Sediments, eroded from this immense Falkland Mountain range to the south, buried the folded Cape Supergroup rocks, and the plains beyond (to the north) to ultimately form the Karoo Supergroup, a sequence of sediments that eventually covered most of southern Africa and other parts of Gondwana. The Cape Supergroup re-emerged as mountains when uplift of the subcontinent, about 180 million years ago, and again 20 million years ago, started an episode of continuous erosion that was to remove many kilometres of surface deposits from Southern Africa. Although the tops of the original Cape Fold Mountains were eroded away, the hard Table Mountain Sandstone component eroded much slower, forming the backbone of the Cape Fold Mountains, with the younger, but very much softer Bokkeveld shales remaining only in the valleys (see diagram on the left).