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The Mountain Club of South Africa MCSA
National flag
Sport	Mountaineering
Official website	www.mcsa.org.za
History
Year of formation	1891
Affiliations
International federation	International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation (UIAA)
Elected
President	Paul Carstensen
Address	97 Hatfield St Cape Town
Country	South Africa

The Mountain Club of South Africa (MCSA) is the largest and oldestmountaineering club inSouth Africa. It facilitates and engages inmountaineering,climbing of all types, bouldering,hiking, international expeditions, mountainsearch and rescue,training,conservation of mountain areas, and procurement of access for mountaineering.

The MCSA was founded in 1891^[1]: 34 and hence is one of the oldest mountaineering clubs in the world. Since its establishment, the MCSA has been embedded with and reflected, the political ideology and interests of the social and governing class during the colonial and segregation eras.^[2] This situation prevailed for most of the apartheid era, when the club finally opened its membership to all, regardless of race and the first black member was admitted in 1986. The MCSA is the only mountain club inAfrica affiliated with the world mountaineering body, theUIAA.^[3] Members of the MCSA have climbed and hiked on all the majormountain ranges throughout the world. Since its inception, the MCSA has published an annual journal. The MCSA Journal is one of the oldest mountain club journals still being published on an annual basis.

The club consists of 14 sections spread overSouth Africa andNamibia and with more than 4000 members.

• Amajuba
• Cape Town
• Eastern Province
• Free State
• Hottentots Holland
• Johannesburg
• KwaZulu-Natal
• Magaliesberg (also known as the Pretoria section)
• Namibia
• Paarl/Wellington
• South Cape
• Stellenbosch
• Tygerberg
• Worcester

The objectives of the Mountain Club of South Africa are to further the interests of mountaineering in South Africa and elsewhere, and in doing so inter alia to:

• Organise and facilitate mountaineering
• Procure and protect real rights in and access to mountains and mountain areas
• Initiate and support actions towards protecting the natural beauty andwilderness character of mountains and to promote their effective conservation management
• Promote the safety and training of mountaineers
• Providesearch and rescue resources
• Promote the study of mountains and their environments, the preservation of historical andarchaeological sites on them and the dissemination of information on mountains and mountaineering.

• Keppel Harcourt Barnard
• Elsie Elizabeth Esterhuysen
• Johannes de Villiers Graaff
• Rudolf Marloth
• Cathy O'Dowd
• Edwin Percy Phillips
• Marianne Pretorius
• Jan Smuts

• South African National Climbing Federation

• The Mountain Club of South Africa
• The MCSA - Cape Town Section
• Johannesburg Section
• Mcsamagalies.co.za
• MCSA Eastern Province Section
• UIAA website
• Kzn.mcsa.org.za

• Sports governing bodies in South Africa
• Climbing and mountaineering organizations
• Hiking organizations
• Alpine clubs
• Sports organizations established in 1891
• Sports clubs and teams in South Africa

• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Articles lacking in-text citations from August 2022
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• Use dmy dates from October 2023
• Use South African English from October 2023
• All Wikipedia articles written in South African English