Compassberg ( af, Kompasberg), is a mountain peak of the

Sneeuberge The Sneeuberge or Sneeuberg mountain range was historically known as “Sneeuwbergen”, meaning ‘snow mountains’ in Cape Dutch, and refers to a significant portion of Southern Africa's Great Escarpment in the Cradock, Murraysburg, Richmon ...

range in

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

. It is located 55 km due north of

Graaff-Reinet Graaff-Reinet is a town in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. It is the oldest town in the province. It is also the sixth-oldest town in South Africa, after Cape Town, Stellenbosch, Simon's Town, Paarl and Swellendam. The town was the c ...

in the

Eastern Cape Province The Eastern Cape is one of the provinces of South Africa. Its capital is Bhisho, but its two largest cities are East London and Gqeberha. The second largest province in the country (at 168,966 km2) after Northern Cape, it was formed in 199 ...

. At 2504 metres, it is the highest peak in South Africa outside the Stormberg-

Drakensberg The Drakensberg (Afrikaans: Drakensberge, Zulu: uKhahlambha, Sotho: Maluti) is the eastern portion of the Great Escarpment, which encloses the central Southern African plateau. The Great Escarpment reaches its greatest elevation – within th ...

massif. It was named by Colonel

Robert Jacob Gordon Robert Jacob Gordon (29 September 1743, in Doesburg, Gelderland – 25 October 1795, in Cape Town) was a Dutch explorer, soldier, artist, naturalist and linguist of Scottish descent. Life Robert Jacob Gordon was the son of Maj. General Jacob ...

when he accompanied Governor

Joachim van Plettenberg Baron Joachim Ammena van Plettenberg (8 March 1739, Leeuwarden, Netherlands – 18 August 1793, Zwolle, Netherlands) was the governor of the Cape of Good Hope from 11 August 1771 to 14 February 1785. Plettenberg was presiding governor after ...

on a journey to the eastern frontier of the

Cape Colony The Cape Colony ( nl, Kaapkolonie), also known as the Cape of Good Hope, was a British Empire, British colony in present-day South Africa named after the Cape of Good Hope, which existed from 1795 to 1802, and again from 1806 to 1910, when i ...

in 1778. The mountain is composed of sediments of the

Beaufort Series The Beaufort Group is the third of the main subdivisions of the Karoo Supergroup in South Africa. It is composed of a lower Adelaide Subgroup and an upper Tarkastad Subgroup. It follows conformably after the Ecca Group and unconformably underlie ...

in the Karoo System, and extensively intruded by

dolerite Diabase (), also called dolerite () or microgabbro, is a mafic, holocrystalline, subvolcanic rock equivalent to volcanic basalt or plutonic gabbro. Diabase dikes and sills are typically shallow intrusive bodies and often exhibit fine-grained ...

dikes Dyke (UK) or dike (US) may refer to: General uses * Dyke (slang), a slang word meaning "lesbian" * Dike (geology), a subvertical sheet-like intrusion of magma or sediment * Dike (mythology), ''Dikē'', the Greek goddess of moral justice * Dikes ...

and sills.

References

External links

*{{cite web, title=''Compassberg'', work=South African Hikes, url=http://www.sahikes.co.za/Details.asp?TrailID=38, accessdate=2010-09-03, archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100821042756/http://www.sahikes.co.za/Details.asp?TrailID=38, archive-date=2010-08-21, url-status=dead
Climbing the CompassbergCompassberg picture from Panoramio
Mountains of the Eastern Cape Karoo