Africa's white tribe

There can be few more unpopular commoditieson sale in the new South Africa than Boer history. The old white supremacist Afrikaner has few friends in a world still hailing the end of white minority rule. Yet in some of the most beautiful parts of Nelson Mandela's new nation, the controversial story of the white settlers is still being offered as the sole attraction.

The footsteps of the Boers are nowhere more visible than in the rolling hill country of Mpumalanga - which, until the boundaries of apartheid were unravelled, was known as the Eastern Transvaal. This green and scenic region marks the far end of the Great Trek, the legendary exodus of Boer farmers away from British rule in the Cape during the 1830s. With their ox-carts and hunting rifles, they pushed eastwards and northwards through an unforgiving expanse in search of new territory. The African locals they met along the way were either scattered, subdued or enslaved.

Today, superbly positioned hotel hideaways tempt "the exhausted executive" with comfort, outdoor pursuits, good food, wine, and clear mountain air. But buy a tourist map of this region and the innocent abroad could still be forgiven for thinking that there is no human history here except that of the white settlers. Three years into the brave new world, there is virtual silence about black South African culture along this particular tourist route.

Pilgrim's Rest, near Lydenburg, is a tourist trap which encapsulates much of this paradox. The fever that followed the discovery of a gold nugget in a river bed here in 1873 made the town boom for more than a decade. Today, this remote mountain bolt-hole looks much as it did in those gold-rush days. Wooden buildings with red corrugated-iron roofs line the main street. Since 1971, the town has been preserved as a living museum. The Digger's Den, part of the Royal Hotel, is decorated with sepia images of busy tented camps, the pained faces of hopeful prospectors, and the heavily laden gold coach about to brave the hazards of Robbers Pass. Guided tours leave from here five times daily along old wagon trails in search of miners' diggings, kitchens, caves and graves.

On a nearby plateau, the luxurious thatched Mount Sheba hotel offers a hiker's paradise, with trails leading around the wooded mountainside and back to a forecourt lined with rusting mining trucks and drilling equipment. The hotel study is stuffed with books in which the 1870s prospectors are revered with ancestral pride, as examples of the ability to "triumph over adversity". Local folklore brims with such outback tales, none more popular than the story of Jock of the Bushveld. Sir Percy Fitzpatrick's trusty dog makes Lassie look like a disobedient mongrel.

Much of the cocooning of the Afrikaner past turns a blind eye to the abuses of recent history and instead lifts up the early Voortrekker families for our admiration. The same is true of other Boer landmarks in the region. The Long Tom cannon overlooking the road to Lydenburg recalls the spirit of stubborn defiance with which the Boers stalled the British Army during the Boer War. On a hilltop at the entrance to Pretoria, the massive Voortrekker monumentproclaims the "heroic" passage of Boers into "their" new land, and is still a gathering point for militant rallies of the "volk" who feel increasingly marginalised in the new South Africa. Within the city, the house of Paul Kruger, trekker and founding president of the Boer Republic, is a time-capsule of a puritanical bible-thumping existence in which is written all the belligerent survivalism which kept Boers strong in their belief that they were a special case for so long.

The mountains of the Mpumalanga are an extremely popular lure for tourists, being only four hours' drive from Johannesburg. With rates of only pounds 45 per night at even the best resort hotels - such as the Mount Sheba - it is no wonder that foreign tourists continue to flock to the area. But anyone expecting a post-1994 multicultural experience won't find it here.

South Africa's tourism authorities are presently wrestling with the Republic's image: "1997 is South Africa's year of cultural tourism," declares a spokesman. "It's about time we added to the beach, the bush, the sports, and share our rich culture with the rest of the world." Will this mean downgrading the emphasis on Boer history in the country's beautiful places? "Not exactly, but we'll be trying to correct the balance and bring African culture more into view."

In the meantime, don't be put off if you find yourself confronted by the ghosts of apartheid when going in search of scenic beauty in the hills. Though the history on show is definitely Boer, it is not necessarily boring. Afrikaner hero Louis Botha, a guerrilla commander admired by both sides in the Boer War, followed a realistic philosophy: "To defeat your enemy, you must first get to know him." A journey through these golden hills can provide a rare insight into the Afrikaner character: stubborn self- reliance, entrenchment in isolation, and a chosen-race mentality that many feel aggrieved at having to explain to others now that their fortunes have changed.

The Boer may be in the dock as never before, but his story is nevertheless integral to understanding anything about the new South Africa. The trip, however, would be even more illuminating if the forgotten history of the black majority were on show as well.