Rhodes Memorial was erected in honor of Cecil Rhodes, the man who, incidentally, donated the land for Kirstenbosch Gardens in 1902. Rhodes made his fortune in the Kimberley diamond mines and became prime minister of the Cape in 1890. A true British imperialist, he "owned" Zimbabwe (previously known as Rhodesia), and it was his lifelong dream to see a Cape-to-Cairo railway line built so that the "sun would never set on the British Empire." The memorial is an imposing granite staircase flanked by lions and overlooking the Cape Flats and Table Bay. In one of the Cape's most bizarre juxtapositions, herds of wildebeests and zebras graze on the slopes around the memorial, oblivious to rubberneckers driving the M3 below. An informal restaurant behind the memorial has outdoor tables with some of the best views in Cape Town -- a great breakfast or light snack venue.

Copyright: Excerpted from Frommer's South Africa, 5th Edition, (c) 2008, Wiley Publishing, Inc.

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