Best Stargazing Lodges in South Africa

It was long after dark. As our safari vehicle’s headlights bounced over the dirt road in front of us, our tracker, Elroy Pietersen, swept a spotlight across the bush, picking up a flash of animal eyes. Roelof Wiesner, our guide and driver, jolted the car to a halt. “Aardvark,” the two men whispered in unison. Then they switched the lights off.

We were in a mountainous corner of the Karoo, a desert that covers a third of South Africa. (The name Karoo comes from a word meaning “place of thirst” in the Khoikhoi language.) As our eyes slowly adjusted to the gazillion pinprick stars above, Wiesner pointed out constellations: Orion’s Belt, consisting of three bright stars; the Southern Cross, the famous navigation tool of early seafarers; the hazy band of the Milky Way. Pietersen — whose family descends from the San people, the oldest Indigenous group in the Karoo — relayed how, in their telling, the galaxy was formed when a young girl threw ashes up into the sky. 

Pietersen and Wiesner are guides at Samara Karoo Reserve, where, in addition to traditional suites, guests can book a four-poster bed under the stars on a wooden pedestal set up along the river. 

The Karoo is largely free of light pollution and offers spectacular views of the southern celestial hemisphere. (The Square Kilometre Array, billed as the world’s largest radio telescope, is being built nearby, in the town of Carnavon.) 

In recent years, lodges throughout South Africa have started catering to travelers who want a clearer view of the cosmos. In the foothills of the Langeberg Mountains, Starry Starry Night Eco Mountain Lodge features “star-domed” tented cottages with skylights. Guests can spot constellations like Scorpius and Sirius by night and, by day, observe a variety of birds, including the orange-breasted sunbird and the Cape rockjumper.

Three hours north of Cape Town is Bushmans Kloof Wilderness Reserve & Wellness Retreat, a 14-room retreat surrounded by the Gaudí-esque rock formations of the Cederberg Mountains. Travelers can book private dinners under the stars and learn about the property’s ancient rock-art sites, many of which date back 10,000 years.

Meanwhile, in the Phinda Private Game Reserve, about 180 miles north of Durban, safari company andBeyond can arrange a sleep-out under the stars for guests at any of its six properties, including Phinda Mountain Lodge, complete with sundowners, a fire-cooked dinner, and beds draped in gauzy netting. Photography lovers might consider the nine-suite Thanda Safari Lodge, which offers workshops in shooting the stars. 

At Samara Karoo, I found that an understanding of the sky also brought greater insight into the land and its inhabitants, including animals — while gazing up at Orion and the Southern Cross, Pietersen told us that in the Sotho and Tswana cultures, these four stars are known as Dithutlwa, which translates to “the Giraffes.”

A version of this story first appeared in the December 2024/January 2025 issue of Travel + Leisure under the headline “Guardians of the Galaxy.”