The most scenic places to eat your takeaways at

Lowveld National Botanical Garden

This unique African garden occupies a beautiful site in the subtropical heart of Mbombela, Mpumalanga, where it receives so much rainfall that it remains green throughout the year and boasts over 2 000 species of plants. Stand on the African Rain Forest suspension bridge and watch waterfalls tumble into the two rivers that cut across the garden, shaped by the two main rivers that cut across it, the Crocodile and the Nels, there are spectacular waterfalls which can be viewed at two viewpoints in the garden and from the African Rain Forest suspension bridge. The garden is also home to the largest collection of cycads in Africa. Plan your visit Visit during spring when most of the plants are flowering for the best display.a blooming display.

Kaapsehoop Lookout Point

At the lookout point you have a panoramic view of the Barberton Valley – rivalling that of God’s Window near Graskop. You see the vastness of the blue, blue skies stretching over the Lowveld and with a bit of imagination, even the sea, on the hazy eastern horizon.

Kaapsehoop is approximately twenty kilometres from Nelspruit, making it the ideal starting point for day trips.

God’s Window

God’s Window is a popular vantage point along the Drakensberg escarpment, at the southern extremity of the Nature Reserve.

Here, sheer cliffs plunge over 700 metres to the lowveld. From this escarpment—a mostly unbroken rampart of cliffs—opens a vista into the lowvelt expanse and escarpment forests, the Eden-like aesthetic appearance of which prompted the name. On a clear day it is possible to see over the Kruger National Park towards the Lebombo Mountains on the border with Mozambique.

The original Window is a rock that is set further back on a private farm and due to Quarry operations and tree plantation farming this actual rock that looks like a square window could not be used, therefore the site was moved by the government to the edge of the escarpment.

Mac Mac Falls

The impressive 70m Mac Mac Falls is one of a collection of waterfalls in the Sabie area. It’s worth walking the easy 3km Secretary Bird Walking Trail from the pools and through indigenous forest.

Nelspruit’s Soccer Ball

The reservoir was built in the ‘70s after the city’s annual water sales doubled in the late ‘60s, and drastic measures were necessary. A former councillor, Mr Johan Fölscher suggested that a special reservoir be constructed. The credit for the dodecahedron shape, a 12-sided reservoir, has to go to Mr DP Liebenberg, who suggested it after having seen it in a book. As computers weren’t as advanced in the ‘70s, the angles of the 12 facets had to be calculated in Switzerland.

Since the reservoir’s inception, it has once before been used as a commerative landmark for the city of Nelspruit – in 1980, the reservoir was used as an emblem for the city’s 75th birthday celebration.

Today the reservoir is a well-known and highly visible landmark in the city, and its 12 facets are identical, pentagonal and uniquely shaped. Ghost completed the task of painting the reservoir to resemble a giant soccer ball at the beginning of April and since then, it has become Mbombela’s 2010 World Cup focal point.