About Great Trek

Our main focus includes, but is not limited to - providing help and advice on immigration, travel, life and experiences in The UK, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand - and bringing people living in these countries together. Our aim is to provide a place where you can ask for help, look for advice, read or write articles, book a flight, have a laugh, and discuss a just about any topic that interests you. We constantly strive to evolve with our members and we're always looking for ways to better the experience of vising our site.

History of the Site

Great Trek was started in 2004 as a more serious spin-off from The Marulatree, one of the pioneers of South African expat forums. The sole aim of Great Trek was to provide help and support for Visa and Immigration issues for South Africans in the UK.

In 2005 Great Trek changed ownership, and the focus of the site changed as well. Due to work, study and travel commitments, we were unable to give the site the attention it needed, and activity was low.

In June 2007, the final decision was made to develop, grow and nurture the site. Some of you will remember the old (boring?) default skin that we had. The Forums underwent an overhaul, with the invaluable help of Matobo Design, taking on a new look and feel. Moderators were appointed, the forum software was upgraded to the latest version, the games arcade was introduced, and we also added the "the little things" that provide a better user experience - News updates, Smileys, Reputation, PM's, Personal Avatars, the Pager to name a few....

In November 2007, a range of new pages were introduced (including this very page) and we also added a flight booking engine - you can now search over 500 Airlines for flights to, from or within South Africa.

The First Great Trek

The Great Trek was the Eastward and North Eastward movement of a number of people (Voortrekkers) in Southern Africa in the 1830's and 1840's in search of a new life. Whilst we don't neccesarily focus on the political aspect of the Great Trek, many of our own members can relate to this great journey as we've made our own journeys to new countries, for varying reasons. I can only imagine how much easier the Great Trek would have been if the Voortrekkers had a site like this where they could share information and ask for advice from people who had already been there...

Have a look around, search for a flight, join the forums - ask a question or write an article, send us some feedback, but most of all, enjoy the site. Thank you for visiting.