South Africa Show cave
Cango Caves
16 °C inside, all year.
Rute Martins of Leoa's Photography ( www.leoa.co.za ) · CC BY-SA 3.0
The descent
The entrance, at 660 m.
The real relief above Cango Caves, measured on the Copernicus model every 30 m, and the cave going down at the same vertical scale.
The depth is the one published by those who explored it; the shape of the galleries is a sketch, not a survey. No depth has been published for this cave yet.
660m
Entrance altitude
published (Wikidata)
16°C
Inside, all year
the yearly average outside, at the entrance
214m
Rock above
the highest point within 1.5 km
Inside and outside
16 °C inside, all year.
Deep inside, a cave keeps the average temperature of the year outside: about 16 °C here, in January and in August. In January the afternoon reaches 30 °C at the entrance, 14 °C warmer than inside: take a jacket. The best months to escape the heat are from December to March.
- 30°14°Jan
- 30°14°Feb
- 28°12°Mar
- 24°10°Apr
- 21°7°May
- 17°4°Jun
- 17°4°Jul
- 18°4°Aug
- 21°6°Sep
- 24°9°Oct
- 26°10°Nov
- 29°12°Dec
Outside: afternoon and night averages for 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) brought to the altitude of the entrance. Inside: the yearly average, which deep parts of a cave keep. Near the entrance it follows the weather a little.
Geographical object
Cango Caves is a show cave in South Africa. The entrance is at 660 m. It has stalactites and stalagmites. It is open to visitors.
Getting there.
- Show cave: open to visitorsHours in OpenStreetMap: Mo-Su 09:00-16:30 · ticket requiredOfficial site↗
- Oudtshoornnearest town · 23 km in a straight line
- Parking 50 m awaynearest car park in OpenStreetMap, straight line
- Viewpointsnearest viewpoint · 0.0 km from the entrance
- George Airport (GRJ)nearest airport with scheduled flights · 70 km in a straight lineCar hire at GRJ airport (George)Discover Cars · sponsored link↗
Plan the visit
Guided tours, a bed nearby, a car.
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
From above.
The ground above the cave, with the relief shaded, the line of the section and what people have mapped around the entrance.
N
1.5 km
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 6.0 × 6.0 km, north up. The line is the section above. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Around the entrance.
- 1other cave entrances within 3 kmCango Caves
- 1viewpoints within 3 km
- 1car parks within 2 km
- 1information boards and visitor centres within 3 km
- 2campsites within 8 kmKangoo Campsite, De Hoek Mountain Resort
- 3hotels and guesthouses within 8 kmKangoo Bergort, Old Mill Country Lodge, Cango Caves Estate Manor House
- 3restaurants and cafés within 3 km
- springs within 2 km
- sinkholes within 3 km
- caving clubs and spots within 15 km
- marked hiking routes within 3 km
- climbing crags within 3 km
- named waterfalls within 4 km
- bus stops within 2 km
Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit, around the entrance. A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet. © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).
Towns nearby
- Oudtshoorn23 km in a straight line
In our other atlases
What else is around Cango Caves.
The river at the entrance, the waterfalls, the lakes, the mountains and volcanoes above, the canyons, beaches and islands nearby — from our other atlases.
Lakeyas1 lakes within 10 km
Peakyas6 mountains within 10 kmFigures from the sister sites' databases (Wikidata, HydroATLAS, GeoNames, NOAA, OpenStreetMap). Links open when each site is online.
Month by month
The weather outside, at the entrance.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Afternoon | 30 | 30 | 28 | 24 | 21 | 17 | 17 | 18 | 21 | 24 | 26 | 29 |
| Afternoon | 30 | 30 | 28 | 24 | 21 | 17 | 17 | 18 | 21 | 24 | 26 | 29 |
| Night | 14 | 14 | 12 | 10 | 7 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 6 | 9 | 10 | 12 |
| Rain (mm) | 38 | 45 | 55 | 43 | 31 | 32 | 32 | 46 | 31 | 45 | 51 | 39 |
| Rainy days | 9 | 9 | 9 | 7 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 7 | 6 | 8 | 8 | 8 |
| Sun hours/day | 11.5 | 10.7 | 9.7 | 8.2 | 7.3 | 6.8 | 7.4 | 8.1 | 9.3 | 10.1 | 11.1 | 11.7 |
| Afternoon | Afternoon | Night | Rain (mm) | Sun hours/day | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan | 30 | 30 | 14 | 38 | 11.5 |
| Feb | 30 | 30 | 14 | 45 | 10.7 |
| Mar | 28 | 28 | 12 | 55 | 9.7 |
| Apr | 24 | 24 | 10 | 43 | 8.2 |
| May | 21 | 21 | 7 | 31 | 7.3 |
| Jun | 17 | 17 | 4 | 32 | 6.8 |
| Jul | 17 | 17 | 4 | 32 | 7.4 |
| Aug | 18 | 18 | 4 | 46 | 8.1 |
| Sep | 21 | 21 | 6 | 31 | 9.3 |
| Oct | 24 | 24 | 9 | 45 | 10.1 |
| Nov | 26 | 26 | 10 | 51 | 11.1 |
| Dec | 29 | 29 | 12 | 39 | 11.7 |
Averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, brought to the altitude of the entrance (660 m) with the standard lapse rate. Not a forecast.
Photographs
Inside and around.
Recent years
Wet years, dry years.
Rain of each month as a share of the 1991–2020 average. A dry year means a lower river and hotter rock; a wet one, more water in the gorge.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 130% | 79% | 58% | 62% | 121% | 35% | 63% | 130% | 128% | 127% | 93% | 51% |
| 2021 | 65% | 38% | 123% | 45% | 166% | 41% | 135% | 124% | 51% | 118% | 150% | 176% |
| 2022 | 72% | 93% | 88% | 73% | 96% | 148% | 57% | 65% | 62% | 49% | 42% | 197% |
| 2023 | 86% | 102% | 126% | 60% | 219% | 193% | 143% | 35% | 288% | 124% | 8% | 129% |
| 2024 | 48% | 73% | 68% | 225% | 35% | 297% | 102% | 130% | 130% | 174% | 92% | 14% |
| 2025 | 56% | 102% | 94% | 139% | 46% | 130% | 69% | 15% | 60% | 54% | 52% | 38% |
130% or more: wet month 70% or less: dry month
Caves nearby.
Cango Caves
South Africa
- —Depth
- —Galleries
- 660 mEntrance altitude
- 16 °CInside, all year
Blombos Cave
South Africa · 146 km
- —Depth
- —Galleries
- 40 mEntrance altitude
- 18 °CInside, all year
Nelson Bay Cave
South Africa · 133 km
- —Depth
- —Galleries
- 34 mEntrance altitude
- 19 °CInside, all year
Klasies River Caves
South Africa · 216 km
- —Depth
- —Galleries
- 32 mEntrance altitude
- 19 °CInside, all year
Where these figures come from
| Name, type, published depth and length, visitors | Wikidata (Q1033211) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| The relief above, the entrance altitude, the section and the 3D model | Copernicus DEM GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA |
| Climate | NASA POWER, 1991–2020 |
| Entrances, springs, sinkholes, opening hours and what is around | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
| Rivers, waterfalls, lakes, mountains, canyons, beaches and islands nearby | Coastya, Lakeyas, Peakyas, Cascadyas, Islandyas, Riveryas |
Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.
The family
Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers, canyons, caves, dark skies, viewpoints, birdwatching or forests?
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