The excitement of heading north to Etosha National Park and our first game drive helped to ease our sadness at leaving our oasis at Damaraland Mopane Lodge.

The drive north was a pretty easy one, with a first stop by the side of the road while Sandile explained the growing number of large mounds we’d seen scattered in the landscape. Termites build these using secretions to bind the soil together into these upside-down cone shaped mounds. The mounds generally lean toward the west somewhat and the Bushmen use that as a direction indicator. Some of them encapsulate trees and eventually kill the tree. There are tunnels and compartments for various uses within the nest

Each mound has one Queen, who can live to be 50 years old and can lay up to 30,000 eggs a day when necessary. There are different kinds of ants, some of which are builders, some that defend the mound, etc. Chemicals they emit when they die let’s the Queen know when she must lay more eggs to replace those that have died. Their predictors are aardvarks who use their long snout to forage in the nest.

We stopped for 45 minutes or so in a town named Outjo, to stock up on provisions for lunches for a couple of days and then headed on to our lodge just outside Etosha National Park, Anderson Gate. It was too early to check in but Sandile and Innocent dumped the bags to be put into the rooms when they were ready and off we went into Etosha and our first game drive.

After registering at the park offices we went into a campsite to have lunch. It was a really well furnished campground, and made me homesick for my little trailer. While lunch was being prepared by Sandile and Innocent, they pointed us in the direction of the water hole to check out what was there. My heart leaped with joy as we rounded the bend to gaze upon the back end of a couple of real live and free elephants just meters away! Well, to say our experience started off well, was a major understatement. One of the four of the Big 5 (Elephants, lions, rhinos, leopard, and water buffalo) that live in the Park, ticked off our list already! Water Buffalo are not found here, so hopefully we’ll see them somewhere else in our travels. We watched while 6 elephants came and went, stopped for a drink, or a bath. There were a couple of giraffe in the far distance, springbok, and all sorts of birds flying in formation. A feast for the eyes. Needless to say, none of us was interested in lunch and Sandile had to come and practically drag us off.

After a quick lunch and wash up we were back on the bus, this time with all the windows down and seat belts off as we started out on our first game drive. We selected this time of year to come to southern Africa because it’s nearing the end of dry season which means that the wildlife are more concentrated around the water holes and you don’t need to go looking for them as much. Well the first watering hole after the camp area was packed with so many different types of wildlife it was hard to decide where to look. Zebras were the first favourite and there were even some cute juveniles and Springboks were plentiful. We watched and took pictures for a while and then were off to check out some other areas and water holes, stopping wherever someone wanted to in order to get a picture.

We had to be out of the park by sunset or receive a huge fine, so after putting in as much time as we could, Innocent headed for the gate and back just a few minutes to our lodge. We then set off in search of our individual rooms with the map, room key and whistle provided anxious for a shower to get off the dust of the day. It was a bit of a hike and we were glad they had put our bags in our rooms for us.

In anticipation of taking a lot of pictures in the park, I had switched memory cards so I’d have an empty one and I was anxious to look at their pictures from the day. I had taken almost 500. I haven’t even downloaded them all yet, and just selected a few of what I thought would be the best to post. I’ll have a big job when I get home to go through and pick the best and purge the rest.

Dinner was lovely, served in a rondovel with a partially open to the stars, partially thatched roof, and there was much chatter about the animals we’d seen, pictures we’d managed to get, etc. But it was early to bed because we had a whole day game drive in the park the next day.

We have a rare 2 nights in one place here in Damaraland at this lovely “neighbourhood” lodge. Today we’ll explore the region a little bit.

We started at the second of two UNESCO World Heritage Sites we’ve visited in Namibia. The first was Sossusveil, where we climbed Dune 45. This one is called Twyfelfontain which means a place where there is sometimes water and sometimes not. An early settler tried, with his large family, to eek out an existence in this unforgiving area, but he was unsuccessful because of the uncertainty of the water supply and the site was abandoned.

Then in 1921, rock drawings were found in this area that are 2000-6000 years old. They were etched in the iron rich sandstone, and acted like early Google Maps, to depict areas where animals and water could be found in the region. They were pretty amazing, although rudimentary etchings, and one even indicated a giraffe with its neck in 3 different positions to indicate it leaning over to drink. Water holes were indicated by a circle and those that were permanent had a dot in the middle of the circle. We saw just a few of the over 2500 drawings found in the area.

Our guide was a descendant of the original Dama people who were Bushmen similar to the San and in his native language they use the same clicking sounds as the San. He demonstrated the 4 different clicks they use and laughed at us trying to recreate the sound.

We had to hike a short bit from the visitors centre out to the site and then scramble over some rocks to be able to view the various pieces of sandstone, now resting on the valley floor or among other rocks. They also had built some metal viewing platforms. Along the way a couple of our travel companions fell, one of top of the other. Everyone scrambled to help, especially our guide as it appeared the one on the bottom might have hit her head on the rocks. Finally this very practical Aussie spry grandmother said, “OK then, who should get up first?” Everyone started breathing again, and after their limbs were untangled their injuries were assessed. Some scrapes and bruises but thankfully, no broken bones. The episode proved to remind us how far from any services we were. Our guide said later he was already thinking quickly about how we’d evacuate anyone with any broken bones, etc. He has already had to rescue a passport left in a safe back in southern Namibia, and arranged to have it brought up to meet us in Windhoek. I’m sure he was relieved not to have to challenge his logistics skills once again.

Next we were off to visit the Petrified Forest National Park. As the Ice Age receded, huge trees (which I think our guide said they figure had stood for 1000 years), from central Africa were deposited in this area, and they were compressed under tonnes of debris and the wood became Petrified. There were pieces of the wood spread over the surface of desert and in some places there were larger trunks of trees, even with some bark still left on the tree. The guide also pointed out a plant surrounded by a circle of the wood, the Welwitschia that was the national plant of Namibia.

Then we were off back to our lovely lodge to enjoy a swim before heading up to the Sundowner deck to enjoy the sunset, drink in hand, before dinner. Well, that plan came off the rails as a rattling noise coming from the undercarriage of the truck that was assessed several times, got worse and worse. Turns out the bracket holding the water tank on the bottom of the truck had broken and although a fast fix was done with wire holding it up, that didn’t last long and something was rubbing on the drive shaft. Luckily it held until we hit the “bitumen” road (we’d call it “sealed” road) and limped into a town just a short distance. And more luck, there was a welding shop that was still open for the day. So we all headed off back to a gas station in town for ice cream treat and sat on a curb in the shade and chatted while the welding job was done and we were on our way again. TIA – This is Africa, and so travellers need to remain flexible, and we all took it in stride.

But it meant that our swim got scratched off the itinerary and we had to hustle up the hill to the sundowner deck to get there in time to grab a drink (and sadly they were out of my Savanna at the mobile bar) and watch the sun go down. We met a lovely German couple travelling with their grandson, who were taking somewhat the same route we were on their own. Canada of course came up and yes, they’d been to the west coast and up through the Rockies to Banff and Jasper, and into Yukon Territory and Alaska. People, one of the best parts of travelling.

Today we left Swapkomund and headed north along the Skeleton Coast along what is referred to as a “salt road”. It’s apparently made from salt and as such can’t be painted so it has no centre line or edge lines. Glad I wasn’t driving.

On our way out of town, our guide pointed out the new neighbourhoods of homes that the Namibian government has undertaken to build for its citizens. The homes are small, but include a small fenced piece of land and all the infrastructure is in place for the new inhabitants, who can rent-to-own at reasonable prices.

The Skeleton Coast is called this because of the number of ships that have been wrecked along this rough Atlantic coast line from the early Portuguese explorers right up until 2008 when a Russian fishing vessel wrecked just south of Henties Bay. We stopped for a Kodak moment and to be inundated by entrepreneurs selling rocks to us and other tourist bus loads. This area is rich with a great variety of stones and it seemed there was one for every taste however they were just rough stones and the real cost would be having it cut and set so no one took them up on the great deals.

We turned inland from the coast at Henties Bay (where parts of the Mad Max movie were filmed) and headed east and north past a small range of mountains including the highest peak in Namibia, Brandberg Mountain at about 2600 meters. And on into Damaraland.

When the German missionaries came to this region, they had some of the local Herero women work for them in their households but the story goes that the missionary’s wives were not comfortable with the women working in their traditional attire and so the wives encouraged the Herero to wear bright Victoria costumes, complete with crinolines, which were much more modest. They also augmented their dresses with broad head pieces that look like horns.

A subset of the Herero people went in the opposite direction. The Himba are cattle ranching people in the north near the Angola border, but the woman have come down to the tourist route to help augment the family income. The women have maintained their traditional costumes which includes elaborate hair and jewelry adornment, loin cloth and little else. The adornment and style of their hair tells the story of who they are, ie. if they are married, if they have children etc. They don’t ever wash their bodies or their hair and they use a concoction of ochre clay, with herbs and butter and smear it over their bodies to protect them from the sun, and they use it in their hair to cover their long braids. The young girls wear two plaits coming forward and the boys wear their’s long in the back. When the girls are about 15 they remove their front teeth because they believe they are more beautiful without them.

We stopped along the way at a couple of very interesting “markets” put up by each of these groups, ramshackle booths made from whatever they could scrounge and set by the side of the highway. The first was a handicraft market set up by the Himba people. It included lots of beaded work, copper bracelets, etc. They were keen for us to buy their trinkets, quite aggressive actually, and in exchange for a purchase we were free to take a picture of them. But don’t try taking one of any that you hadn’t bought from! If looks could kill. They didn’t speak much English but knew enough words to make the trade negotiations work. We discussed with our guide whether participating in trade with these people was the right thing to do. It seemed like exploitation but it helped them make money. A difficult decision one for sure. One of our group brought some candy for the children, and kids came out of the wood work when she arrived. I bought a couple of bangles and took some pictures but I was a little uncomfortable for sure.

Next it was on to the Hereras Market. They were much less aggressive, and happier lot. They cheerfully posed for all our pictures without expecting payment, and they were selling little dolls made up in dresses like themselves.I got chatting with one of the young Herera women dressed in traditional bright dress and headgear to discover that she spoke perfect English and was home visiting her family on break from university in Windhoek. She’s in first year studying for a degree in logistics and transportation. Another was on crutches and showed us her leg had been amputated just below the knee, and we were told that she had been bitten by a puff adder snake and had to have the leg removed. It was a colourful and interesting afternoon.

We arrived at our lodge in Damaraland and pretty promptly decided we didn’t want to leave. It was set up with little “houses” in concentric circles around a huge centre common garden and pool area, surrounded with short little fences, complete with gates. Each yard was planted with various lovely vegetables. (Corn, carrots, egg plant, peppers, cucumbers, etc). I was afraid we might have to hoe a row before dinner, but the tending of the gardens is left to staff, and the kitchen makes use of the abundant fresh veggies in their cooking.

Dinner was served in an open-air courtyard, that was transformed by lights after dark, into a magical garden. Quite delightful. I’m only sorry we ended up being there such a short time and didn’t get to take advantage of their lovely facilities.

It was a nice change to not be getting up to the alarm and piling back on the bus today. It has been non-stop action since we arrived in Cape Town almost 2 weeks ago.

As I mentioned yesterday, Swakopmund is a beach town along the “Skeleton coast” of Namibia, so-called because of all the ship wrecks that can be found here. The coastline is unprotected from the Atlantic and its storms and the water is cold the whole year. It is now winter and cool, so the town is quite quiet, but it looks like it would be hopping with beach goers in their summer months.

Our hotel is near the southern end of the main beach road within easy walking distance of downtown, the market, etc. It’s also one of the most modern we’ve experienced and thankfully had great wifi in the lobby area. Wet rooms seem to be the big thing in hotel rooms these days where all the bathroom facilities are in one open room.

Once we had cleaned up, dropped off our laundry, and had breakfast we walked along the beach road to the main drag named after Namibia independence hero Sam Nujoma. We stopped in at the pharmacy, Pick and Pay, a grocery store chain, and tried, unsuccessfully, to take out some money. My bank card is not working in Namibia for some reason and so Nanci has loaned me some money for this leg of the trip. I have some US cash which I’ll be able to exchange in Windhoek if I still can’t access my accounts, and I’ll put as much on my cards as I can. We’ve had a bit of bad luck in that regard as Nanci’s credit card is not working here either.

We wandered the Main Street and looked in a few of the many shops hoping for some of our tourist dollars. They did librate a few of my Namibian dollars for an Africa print runner for my dining table. We discovered that it’s a national holiday called Hero’s Day. It to celebrate the heros that worked toward Namibia’s independence, most recently from the South Africans who had been given control of Namibia after the Second World War. This meant that many of the shops were either closed or closing early, but we got what we needed before that happened.

We headed toward the market area to see what they had for sale there, and midway there we encountered the guinea hens that we’d seen yesterday on our way in. It was quite funny yesterday to see them scurrying across the road, obediently in a pedestrian walkway. Today they were busy scratching at the earth looking for their dinner and didn’t take any notice of us.

From here we walked toward the lighthouse, because of course I needed to have a picture of it! But it wasn’t that interesting and so a quick snap had us off the the market.

The products for sale in the market were pretty much the same as we’ve seen elsewhere, and so we quickly made our way out to the beach walk, to avoid the ongoing interest of the venders. We wandered along the water and went for a stroll out onto a pier with a restaurant at the end and fishermen along one side. I felt somewhat like I was back in Southern California.

We went back to our hotel where we basically crashed for the rest of the day, although we headed out for lunch to a beach restaurant that looked to be a happening place in the summer. Today it had a few hardy customers seated next to the fireplace.

We did joint up with some of the rest of the group for a dinner of Indian food, after our attempt at eating local was dashed because the restaurant one of the group had researched had closed a couple of years ago. So had a second choice. It had a standard offering of Indian dishes and the food was excellent and so was the service.

Then it was home to bed but thankfully no early start for tomorrow. A very respectable departure time of 9 pm since we didn’t have far to go.

Today was once again a travel day, across some amazing landscape of the Namib Desert, across the Tropic of Capricorn, through the Kuiseb Canyon and out once again to the Atlantic Ocean at Walris Bay.

Early on in the day, 3 giraffe were spotted in the desert! It wasn’t expected that we’d see them in this area. It was actually hilarious since everyone was trying to scramble to get out cameras, get windows on the truck down, and give advice to Sandile as to where to stop the truck. And the giraffe weren’t in a hurry to go anywhere. In fact they moved in to a crossed neck position, a very common giraffe pose, for us.

Sandile pulled over for us at one point to have a closer look at this huge “growth” in one of the Acacia Trees. This is one of the largest Social Weaver’s nest we’ve seen. These little Sparrow-like birds build their nests collectively from grasses and it builds and builds. This one is likely 15 – 20 years old. Underneath you see the individual entrances.

Part of the way from Sesriem to our destination was a remote little town, appropriately called Solitare. A fellow, Mr. McGregor, now deceased, recognized there was an opportunity because there weren’t any services between these two spots. We stopped for gas, toilet break and to try our second version of Apple Cake. The consensus was that this one had a better filling, but the crumble wasn’t as good as the original and the overall winner was the first. We also discussed how weird it was that we were actually in Namibia comparing apple cakes!

Somewhat further along we crossed the Tropic of Capricorn which was not at all exciting for the Australians but was for those of us from the northern hemisphere. Out in front of the group picture is our guide Innocent. One of the nicest people you’ll ever meet. Kind, gentle but firm. “Happy Days” is his favourite expression.

We travelled through the Gamsberg Pass, and stopped at the top for this lookout into the Kuiseb Canyon which was not very visually pretty but really interesting from a geological perspective. The Kuiseb River is nothing more than a dry, sandy river bed most of the time, but it does get filled up for a couple of weeks during the rainy season and flows from the capital city of Windhoek out to the ocean at Walris Bay.

It was so great to get back to the Atlantic, but a bit of a shock to the system since the temperatures were quite a lot lower and it was foggy and overcast. Just outside the industrial city of Walris Bay, we passed by the site of what will be the largest uranium mine in the world when it’s completed. In Walris Bay we did some shopping and stopped at a park by the ocean for our picnic lunch of barbecue chicken and salad. There were flamingos in the bay, but they were different than the ones I’d seen in Florida and other places. They weren’t as pink except under their wings.

Then it was on to the beach and activity capital of Namibia, Swakopmund. We stopped in at an activity centre that offered various things to do from desert tours to skydiving. Most of the group decided to go ATVing in the sand dunes. Meron did the desert tour and Nanci and I opted to do nothing, I should mention at this point that at least half of the people on the bus have succumbed to a cold. And one has had stomach flu. Nanci got the cold before me but I followed shortly thereafter. It started in my head, but has progressed to my lungs. Seems everyone’s progression is a little bit different. I’m not suffering as much as many are and I was healthy for the part of the tour requiring a lot exertion. I have slept as well as I usually do, which always helps. So hope by tomorrow I’m back to normal.

The first few nights of our tour have been just one-night stays and it has been hard to leave some of them without having had the opportunity to really appreciate their facilities. But we stayed two nights in Sesriem so that we could visit Namib-Naukluft National Park in the Sossusvlei area, (roughly translated to dead-end marsh) sight of these amazing huge, and old sand dunes. Our guide wanted to be in line when the park opened at 6:45 am so that we could get out onto the dunes before it became too hot and crowded, which meant a 4 am wake-up call. Ugh. But believe me by afternoon, we were grateful for the early start.

We drove into the park for about an hour after the gates opened, our destination Dune 45. It’s named 45 because it’s 45 km from the park entrance, but other larger but overwhelming huge dunes were named Big Daddy (the tallest at 1000 + ft) and Big Mamma. These dunes are some of the highest in the world and were created by sand being washed down the Orange River and washed out to sea, only to be picked up by the winds and blown back into land here. The sand is a bright orange, with a lot of iron in it. Innocent put a tissue over a magnet, and rubbed it in the sand. The tissue came out covered in iron powder.

In the picture of Big Daddy below if you look carefully you can see tiny specs along the rim which are people that have started at ground level, and are walking across from left to right over the first hump, to the valley on the left, and then across and up to the crest in the middle. We were very glad not to be attempting that but rather trying to tackle Dune 45.

Our guide gave us some great advice about going without shoes to do our climb and to follow in someone else’s foot steps as we climbed. The sand was silky smooth and at this early hour, still cool to the touch. Imagine how difficult it is to walk on loose sand, and then add a high incline! And we’re talking 560 ft. And walking in the footsteps of someone else really did help. The first part of the trail was quite broad, but as we climbed the path became narrower and passing people coming down was a little challenging. You didn’t want to get off the path because the sand was loose there, and the slope was pretty significant. It wouldn’t have taken much to tumble all the way down to the valley floor. I didn’t climb all the way to the top. I knew that I had more walking through sand to do and didn’t want to completely ruin my SI Joint. Several of us rested on a bit of a plateau, took pics and then headed back down. Two of our group made it to the top and get top honours. When we returned, our guides had tea prepared for us. They’re taking such good care of us.

We then headed further into the Park toward the Sossus Vlei area. Once in the vicinity we waited for a lift by 4X4. In ancient times, the Sossus River flowed through this area of the dunes and trees grew in the valley. But when the river dried up, the trees died leaving this unique area of dried and bleached clay and skeletons of trees called Dead Vlei. It has to be one of the most iconic Kodak moments in Namibia.

Our very resourceful guide managed to secure our return to the parking lot with a drive-by some other areas without having to wait for another lift. We left the park to have lunch just outside the gate and then re-entered to head to the 3 million year old Sesriem Gorge. Sesriem means “six belts” in Afrikaans and the gorge was named Sesriem because it took 6 knotted belts to reach down to the bottom of the gorge to get water from the river bed. We were able to get down into the gorge over some pretty rough steps, with the able assistance of Innocent, to walk along the floor of the gorge. The gorge only floods every 8 – 10 years and it’s overdue so we were hopeful that it wasn’t our misfortune to be there for the next instance. But it was shaded and a much-appreciated cooler temperature, and a very enjoyable walk. The erosion of the sides of the canyon over the years, showed layer after layer of flooding and placement of rocks.

Then it was back to our hotel for a sundowner, and another fabulous buffet. Tonight we were entertained in the dining room by the staff of the hotel. Was great fun.

Today, is a pretty much just a travel day, mostly on gravel roads, although not as corrugated as yesterday. When we did come across a paved portion of highway applause broke out!

Just after we started out early this morning we spotted 3 ostriches, a couple of Kuda, and several springboks. Not much further along, someone spotted a more rare Mountain Zebra. They are smaller, with thinner stripes and the light portion of the stripe is slightly golden rather than pure white. There were two of them just standing looking at us. Not great pics because I didn’t yet have my long zoom lens on my camera.

We stopped in a town called Bethanie for gas, and a bum break. This town was founded by the German Lutherans and has more churches per person than any other town in Namibia. The people here are San Bushmen and their descendants. They are very distinctive looking with high cheek bones, and a much lighter, and more yellow colour skin. Their ancestors were generally smaller than other tribes and that carries through to today. Here is a picture of a springbok which I took while we stopped for lunch. These guys are all over everywhere (much like our deer but with nicer colouring), springing along. It’s not great, but I thought it was ironic because it’s behind a fence, but it’s us that are in the enclosure and it was in the open field.

Namibia was a German colony from 1884 when it was called Germany South West Africa. One of the things that the Germans brought to this region was some of their food and we experienced it first hand at our stop in Bethanie. We had the most amazing Apple Cake/Crumble as an augment to our picnic lunch!

The landscape constantly changed as we travelled along through the Namib Desert, one of the world’s oldest deserts. I am sometimes reminded of Utah, and the SW USA. After a long and dusty day we arrived at our destination, a “guest house” near Sesriem, called Hammerstein Lodge. This was to be our home for two nights. It was quite a large compound with blocks of rooms. The facilities were great, with a large patio for enjoying sundowners, or a quick dip although the pool wasn’t heated. Because we know it’s going to cook right down at night, I haven’t felt the need to partake of the pool yet even though the days are hot in the afternoons. Nanci is being challenged to go swimming at every opportunity to one of our English travelling companions but so far she has resisted.

After a beautiful buffet dinner, of kudu and zebra (yes, once again, sorry vegetarians) it was time for an early night because we had a wake-up time of 4 am tomorrow morning! Big day tomorrow……climbing Dune 45. Named as such because it is 45 km from the park entrance.

The cloudy skies didn’t put us off our early start today as it was still warm enough to be comfortable, and it was really calm. After a hearty breakfast (as all our meals have been, sigh),we loaded up on the bus to head up river with our canoes in tow. Now I use the term canoe rather loosely. These were plastic purpose-built canoes complete with two spots for water proof buckets to hold our extra clothes, glasses, etc. And the paddles were not canoe paddles, but rather double ended kayak paddles. But they were probably more forgiving than either true canoes or kayaks. After the canoes were unloaded we paired up, choose our kayaks, climbed in and set off, all without assistance. There was much joking about this activity being the forte of us Canadians, but neither of us had canoed for a VERY long time, and Nanci kayaked in Caye Caulker a few years ago but I never have so there wasn’t a lot of experience in our blue kayak.

But I’m proud to say that not only did we manage to keep the right side up, but we led the way for much of the way and set the pace down the 11-12 km of the Orange River down which we paddled. Competitive much! The valley had high cliffs in places and gentle rises to grape vineyards in other places. We stopped for a break on a lovely beach, and then continued on fairly quickly because our guide thought the wind was going to come up. A gentle breeze was all it took to make the paddling more difficult. Can only imagine how tough ocean kayaking must be. We passed over 3 sets of rapids, which while small still gave us a bit of a rush, having never experienced them in a canoe. Going over the last set we hit a rock and fortunately bounced off it safely and made the quick turn to the beach at the lodge where it all began. I blame the guide who didn’t pre-warn us about which route to take, and once in we didn’t have the ability to avoid it. In any case, no hard done, other than a few panicky moments on my part. Although we didn’t end up in the river, we did get soaked from the water running down the paddles. It was an absolutely fabulous morning. Again, one of my favourite experiences is on the water.

After changing into dry clothes and a casual picnic back our our beautiful lodge we piled onto our trusty truck and we were off. It was a long dusty, bumpy afternoon on washboard gravel roads. It is a really comfortable temperature at this time of year, their winter, and I was glad of that thinking about how this travel would be in the heat of summer.

The landscape changed quite a lot in the afternoon and although we didn’t see much in the way of towns we did pass a huge settlement of farm workers. They grow table grapes in this area, irrigated from the Orange River. There is not a lot with which to build in the middle of the dessert so the workers have constructed their homes with what materials they were able to find. Set in the middle of the dessert it seemed a rather sad existence, but I guess they are lucky to have jobs and a home, such as it is. They waved as we passed by them having their lunch.

Of course while we’re on the road we were constantly scanning the horizon for anything of interest and luckily we spotted a couple of pair of Kuda. And Sandilay pointed out a Quiver Tree and explained it was used to make quivers to carry tools and such as the limbs are hollow.

By late afternoon after many kilometres of “African massage” (washboarded and bumpy gravel roads), we came in sight of the amazing Fish River Canyon in the distance. We carried on to our Lodge, a real oasis in the middle of the desolate but truly interesting landscapes. The lodge consisted once again of little cabins but this time nestled among huge boulders, and beautifully landscaped grounds. It is rated as one of the best lodges in one of my tour books on Namibia. The rooms actually had walls built around the boulders, and other walls were made of stone, both of which were sealed with clear lacquer of some kind. For the first time the room included mosquito nets over the beds. We don’t enter malaria area for a few days so we’re not taking medication yet. It seems pretty cold at night for there to be mosquitos around but it was suggested we use the nets just in case and so happily complied. Even if there is no malaria, who wants a bunch of bites? I didn’t hear any of the tell-tale buzzing at any point

After just a quick chance to unpack a little and freshen up we piled back on the truck to go the 10 km to see the Fish River Canyon. This canyon is not like the Grand Canyon in the US with it’s dramatic vertical, deep walls, but it is really stunning. It measures 160 km long, is 28 km wide in places, and is up to 550m deep. It is a popular hike and a route along the river bed covers half the length of the canyon and takes 5 days. We arrived an hour before sunset and we walked around one side of the highest point to view the canyon with the tiny Fish River far below. There were no fences and one misstep would have been disastrous, but there were the usual, “just a little further back” jokes as we took pictures of each other. When we arrived back at the observation deck at the appointed hour to watch the sun go down, Innocent and Sandilay had laid out a lovely surprise, a wine and cheese feast with glass wine glasses and all. What a civilized way to watch the sun set over one of the largest canyons in Africa.

Dinner back at the lodge was fabulous buffet with a chance to try some of the local meat. I had Kuda Carpaccio for an appetizer, which was nicely smokey flavoured, and a small piece of Arxy (I think) steak for a main. As we were leaving the main building and heading back to our little cabin, we were delighted to find bins of hot water bottles by the door for us to use to take the chill off our bedding. (Which was beautiful and soft and comfie). What a treat.

Today we were on the road early, just after dawn, and Innocent warned us it will be a long day on the bus. 

So while we roll along I should tell you about our fellow travellers. Intrepid is an Australian company so it’s not surprising that there are mostly Australians; two couples, and a solo woman traveller. There is a couple and a single traveller from England (who is originally from Tanzania). The United States of America is represented by three single travellers, two retiring from jobs in Saudi Arabia and a young woman from Los Angeles. And two Canadians, Nanci and I. And of course our guide/drivers Innocent and Sandile. Both of them are from Zimbabwe and are half Zulu and half another tribe. 

The Oliphant River is the lifeblood of the farmers in the region that we drove through this morning. They use a system of canals to irrigate using river water. We saw mostly huge fields of grape vines but also orange groves and tomato plants. There are also lots of sheep grazing. We followed the river for some time crossing it at least once. 

While we were stopped for construction Innocent warned  us about the Pencil Bush. It is a short, round bush with little yellow flowers on it. We expect to have to use Mother Nature as camouflage for squatting later in the trip (referred to as “bushy bushy”) and he warned us not to go near those bushes as their milky sap in an open wound could kill us. The smoke from dry twigs of the plant added to a fire could also kill. He had our full attention. 

As we went further north, the land was not cultivated and it was less green. 

We stopped for provisions in a town of 120,000 people called Springbok just south of the border of South Africa and Namibia. It is a former copper mine town but the mine is now spent and it primarily acts as a service centre for the surrounding farms and housing farm workers. 

We will spend the next couple of days in the desert where there are few services so we stocked up on food for picnic lunches. And we had our first one today just after leaving Springbok. I sat there thinking how amazing it was that here I was enjoying a chicken sandwich at the side of the road in northern South Africa. Pretty darn amazing. 

Next up was the border crossing. All went well with a minimum of fuss and no wait on either exiting or entering. Although we did have to take all our bags out of the truck for inspection leaving South Africa. We crossed over the Orange River into Namibia and after a short process we were on our way. 

It was just a short 10 minute drive   home for tonight. We had been driving through arid, grey shale type rock for the last little while and what a pleasant surprise awaited us upon our arrival. We are in individual cabanas lined up overlooking the Orange River. They are beautifully appointed. 

We’ll meet up for dinner tonight and get briefed on our canoeing adventure on the Orange River tomorrow morning.  No hippos or crocs we’re told. 

Before we get on with today, I forgot to mention that last night we were each given a really nice quality textile shopping bag. Intrepid (our Tour company) is trying to encourage their use instead of plastic in all areas of the world and asked us to be ambassadors of the cause and to use them whenever we were shopping. It’s part of their responsible travel mandate. 

The Cape Milner Hotel has been a great home for the past several nights. The staff have just been tremendous, always willing to go the extra mile. Aside from a bit of road noise in the morning, it was very comfortable. 
I was relieved when we assembled in the lobby this morning to discover that my suitcase was not the largest by any stretch and in fact was one of the smaller ones. Now I can feel guilt-free about opening the expansion section if necessary. 

The Intrepid purpose-built overland vehicle stood ready to go this morning and once we and our luggage were all stowed in lockers we were off. 
Our truck/bus is equipped with power and USB power plugs about every 2 seats, has really large viewing windows (which open for cooling), and two refrigerators. 

Since it was Sunday morning there was little traffic and we were out of the city in no time. We travelled north on a major road, the M7, towards Namibia. We stopped just north of the city for gas for the truck and to bid farewell to Table Mountain, until we meet again. 

We travelled mostly along a lush valley with the Cedarburg Mountain range to the east and small coastal range to the west. The farmland looked quite productive with crops of canola and some I couldn’t identify. We went through an area called Citrusdel that not surprisingly had groves of citrus trees, primarily oranges,which were heavily laden with fruit. 

Further along there were fields of low growing bushes of Rooibos for making Nanci’s new favourite tea. Innocent said they make the tea from the seeds rather than leaves. 

Just after noon we turned west towards the ocean on to rural highway R364 towards Lamberts Bay. After driving through the small town of Lamberts Bay we pulled into a parking lot that was already packed with cars and trucks. We walked in to a seemingly chaotic scene of cooking smoke and music and piles of people at a restaurant on the ocean. The music was an eclectic mix of Afrikaans songs and cowboy harmonica music. It was an all you can eat BBQ buffet or braai as they call it here only open on Sundays. Aside from us, the guests were all local farmers. We joined the queue and dug in and then scattered throughout the venue to find seating. After filling up on several kinds of fabulous barbecued fish, salad, bread with fig preserves, sweet potato, rice with muscles, and stir fried veggies we discovered there would be more courses! Curried beef and lamb and even lobster (which was at a premium price).  We all waddled back to the bus to carry on. 

We had only a short drive to the wharf and a marine park to see “Bird Island” and the nesting area of Cape Gannets.  While most birds spread their breeding area out these guys practically nest on top of each other. They can do that because their nests are made of guano (dried droppings) which can’t be stolen by other birds. We watched them for a time from a blind to see their behaviours. They are quite aggressive and they use their various movements to keep fights from breaking out. We don’t have wifi so I can’t upload the pics I took of the birds tonight but I’ll add them another day. 

Next it was off to our swanky hotel, not. It’s a small hotel that is supposedly under going a renovation. But the room is spacious and clean if somewhat tired. 

We are having dinner at this hotel tonight and will turn in early as we have a long day tomorrow.