosmopolitan and fully integrated rainbow nation before apartheid.

Email: info@ditsong.org.za
Call: +27 (0)12 324 6082
Web: ditsong.org.za
Address: 149 Visagie Street, Pretoria, 0001

Sammy Marks Museum

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The Sammy Marks Museum is a Victorian mansion called Zwartkoppies Hall, situated about 23km outside Pretoria. The 48-room mansion with its lush gardens and tennis courts originally belonged to 19th century agricultural, industrial and mining tycoon Sammy Marks, who lived there with his wife Bertha and their nine children. The estate became a museum in 1986 and the opulent life of the Marks family is remembered today in this carefully preserved house museum and is one of the tourist attractions in South Africa that showcases some of the country’s olde world charm.

Email: marks@ditsong.org.za
Call: +27 (0)12 755 9542
Web: ditsong.org.za
Address: Bronkhorstspruit Rd, Savannah Country Estate, Pretoria, 0184

National Museum of Military History

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The museum houses weapons and other artefacts from the many conflicts that South Africa has been involved in through the centuries including the Anglo-Boer Wars, the Anglo-Zulu War, World War I and II, the conflict in South West Africa (present-day Namibia) as well as items relating to the armed struggle against apartheid.

Email: milmus@ditsong.org.za
Call: +27 (0)11 646 5513
Web: ditsong.org.za
Address: 22 Erlswold Way, Randburg, 2132

National Museum of Natural History

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The Ditsong National Museum of Natural History acts as custodian and documentation centre of South Africa’s natural heritage.The Museum’s collections and exhibits include hominid fossils from the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site and associated fauna, including Mrs Ples [the nickname attributed to a fossil skull believed to represent a distant relative of all humankind]; fossils, skeletons, skins and mounted specimens of amphibians, fish, invertebrates, reptiles and mammals. On these collections are based the Museum’s educational programmes, research is done and information is communicated to all people of South Africa as well as to the international community.

Email: info@ditsong.org.za
Call: +27 (0)12 322 7632
Web: ditsong.org.za
Address: 432 Paul Kruger Street, Pretoria, 0001

Pioneer Museum

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While enjoying a cup of coffee and homemade bread, visitors can experience a way of life that has irrevocably passed. The stories of the Pioneer Museum and 1848 house, and of the people who lived on the farm, Hartebeestpoort, are enacted against the background of the pioneer years in South Africa.

The house was built of clay and local materials, with a thatched roof and earthen floors, and is furnished in the traditional 19th century rural style. The house is surrounded by a traditional herb and vegetable garden, orchard, furnished wagon house and vineyard. Well-trained guides in period clothing present adult programmes and curriculum-based educational programmes.

Email: pioneerm@ditsong.org.za
Call: +27 (0)12 813 8006
Web: ditsong.org.za
Address: Keuning Dr, Silverton, Pretoria, 0127

Kruger Museum

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The Kruger Museum and its contents bear witness to the forceful personality of the man who lived there as leader of a small republic in southern Africa, at a stormy and unsettling time of his people’s long struggle against British imperialism.

The Museum consists of the original house in which S.J.P. Kruger, President of the old Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek (ZAR), and his family lived during the last years of the 19th century, as well as two display halls and President Kruger’s State Railway Coach.

Email: krugerm@ditsong.org.za
Call: +27 (0)12 000 0010
Web: ditsong.org.za
Address: 59 WF Nkomo St, Pretoria Central, Pretoria, 0002

Tswaing Meteorite Crater

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Some 220 000 years ago a blazing stony meteorite the size of half a football field slammed into the earth’s crust. The impact formed a huge crater, 1.4 km in diameter and 200 m deep. This crater is one of the best-preserved meteorite impact craters in the world. The name Tswaing means Place of Salt in Setswane, and refers to a saline lake that covers the crater floor. From 1912 to 1950 an industry producing soda ash and salt was based at the crater.

Major attractions, besides the crater, are an extensive wetland system, the large variety of plant species of the Sourish-Mixed Bushveld, and 240 species of birds. From the start, the Tswaing project has invited community participation in its planning and development. Local communities have already benefited from the Museum project through job creation, skills training, environmental education, income-generating projects and tourism.

Email: tswaing@ditsong.org.za
Call: +27 (0)73 661 5014
Web: ditsong.org.za
Address: Soshanguve – T Ext, Soshanguve, 0164

Dinokeng Game Reserve

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The Dinokeng Game Reserve is the first free-roaming Big 5 residential game reserve in Gauteng – and probably in the world – next to an urbanized area. It is a private/public initiative for which planning and development started in the early 2000’s. It was officially opened on 22 September 2011 after the introduction of four of the Big 5. The last of the Big 5, the buffalo, were introduced in late 2012 and they have settled in well.

Email: reception@dinokengreserve.co.za
Call: +27 (0)12 711 4391
Web: dinokengreserve.co.za
Address: R734, Pretoria, 0400