Background
The first part of the complex was opened in 1979, when the central features were the Sun City Hotel and a golf course designed by Gary Player. Much of the appeal of Sun City was its gambling licence: the hotel was in Bophuthatswana where gambling was legal. Wealthy whites travelled to what were then the designated black homelands to gamble, and like many other casino resorts from the Apartheid era, the contrasts between the luxury of the resorts and the impoverished areas around them were (and, to some extent, still are) stark.
In the same year, Pilanesberg Game Reserve opened. A year later the second phase was complete – the 284-room Sun City Cabanas opened, aimed at families. In 1980 the famous Sun City Million Dollar Golf Challenge was founded, and over the years this has attracted most of the world’s top golfers. In 1984 the third hotel was opened, the five-star Cascades, surrounded by waterfalls, streams and a tract of forest. In 1992 came the icing on the cake: the Lost City and the Valley of the Waves .
With the change in gambling laws, visitor numbers dropped sharply in the 1990s, but these have crept up again as the focus has switched from gambling to family entertainment, golf and conferences. Although far removed from the culture and landscapes that draw most tourists to South Africa, Sun City’s glitz and garishness is fascinating and worth a day’s visit.
more Sun City photos
