Discover enchanting Dorset

Intimate and special, and surrounded by beautiful countryside, our country-house hotel offers a cosseting experience in the heart of Dorset. With genuine warm service, innovative and delicious menus, a relaxing spa, a stunning indoor pool and fragrant landscaped gardens, this is the quintessential luxurious escape.

We are delighted to be re-opening our doors once again for leisure stays from 17th May, and look forward to welcoming our guests with exceptional service and warm hospitality, alongside stringent safety and sanitation protocols to place our guests’ and teams’ wellbeing at the heart of everything we do.

Making a difference

The Bushmans Kloof rock art excursions have been selected as a MAKE TRAVEL MATTER® experience. Chosen for the positive impact it has on the traveller and the communities we explore, it directly advances the United Nations’ Global Goal 11 'Sustainable Cities and Communities' by preserving ancient traditional art, an important element of Bushmans Kloof's cultural heritage.

Discover our rock art excursions

Bushmans Kloof Londi at the Cave pointing to rick art with a stick

If rocks could talk

The San rock art of the Cederberg offers a fascinating glimpse into both the daily life and cultural traditions of this ancient nomadic people. Typically painted in sheltered overhangs, these intricate paintings are a vibrant record of this stone-age culture. The artists used ground ochre, animal blood and plant extracts to create their paint, with the passage of time evident in the fading of each pigment.

In the company of our expert guides, discover the remarkable history stained into these dramatic cliffs and rocky outcrops. From energetic hunts to shamanic visions and transformative dances, these sandstone galleries have so many stories to share.

Key sites

Of the 130 rock art sites identified on the reserve, a handful stand out for their enormous contribution to our understanding of the depth and diversity of San rock art.

Fallen Rock is one of the undoubted highlights, and the walls here contain a large well preserved collection of images unique in the entire Pakhuis region. Named for an enormous slab of fallen sandstone, deposits of ash, sand and grass suggest that this was once a dwelling site for local San.

At Elephant Hunt the metaphorical nature of San rock art is clearly visible, while at Bleeding Nose guides will explain why the images here suggest that this was a site of shamanic importance.