Geography

The landscape

Lesotho is a small, independent nation about the size of Belgium. It is located in the middle of Southern Africa, completely surrounded by South Africa. It is known as "the Mountain Kingdom", with many peaks well over 3000m, and the highest "lowest" point of any country in the world at over 1000m.

Geographically, most of Lesotho is a high mountain plateau, carved out by river valleys. Most of these drain into the Senqu River, which later becomes South Africa's major river, the Orange. The river valleys and the mountain ranges run from the northeast to the southwest of the country. The eastern edge of the plateau forms the Drakensberg Mountains and the border with Kwa-Zulu Natal. The western border is formed by the Caledon(or Mohokare) River. The area between the Caledon and the first range of mountains is known as the Lowlands.

In the Lowlands and the deeper valleys, the terrain is eroded into cliff faces, large overhangs and interesting rock formations. The rock here is sandstone, of which there are different layers. After the sandstone was laid down, large fissures formed and lava poured out, forming a series of thick layers of basalt on top of the sandstone. Thus the peaks and ridges of the mountains are the harder basalt which have resisted erosion. The basalt layers in the Lowlands have eroded and exposed the sandstone. In many places the transition from the reds, oranges and yellows of the sandstone to the grey basalt is very clear.

Mountain View cc-img_2256.jpg Valley g84-ribaneng-top-view,-mar9.jpg Snow i-img_1581.jpg