Great Karoo

The hot dry Karoo overlaps the Eastern Cape and the Western Cape. It has a sparse barren landscape, where the main economic activity is wool and meat from hardy Karoo sheep.

One of the main towns in the Eastern Cape Karoo is Graaff-Reinet. The wide streets of Graaff-Reinet have more National Monument buildings than any other town in South Africa and it is a delightful oasis in the scrubland.

Nearby is a spectacular natural wonder known as the 'Valley of Desolation', where the ground falls away dramatically, and strange dolomite pinnacles rise like rockets from a launching pad.

Nieu-Bethesda is a quirky little town and home to the strange Owl House. The Owl House is an unusual collection of cement and glass sculptures and is the life's work of an eccentric artist named Helen Martins.

It may seem vast and empty but the Karoo is full of delightful eccentricities waiting to be discovered.

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