Cliff Hangers

Birds of the Augrabies Gorge

- ANDREW JENKINS

Out on the broken plains of Bushmanland, the winding milk-chocolate flow of the Orange (or Gariep) River suddenly splits, narrows and accelerates. The main channel compresses millions of litres per second of turbid water into a torrent that surges through a smoothed bottleneck and roars out into a vast, dimly lit chasm. The water’s angry voice and the vapour born of its expressed energy fill the echoing cathedral it has spent millions of years carving from hard-baked rock. In a landscape of austerity and heat, the waterfall is an endless celebration of the vitality of the river, while the deep devastation of the gorge below is a monument to its enduring power.

Augrabies Falls National Park is located in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa and is naturally focused on its eponymous waterfall and the subsequent course of the Orange River. The park also extends to include a significant area of rugged terrain and mainly stunted succulent vegetation that sustains a modest diversity of dry-country fauna and flora. The landscape surrounding the river is flattish but undulating and complex, beset with exposed geology and dark, craggy rock formations, topped by ancient quiver trees frozen in angular poses.