Graskop
The Panorama Route's main town — God's Window, Blyde River Canyon viewpoints, and pancakes on the main road.
Trip Role
Ideal stay
Best for
Our take
The Panorama Route's base town — viewpoints by day, pancakes by default.
The Panorama Route's base town — viewpoints by day, pancakes by default.
- Trip Role
- Overnight
- Ideal Stay
- 1-2 nights
- Best For
- Panorama Route access
- Go If
- You're doing the Panorama Route or the Joburg–Kruger scenic drive.
Why go
Graskop is the practical hub of the Panorama Route — a forestry town perched on the escarpment, minutes from God's Window, Burke's Luck Potholes, and the Blyde River Canyon viewpoints.
What we love
The Blyde River Canyon viewpoints and the Graskop Gorge Lift.
What to know
4h from Johannesburg; a car is essential. Often foggy — viewpoints are weather-dependent.
What's here
Also in Graskop
Berlin Falls
A single, slender waterfall in a forested amphitheatre near Graskop.
Blyde River Canyon
One of the world's largest green canyons, on the Panorama Route above the lowveld.
Bourke's Luck Potholes
Strange, swirling rock potholes where the Treur and Blyde rivers meet — the start of the canyon.
Forest Falls
A wide, low Panorama-Route falls in pine forest — the broadest of the Sabie-area waterfalls.
God's Window
A cliff-edge viewpoint on the Panorama Route looking out over the lowveld to Mozambique.
Lisbon Falls
The highest of the Panorama Route waterfalls, a 90-metre drop near Graskop.
Mac-Mac Falls
Twin waterfalls near Sabie named after the gold rush that tried to mine the rock above them.
Three Rondavels
The three quartzite peaks across the Blyde Canyon — the iconic photograph of the Panorama Route.
Best things nearby
Blyde River Canyon
One of the world's largest green canyons, on the Panorama Route above the lowveld.
Hazyview
The self-drive Kruger gateway — the closest town to Phabeni and Numbi gates, and a launch point for the Panorama Route.
Sabie
A forestry town in a misty valley on the escarpment — waterfalls, forests, and the southern Panorama Route base.
More town in Mpumalanga
Barberton
An old gold-mining town ringed by the Makhonjwa Mountains — the earth's oldest rocks and a real working town, not a museum.
Dullstroom
A high-altitude trout-fishing village on the way to the Lowveld — cold, misty, and a weekend escape from Joburg.
Hazyview
The self-drive Kruger gateway — the closest town to Phabeni and Numbi gates, and a launch point for the Panorama Route.
Komatipoort
The last town before Kruger's Crocodile Bridge gate and the Mozambique border — a hot lowveld base, not a destination.
Lydenburg
A 1849 voortrekker town at the foot of the Long Tom Pass — the historical gateway onto the escarpment from the highveld.
Machadodorp
A highveld trout-fishing village on the N4 — a quiet fuel-and-river stop between Joburg and the escarpment.