Entry to Meiringspoort is via Klaarstroom, 55 kms east of Prince Albert en route to Oudtshoorn and the coast. Following spectacular floods which caused great damage, the road has been reconstructed over the past two years at a cost of R70 million. Meiringspoort was officially re-opened by the Western Cape Premier, Gerald Morkel, on 20th October 2000.
The first road through Meiringspoort was constructed between 1856 and 1858. by Adam de Schmidt. On the morning of 3 March 1858 a colourful procession of about 250 mounted men and 100 distinguished guests in "spiders", carriages and wagons departed through a triumphal arch decorated with flags for the journey to Klaarstroom - where a deputation of important guests from Prince Albert and Beaufort West awaited their arrival under another triumphal arch.
The first freight of wool from the interior was dispatched to Mossel Bay through Meiringspoort in "twaalf lange wolwagens" (12 long ox-drawn wool wagons) on the same day.
The road through the Meiringspoort is a remarkable engineering feat, but the overwhelming features of a drive through Meiringspoort are the wonders of nature. The folds of the Table Mountain sandstone strata tower above the road, constantly changing colour as you move through sunlight and shade. Hardy plants, including indigenous pelargoniums, cling to the precarious rock faces while birds, baboons and smaller fauna abound in the protected kloofs and crevices. Among the most scenic spots is the Skelm tumbling into a dark pool which, legend has it, is bottomless. (In 1938 it stopped flowing for the first time in human memory).
How does a fold mountain form?
Fold mountains are created by uplift and folding of tectonic plates as they move towards each other and collide. This is known as a compressional plate margin. An example is the Andes Mountain range in South America (Nazca Plate colliding with the South American Plate)
The plates may be either 'continental and continental' or 'continental and oceanic'. The plates move towards each other, but there isn't a free space for them to move into because they are already touching each other. With two massive plates of rock pushing against each other and continually moving, all that rock has to go somewhere!
At a destructive plate margin where oceanic and continental plates collide, the oceanic plate is subducted, pulled under the continental plate - whilst the continental plate is crumpled upwards to form a mountain range. The Andes are an example of fold mountains formed at a destructive plate margin.
When two continental plates move towards each other, both plates are forced upwards in a series of folds. This caused big problems for early geologists who struggled to explain why they were finding fossils of sea creatures high up in mountains such as the Himalayas! We now know that the fossils got there due to uplift of sedimentary rocks found along the edges of the plates.
You can simulate this process using two flat strips of modeling clay or old carpet. Put them side by side and push them together. One or both will crumple up and form a mini mountain range on your table top.
To log your visit, answer the following:
1. How deep is the pool at the waterfall?
2. What rockformations can be found/seen here?
3. How manny times do you cross the "Grootriver" in the "Poort"?
4. What other famous spot is closeby? (see GC1BXMT)
5. Send a photo (you and your GPS @ the waterfall) and answers to me