The Great Trek was a northward migration of Dutch-speaking settlers who travelled by wagon trains from the Cape Colony into the interior of modern South Africa from 1836 onwards, seeking to live beyond the Cape's British colonial administration. The Great Trek resulted from the culmination of tensions between rural descendants of the Cape's original European settlers, known collectively as Boers, and the British Empire. It was also reflective of an increasingly common trend among individual Boer communities to pursue an isolationist and semi-nomadic lifestyle away from the developing administrative complexities in Cape Town. Boers who took part in the Great Trek identified themselves as voortrekkers, meaning "pioneers", "pathfinders" in Dutch and Afrikaans.
Tour d'Afrique is one of the longest bicycle expeditions in the world. It is organised by TDA Global Cycling, a Canadian company based in Toronto. It runs each year from January to May, from Cairo to Cape Town. The participants are expedition riders who cover each day at their own pace, stopping in the villages and roadside cafes. There are about 20 rest days. The organisers prepare three meals every day and transport tents and other equipment the riders need for the night stops.
William John Burchell was an English explorer, naturalist, traveller, artist, and author. His thousands of plant specimens, as well as field journals from his South African expedition, are held by Kew Gardens, and his insect collection by the Oxford University Museum.
Vryheid is a coal mining and cattle ranching town in northern KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Vryheid is the Afrikaans word for "freedom".
The Cape to Cairo Railway was an unfinished project to create a railway line crossing Africa from south to north. It would have been the largest and most important railway of that continent. It was planned as a link between Cape Town in South Africa and Port Said in Egypt.
Expedition 360 is the name of a successful attempt by Briton Jason Lewis to be the first person to circumnavigate the globe using only human power – no motors or sails. It was begun by Lewis and Stevie Smith in 1994 and ended at 12:24 pm on 6 October 2007, when Lewis re-crossed the prime meridian at Greenwich, London, having travelled 74,842 km (46,505 mi).
David Ewing Duncan is an American journalist, author, and researcher on new discoveries and their implications for the life sciences. He also writes about robots and artificial intelligence. He is the author of 12 books and a journalist for Vanity Fair, Wired, Scientific American, The Atlantic, The New York Times, MIT Technology Review, National Geographic, and other publications.
RMS Dunottar Castle was a Royal Mail Ship that went into service with the Castle Line in 1890 on the passenger and mail service between Britain and South Africa. In 1913 the ship was sold to the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company as the Caribbean. After the outbreak of the First World War she served as HMS Caribbean, first as a troop ship and then as an armed merchant cruiser, until she sank in a storm off the Scottish coast on 27 September 1915.
Sibusiso Vilane is a South African adventurer, motivational speaker, and the author of the book To the Top from Nowhere. An adventurer, marathon runner, mountaineer, and expedition leader, he has also served as the Chief Scout of Scouts South Africa.
Riaan Manser is an explorer based in South Africa. He has done his exploring on a bicycle or a kayak.
Overlanding or 4WD Touring is self-reliant overland travel to remote destinations where the journey is the principal goal. Typically, but not exclusively, it is accomplished with mechanized off-road capable transport where the principal form of lodging is camping, often lasting for extended lengths of time and spanning international boundaries.
Mark Ian Macleod Beaumont is a British long-distance cyclist, broadcaster and author. He holds the record for cycling round the world, completing his 18,000-mile (29,000 km) route on 18 September 2017, having taken less than 79 days. On 18 February 2010 Beaumont completed a quest to cycle the Americas, cycling from Anchorage, Alaska, US to Ushuaia in Southern Argentina, for a BBC Television series.
The Cairo–Cape Town Highway is Trans-African Highway 4 in the transcontinental road network being developed by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), the African Development Bank (AfDB), and the African Union. The route has a length of 10,228 km (6,355 mi) and links Cairo in Egypt to Cape Town in South Africa.
Overland or Overland World Truck Expedition is the name of a documentary series of expeditions promoted and organized by Beppe Tenti.
Eric Larsen is an American Polar adventurer known for his expeditions to the North Pole, South Pole, and Mount Everest.
Luke Robertson is a British and Scottish explorer, adventurer, endurance athlete and motivational speaker.
Mario Rigby is a Canadian-Turks and Caicos Islander adventure explorer, author, speaker, and former professional track and field athlete currently based in Toronto, ON. From 2015 and 2017, he completed an epic two year long walk across Africa, from Cape Town to Cairo entitled Crossing Africa. Mario is an advocate for the inclusion of diversity in the outdoors and encourages POC to explore the outdoors more often. Rigby leads hikes, small expeditions and speaking engagements between major projects.
Stella Maud Court Treatt, FRGS was a South African filmmaker, author, and adventurer who with her first husband Chaplin Court Treatt undertook the Court Treatt Expedition 1924–1926, the first successful attempt to drive a motor car from Cape Town to Cairo.
Pretoria–Maputo railway, also called Delagoa Bay railway, Iron railway and Eastern railway, is a railway that connects the city of Maputo, Mozambique, to the city of Pretoria, in South Africa. It is 567 km long, in 1067 mm gauge. The Mozambican section, between Maputo and Ressano Garcia, is managed by the state-owned Mozambique Ports and Railways (CFM) company, and it is officially known in Mozambique as the Ressano Garcia Line; in turn, on the South African stretch, between the town of Komatipoort and city of Pretoria, the administration is done by the company Transnet Freight Rail.
