In South Africa’s largest province, the Northern Cape Province, about halfway between Cape Town and Upington in the Karoo, lies a gem that can be called Home away from home. In this haven you can relax to your heart’s content because the atmosphere is so conducive to it. This haven, called Calvinia, is a town where people are still real, where you can stop a stranger to ask directions, or sometimes just to chat. Here you can allow yourself to be “transported” to the past while still having the best of modern society at your fingertips.

In Calvinia you can relax and recharge the batteries without the bustle of over-populated holiday resorts. Calvinia is a town in a time warp, where the past and present are intertwined. This is a land where, 250 million years ago, prehistoric dinosaurs trod the earth, leaving unique flora, fauna, geology and palaeontology in harmony concord with the infinite universe … truly a place with room for all.

Life in this picturesque town seems to be going slower than elsewhere, giving you time for the more worthwhile things in life. Here you are welcomed like the prodigal son, and treated like a local from the outset. The friends you quickly make in this town will go out of their way to accommodate you with almost any request you may have. Here you easily forget about traffic jams, shootings, muggings and other perils of modern life. The lasting first impression is one of calm sophistication.