Rovos Rail - "Pride of Africa"

Event: Rail journey from Cape Town to Pretoria

Country: South Africa

Details: 1,600 kilometer journey, duration 2 days

Like all "red blooded" males with a pulse, TM loves trains. If you look hard enough I'm sure you'll find an old train set or two hiding away in a box somewhere in my past. Unlike most people today, I can remember steam trains, belching smoke and steam, whistle screeching, proudly pounding their way along the rails prior to their demise, at the expense of the diesel locomotive. Oh - I was looking forward to this journey, into the future and the past. We'd been sitting around for two days getting over jet lag and flying down to Cape Town to "mount our steed" - it was time to get our African trip underway.

After meeting for "drinks" accompanied by a stringed duet in the Rovos Rail Lounge we were assigned to our Hostess and escorted to the Pride of Africa on Platform 23.

Rovos Rail Lounge

Tablecloth on Table Mountain overlooking Cape Town Station

All the carriages making up the train have been painstakingly restored, and once aboard, it was easy to travel back in time to the 1920's -30's. Our train was made up of 20 odd carriages; talk about luxury and being spoilt, there were 29 passengers being looked after by almost 20 staff. Wow! Before we knew it, the train was pulling out of the station and our adventure had begun. Lunch was served two hours later and TM hadn't moved from his window - apart from taking photos.


Dining car

Smoking Lounge

Observation Car

The highlights from day one were: passing through the Hex River Pass and spending ten minutes going through the longest tunnel; visiting Matjiesfontein and traveling around a villiage no longer than 500 meters in a London double decker bus with the conductor yelling out "it's Showtime" every thirty seconds; dining in a suit and tie and trying to sleep, swaying from side to side. Thankfully the train stopped in Hutchinson for a couple of hours and TM was able to drift off.

Entering the Hex River Mountains


Sunset over the Karoo

The following morning TM awoke at 6.30 am and wandered down to the observation car and sat out on the open deck at the rear of the train and just totally relaxed as the world passed him by. Duncan brought him a Cappuccino and for about one hour he was able to sit by himself and imagine living in a different time and world - it was worth the whole trip to just to do that. At about 2.30 pm we pulled into Kimberley, departed the train and went on a conducted tour of the "big hole" and the mine museum. De Beers still have their headquarters for their world wide operations in Kimberley. A couple of interesting facts that stayed with me were: mining actually finished in 1914 and the reason there is no trees for hundreds of kilometers around Kimberley is they were all used in the mining process!

The "Big Hole"

Just as we pulled out of Kimberley, on the way north to Pretoria, we passed a lake that has spectacular flocks of Flamingos, in excess of 23,000. We didn't see anywhere near that many - it's a big lake but we saw more than enough to take some photos and to exclaim!

Flamigos on Kamfers Dam, Kimberley

TM's favourite "possie" on the train, watching the world pass by.

On the final day we pulled into Centurion Station in the midst of a slight electrical storm. The final lightening strike took out all the signals on our line through to Rovos Headquarters in Pretoria. Consequently we had a " longer than planned" stay at the platform waiting for our steam train to join us, to bring us home. In a way it just added to the tension, would the steam train join us or not? Luckily, it did.

Admiring the Steam Engine (Keith giving it the thumbs up)

After a delay of almost three hours we pulled out of Centurion for the last 30 minutes or so of the trip under steam! TM is the "typical Australian (baby boomer) Male" who, amongst other well documented short comings, is totally unemotional - well he thought he was. He was like a little kid, with the windows down on both sides of the carriage, running from one to the other, to get the best views as they moved down the tracks. Oh, the smell, the sight of the plume of smoke bellowing from the engine and the cinders hitting your face as you "craned out" as far as possible to take it all in, - watching our train on the bends, proudly and regally bringing us home.

What can you say - apart from "I wish the photo was better" LOL

Pulling into Rovos Headquarters at Capital Park Station.

Yes, I can admit it - the tears in my eyes were not just from the wind rushing past. Thank you Andrew, Yui and Duncan for looking after us - it was truely the best ride of my life.