The Company’s Garden is Cape Town’s green lung. This oasis right in the centre of the city is a favourite for both locals and tourists. The site is important historically, and is a thriving urban space where buskers strum guitars while office workers sun themselves over lunch hour. There is plenty to do, but here are our top six things to do when you visit.

The Company’s Garden was first built as a refreshment station for the trade route that rounded the tip of Africa between Europe and the east. Ships sent by the Dutch East India Company would stop by after months at sea and stock up on fresh produce grown in the garden—hence, “The Company’s Garden”.

There is so much to explore in terms of history inside the garden. Near the Adderley Street entrance a statue of Queen Victoria stands overlooking the Slave Lodge, while a statue of Jan Smuts looks on. Just over the road is the St George’s Cathedral, known as the “people’s church”—even during the apartheid era, all races were welcomed. It was also the starting point for the 30,000-strong demonstration led by Archbishop Desmond Tutu in 1989—and where Tutu coined the phrase ‘rainbow people’ to describe the diversity of South Africa’s population.

The Garden is also home to the South African Museum and the Cape Town Holocaust Centre here, where you can view exhibits about the atrocities suffered by Jews during World War II.

Beyond that, there are dozens of little historical treasures you’d easily miss if you weren’t looking for them. There is the Rutherford Fountain—which still stands on the original spot where it was erected in 1864—and the well pump embedded in an oak tree which dates back to 1842. There’s also the oldest cultivated tree in South Africa—a saffron pear, propped up on huge steel crutches.