Porterville

Situated 140 kilmetres from Cape Town, Porterville is a quaint, friendly and welcoming town nestled on the slopes of the Olifant's River Mountains. It is well known amongst locals and oficionados as the paragliding and hang gliding capital of the Western Cape.

Enthusiast are attracted to Porterville from all over the world when the active sky and powerful thermals provide ideal conditions for cross country flying.

First established in 1863 after Frederick John Owen, one of the original 1820 Settlers subdivided his farm into plots, Porterville was first named after the then popular Attorney General of the Cape - William Porter.

Perhaps the most outstanding of these is the rock art painting of a sailing ship east of Porterville. (located on private land).

This region is particularly famous for the Disa Uniflora, a rare flower, and is the only place in the world where whole fields of these flowers can be seen in nature.

The rarest of the disa unifloras is the sulphur yellow Disa, which has only been found in one small colony in Porterville.

Just east of Porterville lies the Groot Winterhoek Wilderness area, complete with extraordinary sandstone rock formations and popular hiking routes. It also features one of the largest natural rock pools in South Africa and offers an abundance of fauna and flora

Many amazing examples of rock art, believed to be between 300 and 6 000 years old, can be found in this area, whose subjects illustrate the religious and social life of the Bushman or San, whose ancestors have lived in southern Africa for more than 100 000 years.