Pretoria Zoo

The zoo was founded in 1899 as a private collection by Dr Jan Gunning and was nationalised in 1916. Over the following century it built one of the most diverse animal collections in the southern hemisphere, with particular strengths in southern African species, big cats, primates, reptiles and a small but important aquarium and reptile park that few visitors realise is included with the ticket.

The site is split by the Apies River into a western hills section and an eastern flatland section. A four-cabin cable car runs over the river giving a good aerial sense of the layout, and most visitors take it across early in the morning and then walk back through the hill enclosures. The hills section is steep — comfortable shoes and a bottle of water are essential.

Highlights include the white lion enclosure, the gorilla family group, the African elephant pair, the cheetah breeding centre and the unique Cape vulture rehabilitation enclosure. The aquarium has tanks of fish from rivers across southern Africa, and the reptile park's collection of rinkhals, puff adders and rock pythons is one of the best in the country for South African herpetology.

Behind the visitor offering is a serious research operation. The Pretoria Zoo is part of the South African National Biodiversity Institute and runs ongoing breeding and reintroduction programmes for critically endangered species including wattled crane, riverine rabbit and the African painted wolf. Several of its keepers are doctoral researchers in their own right.

Practical info: the zoo is open daily from 08:30 to 17:30. Entry is around R130 per adult and R80 per child, with the cable car at additional cost. There are restaurants and snack bars across the site. Allow at least four hours, and ideally a full day if you also want to do the reptile park and the aquarium. We include the zoo on our family-friendly Pretoria Day Tour and as a half-day add-on for visitors travelling with children.