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Karoo Sand Snake
The Karoo ( ; from the Afrikaans borrowing of the South Khoekhoe Khoemana (also known as !Orakobab or Korana) word is a semidesert natural region of South Africa. No exact definition of what constitutes the Karoo is available, so its extent is also not precisely defined. The Karoo is partly defined by its topography, geology and climate, and above all, its low rainfall, arid air, cloudless skies, and extremes of heat and cold. The Karoo also hosted a well-preserved ecosystem hundreds of millions of years ago which is now represented by many fossils. The Karoo formed an almost impenetrable barrier to the interior from Cape Town, and the early adventurers, explorers, hunters, and travelers on the way to the Highveld unanimously denounced it as a frightening place of great heat, great frosts, great floods, and great droughts. Today, it is still a place of great heat and frosts, and an annual rainfall of between 50 and 250 mm, though on some of the mountains it can be 250 to 50 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Matjiesfontein
Matjiesfontein is a settlement in Central Karoo District Municipality in the Western Cape province of South Africa. History The original inhabitants of the region were the Khoikhoi herders and the Bushmen, San hunter gatherers. Following the arrival of the early European colonists, the area was settled by Afrikaner Trekboers and Griqua people, Griqua people. Railway origins The town itself owes its existence to the Cape Government Railways, and to the route that their founder, Cape Colony, Cape Prime Minister John Molteno, chose for a railway line that would connect Cape Town's port to the diamond fields of Kimberley. The Royal Commonwealth Society (1898) records that in a meeting with his consulting engineers, the Prime Minister called for a map of Southern Africa to be brought to him and, taking a ruler, drew his pen along it from Cape Town all the way inland. He then handed the map to the engineers, telling them to build the railway accordingly. The line rapidly extended in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crassula
''Crassula'' is a genus of succulent plants containing about 200 accepted species, including the popular jade plant (''Crassula ovata''). They are members of the stonecrop family (Crassulaceae) and are native to many parts of the globe, but cultivated varieties originate almost exclusively from species from the Eastern Cape of South Africa. Crassulas are usually propagated by stem or leaf cuttings. Most cultivated forms will tolerate some small degree of frost, but extremes of cold or heat will cause them to lose foliage and die. Taxonomy ''Crassula'' was first formally described by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 with 10 species. Etymology The name crassula comes from the Latin adjective ''crassus'', meaning thick, referring to the thickening of the succulent leaves. Selected species *'' Crassula alata'' *'' Crassula alba'' *'' Crassula alpestris'' (Sand-Coated Crassula) *'' Crassula alstonii'' *'' Crassula aquatica'' (common pigmyweed, water pygmyweed) *'' Crassula arborescens ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Griqualand West
Griqualand West is an area of central South Africa with an area of 40,000 km2 that now forms part of the Northern Cape Province. It was inhabited by the Griqua people – a semi-nomadic, Afrikaans-speaking nation of mixed-race origin, who established several states outside the expanding frontier of the Cape Colony. It was also ancestral home to the Tswana and Khoisan peoples. In 1873 it was proclaimed as a British colony, with its capital at Kimberley, South Africa, Kimberley, and in 1880 it was annexed by the Cape Colony. When the Union of South Africa was formed in 1910, Griqualand West was part of the Cape Province but continued to have its own "provincial" sports teams. Early history The indigenous population of the area were the Khoi-khoi and Bushmen peoples, who were hunter-gatherers or herders. Early on they were joined by the agriculturalist Tswana people, Batswana, who migrated into the area from the north. They comprised the majority of the population througho ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cape Fold Mountains
The Cape Fold Belt (CFB) is a long fold-and-thrust mountain belt along the western and southern coastlines of Western Cape, South Africa. The Cape Fold Belt formed during the Permian period (300 to 250million years ago) in the late Paleozoic age, affecting the sequence of sedimentary rock layers of the siliciclastic Cape Supergroup with folding and faulted rocks, which were deposited in the Cape Basin in the southwestern corner of South Africa. The Cape Fold Belt was once part of a larger orogenic belt with other mountain ranges that formed as part of the same tectonic event that originally extended from Argentina, across southern Africa, and into Antarctica. It included the Ventana Mountains near Bahía Blanca in Argentina, the Pensacola Mountains in East Antarctica, the Ellsworth Mountains in West Antarctica, and the Hunter–Bowen orogeny in eastern Australia. The rocks involved in this fold system are primarily sandstones and shales, with shales from the Bokkeveld G ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Great Escarpment
''The'' is a grammatical article in English, denoting nouns that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the most frequently used word in the English language; studies and analyses of texts have found it to account for seven percent of all printed English-language words. It is derived from gendered articles in Old English which combined in Middle English and now has a single form used with nouns of any gender. The word can be used with both singular and plural nouns, and with a noun that starts with any letter. This is different from many other languages, which have different forms of the definite article for different genders or numbers. Pronunciation In most dialects, "the" is pronounced as (with the voiced dental fricative followed by a schwa) when followed by a consonant sound, and as (homophone of the archaic pronoun ''thee'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Karoo National Park
The Karoo National Park is a wildlife reserve in the Karoo, Great Karoo area of the Western Cape, South Africa#Geography, South Africa near Beaufort West. This semi-desert area covers an area of . The Nuweveld portion of the Great Escarpment, Southern Africa, Great Escarpment runs through the Park. It is therefore partly in the Karoo#Divisions, Lower Karoo, at about 850 m above sea level, and partly in the Karoo#Divisions, Upper Karoo at over 1300 m altitude.''Atlas of Southern Africa''. (1984). p. 102-103. Reader’s Digest Association, Cape Town Facilities The Park has a camp site for caravans and tents, chalets, an à la carte restaurant, a shop for basic necessities and curios, and picnic sites. The Park can be viewed by visitors on their own or with a guide. There are two main game viewing drives that do not require a four-wheel drive vehicle: the one to the east remains on the “Lammertjiesleegte” plains of the Lower Karoo; the other is the 49 km long circ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Swartberg
The Swartberg mountains (''black mountain'' in English language, English) are a mountain range in the Western Cape province of South Africa. It is composed of two main mountain chains running roughly east–west along the northern edge of the semi-arid Little Karoo. To the north of the range lies the other large semi-arid area in South Africa, the Great Karoo. Most of the Swartberg Mountains are above 2000 m high, making them the tallest mountains in the Western Cape. It is also one of the longest, spanning some 230 km from south of Laingsburg, Western Cape, Laingsburg in the west to between Willowmore and Uniondale, Western Cape, Uniondale in the east. Geologically, these mountains are part of the Cape Fold Belt. Much of the Swartberg is part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The two ranges The Swartberg consists of two officially named ranges, the Smaller and the Greater Swartberg Mountains. ''Klein Swartberge'' The Smaller Swartberg are the westernmost of the two. Ironi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Outeniqua Mountains
The Outeniqua Mountains, named after the Outeniqua Khoikhoi who lived there, is a mountain range that runs a parallel to the southern coast of South Africa, and forms a continuous range with the Langeberg to the west and the Tsitsikamma Mountains to the east. It was known as ''Serra de Estrella'' (Mountain of the Star) to the Portuguese. The mountains are part of the Garden Route of South Africa. Nomenclature "Outeniqua" is said to be derived from a Khoikhoi tribe that once lived in the mountains, and means "they who bear honey". Indigenous rock paintings can still be found in the area. History The San and Khoi people inhabited the mountains before the arrival of Europeans in the 1600s. The rugged mountains have long posed a barrier to the Klein Karoo and early settlers in the late 1600s used to follow herds of elephants to find easier ways through the area. The region was first explored by white settlers in 1668. In 1782 French explorer ornithologist François Levaillant e ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tankwa Karoo National Park
Tankwa Karoo National Park is a national park in South Africa. The park lies about 70 km west of Sutherland and along the border of the Northern Cape and Western Cape in Succulent Karoo habitat; a biodiversity hotspot and one of the most arid regions of South Africa. Before the park's proclamation, the only protected area of Succulent Karoo was the 2 square kilometre patch of the Gamkaberg Nature Reserve. Succulent Karoo has, together with the Cape Floral Kingdom, been declared a biodiversity hotspot by Conservation International. Geography It is bounded on the east by the Roggeveld Mountains, on the west by the Cederberg, to the north by the Kouebokkeveld Mountains and on the south by the scattered foothills of the Koedoesberge and Klein Roggeveld Mountains, and the Tankwa River. The park's headquarters are located at Roodewerf. Distances from the nearest towns to the park's headquarters are: Ceres (180 km), Sutherland (120 km), Calvinia (110 km) a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cederberg
The Cederberg mountains are located near Clanwilliam, Western Cape, Clanwilliam, approximately 300 km north of Cape Town, South Africa at about . The mountain range is named after the endangered Clanwilliam cedar (''Widdringtonia cedarbergensis''), which is a tree Endemic (ecology), endemic to the area. The mountains are noted for dramatic rock formations and Bushmen, San Cave painting, rock art. The Cederberg Wilderness Area is administered by CapeNature. ''Cederberg'' is now the generally accepted spelling for the area, which combines the English (Cedarberg) and Afrikaans (Sederberg) variants. Geography and climate The Cederberg mountains extend about 50 km north–south by 20 km east–west. They are bordered on the west by the Sandveld, the north by the Pakhuis Pass, Pakhuis Mountains, the east by the Springbok Flats and the south by the Kouebokkeveld Mountains and the Skurweberg Pass, Skurweberge. The main access road, the N7 (South Africa), N7, runs to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kalahari Desert
The Kalahari Desert is a large semiarid climate, semiarid sandy savanna in Southern Africa covering including much of Botswana as well as parts of Namibia and South Africa. It is not to be confused with the Angolan, Namibian, and South African Namib coastal desert, whose name is of Khoekhoe language, Khoekhoegowab origin and means "vast place". Etymology ''Kalahari'' is derived from the Tswana language, Tswana word ''Kgala'', meaning "the great thirst", or ''Kgalagadi'', meaning "a waterless place"; the Kalahari has vast areas covered by red sand without any permanent surface water. History The Kalahari Desert was not always a dry desert. The fossil flora and fauna from Gcwihaba, Gcwihaba Cave in Botswana indicates that the region was much wetter and cooler at least from 30 to 11 thousand Before Present, especially after 17,500 BP. Geography Drainage of the desert is by dry black valleys, seasonally inundated pans, and the large salt pan (geology), salt pans of the Mak ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bushmanland, Northern Cape
Bushmanland is an arid area south of the Orange River and west of Kenhardt and east of Springbok (Namaqualand) in the Northern Cape, South Africa. It includes the towns of Pofadder and Aggeneys, and places such as Namies and Bosluis Pan. Extensive plains are dotted with koppies like the Gamsberg. Bushmanland is an arid area inland from Namaqualand Namaqualand ( Khoikhoi: "Nama-kwa" meaning Nama Khoi people's land) is an arid region of Namibia and South Africa, extending along the west coast over and covering a total area of . It is divided by the lower course of the Orange River int .... It is probably the most inhospitable area in South Africa, arid and largely with infertile soil and highly saline groundwater. Vaalputs, a nuclear waste repository, has been sited between Bushmanland and Namaqualand, and acts as a '' de facto'' nature reserve. See also * Bushmanland (South West Africa) * Bundu Farm site {{Authority control Geography of the Northern Cape K ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
