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Car Rental Services offers you low cost car hire in the Drakensberg with car rental branches conveniently located all over the Drakensberg. Our car hire rates are inclusive of all insurances and taxes and may also include unlimited mileage and a zero excess. We rent cars from the Drakensberg top car rental companies, offering you a wide choice of vehicles ranging from economy to luxury rent a cars. Car Rental Services will find you the best deal for car rental in the Drakensberg.
Contact us to start the easy reservation process to book car hire in the Drakensberg. Low cost and best value car hire in the Drakensberg is what we would like to offer you. We can arrange car hire with Europcar car hire, National rent-a-car, Avis, Alamo car hire, Hertz car rental, Budget car hire and other well known car rental companies.
Click below to start the easy reservation process to book your car rental in the Drakensberg
Satellite Navigation and Smart Tour Guide
Satellite navigation includes our unique Smart Guide, a must for all Drakensberg self drive travelers. Enjoy a guided tour including useful information about South African history, fauna and flora, food, local entertainment, what’s hip, hot and happening in the vicinity as you drive past. A daily service fee applies.
HARRISMITH Car Hire
Spur Village, Engen Garage, Harrismith, Freestate
Station Code: HARI
Tel: 058 623 2904
Fax: 058 622 2750
Mon - Fri:08:00 - 17:00
Sat & Sun: Closed
Public Holidays: Meet Reservations
HOWICK Car Rental
29 Belll Street, The Car Salon, Howick
Station Code: HOWK
Tel: 033 330 5625
Fax: 033 330 2915
Mon - Fri: 08:00 - 17:00
Sat & Sun: Closed
Public Holidays: Meet Reservations
LADYSMITH Car Hire
372 Murchison Street, Ladysmith
Station Code: LADY
Tel: 036 631 0913
Fax: 036 637 6629
Mon - Fri: 07:00 - 17:00
Sat & Sun: Closed
Public Holidays: Meet Reservations
NEWCASTLE Car Hire
Murchison Street Motors, 20 Murchision Street, Newcastle
Station Code: NEWA
Tel: 034 312 2806
Fax: 034 312 4735
Mon - Fri: 08:00 - 17:00
Sat - Sun: Closed
Public Holidays: Meet Reservations
Car Rental in Drakensberg - Information
The Barrier of Spears
The Drakensberg
The soaring peaks of South Africa’s Drakensberg mountain range run in a ragged sickle shape along the eastern part of the country, dividing KwaZulu-Natal’s highlands from Lesotho.
To the Boers who first trekked north away from British rule in the Cape, these jagged peaks wreathed in mist looked like the back of a giant dragon. The word Drakensberg literally means ‘dragon mountains’.
To the Zulus, the storms crashing around the peaks in summer sounded like warriors beating their shields with their spears, so they named the mountain range uKhahlamba, or ‘barrier of spears’.
In 2000, the uKhahlamba-Drakensberg Park became the fourth of South Africa’s World Heritage Sites. It is one of only 23 such sites worldwide to be recognised for its natural as well as its cultural value – comparable with Machu Picchu in Peru or Ayers Rock in Australia.
Extraordinary Beauty
Covering over 243 000 hectares, this is a place of extraordinary beauty –summer-green grasslands, high twists of montane forest, a place of sheer cliffs, clear streams, a fairy world of tree ferns and mosses that just begs to be explored on foot.
In winter, the Drakensberg mountains are often shape-shifted by mist and snow – the perfect place to relax before a roaring fire with something belly-warming to hand. The basalt and sandstone peaks have eroded into shapes that evoke their names: Giant’s Castle, the Amphitheatre, Cathedral Peak, Devil’s Tooth, Champagne Castle, the Monk’s Cowl, and the Sentinel.
Biodiversity Hotspot
The Drakensberg mountain range is considered a South African biodiversity hotspot with well over 2 000 plant species, many of them found nowhere else in the world. At least 299 bird species have been recorded, including Verreaux’s eagle and the endangered bone-cracking bearded vulture. Leopards lurk in the mountains, hunting the antelope that thrive on the fertile, watered earth.
Ancient Artworks
It was the San (also known as the Bushmen) who first lived in these mountains. By 1880, they had been decimated by black and white settlers, but they left a magnificent collection of rock paintings on rocky overhangs and cave walls.
There are thought to be roughly 40 000 individual images painted in the Drakensberg, one of the richest ‘collections’ of rock art in the world.
Some are thought to be at least 3 000 years old, and are now recognised as a unique expression of human creative genius. They are also the best preserved rock paintings south of the Sahara. The animals depicted on the rock walls are acutely observed and movingly portrayed, but their meaning is not just descriptive. Certain paintings in the Drakensberg alerted academics to the fact that the paintings have a rich spiritual significance, and were often painted by shamans in trance states.
KwaZulu-Natal Nature Conservation Services (also known as Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife) administer the Park, and they offer accommodation that ranges from budget to semi-luxury throughout the mountain range.
Hiking is the best way to explore the mountains. There are excellent trails and maps. Many of the camps have horse-riding facilites and mountain bikes are generally allowed. Ask about trout-fishing.
Links:
Visit Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife at: www.kznwildlife.com.
For information on the Drakensberg and the Greater KwaZulu Natal region, visit: www.zulu.org.za
For information on the Drakensberg visit: www.drakensberg-tourism.com or www.drakensberg.org.za
Source: SA Tourism
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The Amphitheatre in Drakensberg North, KwaZulu-Natal
Photo by Wietsche Bosman. Copyright South African Tourism |
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