Dinokeng Game Reserve

Dinokeng Game Reserve is Gauteng's only Big Five reserve, forty minutes from Pretoria and malaria-free. You can drive yourself through twenty-one thousand hectares of bushveld, or join guided game drives to see lion, leopard, elephant, buffalo, and rhinoceros. Over three hundred bird species live here, including the endangered blue crane and martial eagle.

The reserve sits north of Pretoria, close to the N1 highway. Its name means 'a place of rivers' in the languages of the baTswana and baPedi people, and water draws the game through the reserve. You can picnic at one of three unfenced sites along the self-drive route, or stay overnight at lodges, chalets, and campsites.

Game drives go out twice daily — mornings cold, afternoons golden — and rangers radio sightings across the reserve. Dinokeng also runs conservation events, where visitors can watch collaring and population management.

The reserve is unfenced, so animals move freely across the land. Speed limits are enforced to protect wildlife: fifty kilometres per hour on tar roads, forty on dirt roads, and thirty on self-drive routes.