API bindings to the Geospatial Data Abstraction Library ('GDAL', <https://gdal.org>). Implements the GDAL Raster and Vector Data Models. Bindings are implemented with Rcpp modules. Exposed C++ classes and stand-alone functions wrap much of the GDAL API and provide additional functionality. Calling signatures resemble the native C, C++ and Python APIs provided by the GDAL project. Class GDALRaster encapsulates a GDALDataset and its raster band objects. Class GDALVector encapsulates an OGRLayer and the GDALDataset that contains it. Class VSIFile provides bindings to the GDAL VSIVirtualHandle API. Additional classes include CmbTable for counting unique combinations of integers, and RunningStats for computing summary statistics efficiently on large data streams. C++ stand-alone functions provide bindings to most GDAL raster and vector utilities including OGR facilities for vector geoprocessing, several algorithms, the Geometry API ('GEOS via GDAL headers), the Spatial Reference Systems API, and methods for coordinate transformation. Bindings to the Virtual Systems Interface ('VSI') API implement standard file system operations, abstracted for URLs, cloud storage services, Zip'/'GZip'/'7z'/'RAR', in-memory files, as well as regular local file systems. This provides a single interface for operating on file system objects that works the same for any storage backend. A custom raster calculator evaluates a user-defined R expression on a layer or stack of layers, with pixel x/y available as variables in the expression. Raster combine() identifies and counts unique pixel combinations across multiple input layers, with optional raster output of the pixel-level combination IDs. Basic plotting capability is provided for raster and vector display. gdalraster leans toward minimalism and the use of simple, lightweight objects for holding raw data. Currently, only minimal S3 class interfaces have been implemented for selected R objects that contain spatial data. gdalraster may be useful in applications that need scalable, low-level I/O, or prefer a direct GDAL API.