The Cradle of Humankind

UNESCO World Heritage Site (1999): The Richest Hominin Fossil Ground On Earth, Where Mrs Ples And Little Foot Came Out Of The Sterkfontein Dolomite And Where Homo Naledi Was Found In The Rising Star Cave In 2015 A Cluster Of Working Excavations And Show Caves In Farmland An Hour From Johannesburg, With A Purpose Built Interpretive Centre At Maropeng · Krugersdorp, Gauteng

In dolomite hills an hour north-west of Johannesburg, a cluster of caves has produced more hominin fossils than anywhere else on earth. Sterkfontein gave up Mrs Ples in 1947 and, half a century later, Little Foot - a near-complete Australopithecus skeleton that took fifteen years to free from the breccia. In 2015 the Rising Star cave a few kilometres away produced Homo naledi, hundreds of bones of a species nobody had predicted, recovered by cavers thin enough to pass through an eighteen-centimetre squeeze. The UNESCO listing covers around a dozen fossil sites across farmland, and what a visitor actually does is two things: go down into the Sterkfontein caves on a guided tour past the excavation itself, and work through the Maropeng visitor centre, which is a serious and surprisingly good museum of human origins. It is malaria-free, an easy drive from Johannesburg, and the most important place in the world for the question of where we came from.

In the dolomite hills 50 km north-west of Johannesburg, with the Sterkfontein caves and the Maropeng centre at its core, Krugersdorp, Gauteng, South Africa

Both Sterkfontein and the Maropeng centre keep daylight hours daily with separate or combined tickets, and the cave is GUIDED ONLY on tours that leave at intervals - you cannot wander in. Tours fill at weekends and in South African school holidays, so arrive early or book. BOTH SITES HAVE CLOSED FOR REFURBISHMENT for extended periods, and whether the Sterkfontein tour is running at full length varies with excavation work, so confirm before driving out. THE RISING STAR CAVE, where Homo naledi was found, IS AN ACTIVE RESEARCH SITE AND NOT A VISITOR ATTRACTION - do not expect to see it. The caves are cool, damp and lit; Maropeng is air-conditioned. It is a fifty-kilometre drive from Johannesburg on good roads and a hire car is the practical way; there is no useful public transport.

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