South Africa is the southern most country in Africa, bordered on the north by Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Swaziland - On the east and south, by the Indian Ocean and on the west, by the Atlantic Ocean. Lesotho forms an enclave in the northeastern part of the country.
South Africa has a diverse and dramatic landscape. Most of the interior, is covered by high plateaus, which are separated from the country's long coastline, by chains of tall mountains. South Africa is rich in minerals, such as gold and diamonds and its industrial base, grew up around the mining industry.
South Africa is divided into nine provinces. These provinces are Gauteng, Northern Province, Mpumalanga, North-West Province, Free State, Eastern Cape, Northern Cape, Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal. The country has three capitals - Cape Town is the legislative capital - Pretoria, the executive capital and Bloemfontein, the judicial capital.
South Africa stretches for some 1,500 km (950 miles), from east to west and 1,000 km (640 miles) from north to south. It has an area of 1,219,090 sq km (470,693 sq miles). A ridge called the Great Escarpment, forms a boundary between the interior plateaus and the coastal regions.
South Africa's 2,800 km (1,740 miles) of coastline, has few bays or coves and only one good natural harbor, at Saldanha Bay in the southwest, which is used mainly for the export of iron ore. Other ports are essentially artificial, including Durban, East London, Port Elizabeth and Richard's Bay. The most distinctive promontory on the coast, is Cape Peninsula, in southwestern South Africa, which ends at the Cape of Good Hope. Coral reefs fringe parts of the eastern coast.
The chief rivers are the Orange, Vaal and Limpopo. The Orange is the longest, stretching about 2,100 km (about 1,300 miles). It rises in Lesotho, where it is called the Senqu and flows northwestward to the Atlantic, forming the boundary with Namibia, along the river's westernmost section. The Vaal rises in the northeast, near Swaziland and flows southwestward to its confluence with the Orange. The Limpopo rises further north, flowing northeastward to the Botswana border and then eastward along the Botswana and Zimbabwe borders, until it enters Mozambique, where it empties into the Indian Ocean. Many shorter rivers flow south to the Indian Ocean, including the Sondags, Great Fish and Kei in the Eastern Cape and the Tugela, in KwaZuluNatal.
Most of South Africa's rivers, are irregular in flow and are dry during much of the year. Consequently, they are of little use for navigation, or hydro-electric power, but of some use for irrigation and water supply. The Orange River Project, begun in 1962, transfers water from the Orange River to the Great Fish and Sondags river basins. In the late 1970s, water began to be pumped from the Tugela, to the Vaal, to meet the growing needs of the Witwatersrand industrial region. This is supplemented by the major Lesotho Highlands Water Project, begun in 1986, which diverts water from the Senqu and other rivers. With the exception of Fundudzi Lake, which was formed by a huge landslide in the northeastern Soutpansberg Range, South Africa's only notable lakes, are artificial and include those created by the Vaal Dam and Gariep Dam on the Orange River.
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