desert | No 1 Adventurers travel blog

Did we just land on Tatooine?

We’ve been to a few places and done a bit of stuff, but nothing prepared us for our visit to Opuwo. We stayed in the campground at the Opuwo Country Lodge last night. It’s set on a hill above town, with great 360 degree views. The reception-restaurant-gift-shop building has the largest thatched roof in the southern hemisphere. The campground was nicely laid out and it was good to be away from the wind and dust of the last few days.

The eye-popping stuff started this morning when we went to get fuel and some food. The retail area of Opuwo is a seething hub of people. Local Himba women with their plaited hair covered in ochre mixed with butter, wearing a short skirt made of hide, some jewellery and not much else. One tried to sell me some jewellery, and I stood behind another young Himba woman in the supermarket. They walk barefoot and their feet must be tough – there are loads of thorny bushes, prickles and other sharp objects all around.

At the other end of the scale were the Herero women dressed like Mammy from Gone with the Wind – voluminous colonial-style dresses with long skirts, crinolines, petticoats, shawls and horn-shaped headgear made from the same fabric as the dresses. Some of the women wore a variation of the dress, but made of patchwork. And then there were the men – Himba men wearing a fabric loincloth at the front, with a hide cloth covering their bottoms. There were some dapper older dudes wearing trousers, long-sleeved shirts, buttoned-up cardigans and carrying walking canes, and even a young guy with a bow tie.

It was an amazing parade of humanity and while we were buying fuel I commented to Greg that I felt like I’d landed on Tatooine, or some other distant planet far, far away. Adding to the entertainment were cows wandering across the street, locals selling stuff by the side of the road, people trying to hitch a ride or just sitting waiting.

We’ve had a few days of wind and dust, but now we’re camped on grass by the Kunene River in the far north of Namibia. Angola is on the other side of the river. When I was being shown to the campsite, I asked if there were crocodiles in the river …. ‘only on the Angola side’. Er. right. It’s not a very wide river, so those crocs might just sneak over this side. We’ve done 2 tyres in the last couple of days. One also has bent rims, but Greg and a fellow camper were able to plug the other one, so we do still have a spare (we started with 2 spares).

We’ve been as far north, and as far west as we’ll travel on this trip. Now we’ll head east to the Caprivi Strip – a weird, narrow strip of Namibian land in the north east, between Botswana to the south and Angola & Zambia to the north.

Dung near our camp at Puros. It comes from an animal that starts with "E" — Dung near our camp at Puros. It comes from an animal that starts with “E”

On the road out of Poros — On the road out of Puros

The Road Block North. We came across this road block to Opuwo. No people no explanation, no detour. We found another tourist who had been up the road and yes it really was a road block. The map showed a long hundreds of kms long detour to avoid. We gave up and headed south only to find another road a few kms on showing a road to Opuwo, so we took it still detouring at least a 100km. — The Road Block North. We came across this road block to Opuwo. No people no explanation, no detour. We found another tourist who had been up the road and yes it really was a road block. The map showed a long hundreds of kms long detour to avoid. We gave up and headed south only to find another road a few kms on showing a road to Opuwo, so after asking a local driving along the road we took it still detouring at least a 100km.

A drive through Opuwo

The craziness that was the OK supermarket at Opuwo - loading groceries. — The craziness that was the OK supermarket at Opuwo – loading groceries.

We didn't take this, but this is a typical Himba woman. It is hard to explain how strange it is queuing behind someone dressed like this at the supermarket — We didn’t take this, but this is the dress of a typical Himba woman. It is hard to explain how strange it is queuing behind someone dressed like this at the supermarket

The memorial to the trekkers that crossed into Angola in the 1880s and were expelled from Angola in the 1920s

Looking across the Kunene river into Angola

White Sand, Blue Water

We only had one full day in Windhoek, and no plans on what we’d see or do … which was probably a good thing, as it turned out. We went to a suburban shopping centre in the morning to get a few things. The outside of the centre was very eye-catching, painted in bright pastel colours. We parked towards the end of the car park, about 20 metres from a police station. Didn’t help much, because someone chucked a brick through the passenger window and stole Greg’s camera. Yeah, we know, he shouldn’t have left it in the car. The locals we talked to were really surprised that it happened, apparently stuff like that doesn’t happen in Windhoek, or it only happens in the centre of town, or only on weekends, or something. But that sort of thing happens at home too – it happened to my mum when her car was parked outside a friend’s place in the ‘leafy Eastern Suburbs of Adelaide’, and when Greg had the child care centre, it happened to the family of a child who attended … and their car was unlocked!

Anyway, that took care of the rest of our day in the big city. I started cleaning up the glass while Greg went and joined the enormous queue in the nearby cop shop, only to finally reach the head of the line and be told that they only stamped forms or something. If we wanted to report it, we’d have to go to the main station in town. We also had another problem with the car – it made a clunking noise when it was in 4-wheel drive, and we had to take it to the rental office to either be looked at or swapped for one that (hopefully) didn’t make clunking noises. The rental office and our hotel were very helpful and told Greg where to take the car to have the window replaced, which took a couple of hours and cost $100. We didn’t bother about reporting it to the police as we aren’t claiming anything on insurance, and the rental office were pretty half-hearted about whether they needed it or not. When we returned the car, you couldn’t tell there had been a problem, apart from a bit of glass under the passenger seat that we couldn’t reach.

We swapped all our stuff from one single cab Hilux to an almost-identical car, apart from the ‘new’ one having 45,000 fewer kms on its odometer, and the back door of the canopy being much easier to open. Even the number plate is very similar. There was a roof tent on it, which was removed because we didn’t want it – those things look like canvas torture chambers to me – several metres off the ground, only accessible by a flimsy ladder, very unstable in high winds, and apparently prone to collapsing if not put up properly. Because of its weight and increased roof height, it increases wind resistance and lowers fuel economy. Here endeth my rant against roof tents.

So, we’re back on the west coast – at Swakopmund. It’s about 350kms west of Windhoek, sort of like the Gold Coast of Namibia, but on a much lower scale. Some nice houses, lots of holiday accommodation, fancy shops, beaches, cafes. You know the kind of thing. We’re spent the last 2 days at the Alte Bruck Holiday Resort and Conference Centre, camping in our tent in an en-suite campsite. Bathroom, huge paved area with sink, braai (bbq), drying rack, power … all the things. It’s lovely. Yesterday we drove 30kms south to Walvis Bay, another seaside resort that offers lots of holiday activities – cruises, sand activities including sand-boarding, go carts, 4WD tours. Undeterred by our recent sand dune experience, Greg was keen to do some more sand dune driving to the northern end of the Namib-Naufluft National Park (Sossusvlei is also part of the same part, but further south), so we headed for the dunes, with more success this time, despite my reservations. Just a bit south of Walvis Bay is a large flamingo colony, and a sand mine.

We’re heading north towards the Skeleton Coast today, and will probably be ‘off the grid’ for a few days. Have a good weekend, all.

The fanciest campground we have ever stayed in with our own onsuite

judy on the sand dune south of Swakopmund

The beach north of Sandwich Harbour. In the background is the ever present mist that hangs over the coast because of the Benguela Current, the cold current that makes Namibia and desert and affects the weather along the coast — The beach north of Sandwich Harbour. In the background is the ever present mist that hangs over the coast because of the Benguela Current, the cold current that makes Namibia a desert and affects the weather along the coast

Dune 7 outside Walvis Bay. 383 metres high half the height of Mount Lofty in Adelaide

Ina shopping centre in Windhoek outside a Police Station — In a shopping centre in Windhoek outside a Police Station

Red Sand, Blue Sky

The sand dunes around Sossusvlei (the pan or floor of the dunes) are reputed to be the highest in the world, and they are definitely among the most striking and well-preserved. The sparse vegetation on most of them suggests that they are still in motion, and driving on the sealed roads with wave-like dunes on both sides, it feels like the red sand is moving, like the sea. Only this is a sea of slow-moving sand, rather than fast-moving water.

The entrance to the Namib-Naukluft Park at Sesriem is 60kms from Sossusvlei. Inside the park is a campground and some up-market accommodation. In our usual ad-hoc style, we hadn’t pre-booked a spot in the campground and it was full by lunchtime, so we ended up at the overflow campground with just a couple of other vehicles. Probably much quieter than the main campground, but a long walk to the showers and toilets. We set up our tent then drove the 60+ kms to get to the dunes. Staying inside the park means an extra hour’s access to the dunes in the morning, and an extra hour in the afternoon. The park’s main gates open at 6.45am and close at 5.15pm, so anyone not staying in the park doesn’t get in before sunrise, and has to be out well before sunset. The inside gate opens at 5.45am and close at 6.15pm, which in theory gives people time to get down to the dunes and watch the sun rise, or watch the sun set and then drive back before the inside gate is closed.

Not being morning people, the idea of getting up in the dark and traipsing down to the dunes with a convoy of other vehicles held absolutely no appeal, but the idea of watching the sun set over the tall red dunes in the desert sounded pretty nice, so we opted to do that. We stopped at Dune 45, at the 45km mark, and walked about halfway up, watching the wind blow sand over the footprints of previous visitors. It feels like the dunes are in constant motion. A lot of the area is inaccessible in order to preserve the area, but a few dunes can be visited. There is a sealed 60km road, then 4kms of sand, which is only accessible to 4WD vehicles. But that was no problem to us, ‘cos we have a Toyota Hilux 4WD.

At least, it was no problem until we got it bogged in sand on the way back. Drat! And then we had one of those adventures-without-really-meaning-to. We had left ourselves exactly enough time to drive back on the sandy bit, watch the sun set over the dunes, then drive the 60kms back while sticking to the 60km speed limit, so that we could be back at the inside gate before 6.15pm. Getting stuck in sand was not part of the plan.

So … let the tyres down a bit, no go. Let them down a bit more, dig out all the sand from the middle of the car, start the car in 2nd gear … success! Then we had to re-inflate the tyres once we were back on the sealed road … but wait! One of the tyres is leaking! More pumping, more lost time, finally back on the road, needing to cover the 60kms in 45 minutes. In all the excitement, we completely missed sunset, although the colours in the dusky sky before it got completely dark were beautiful. So we zapped those 60kms to the gate, going just a bit over the speed limit. Okay, probably quite a lot over the speed limit. Passed a herd of some kind of antelopey-thingy close to the road, and then every bush, sign and stone marker looked like more wildlife that we needed to not hit. Passed a stationary car about 15kms from the gate … what were they doing, and why were they still in the park? No time to stop, but that car got going and followed us back. We made it with about 90 seconds to spare, and the gate-closing guy was there ready to do his thing. Phew, that got the adrenalin pumping! It was only after we were back at our tent that I realised our headlights would have been visible for miles, and he probably would have waited for us, but there wasn’t time to think about that while we were trying to cover the distance. My head was too crowded with watching out for things to avoid hitting, and calculating how much distance we had to cover in the time we had left.

If we had been smarter, we would have gone down to the dunes with our tent in the car and camped down there for the night. A photographer has just won a National Geographic award for a photo she took of one of the dunes at night. Magnificent photo, but the only way she was able to take it was by staying down there well after sunset – here it is, with other prize-winning photos.

There is a canyon at Sesriem, not on the scale of Fish River, but interesting because it gave the village its name. ‘Sesriem’ means six lengths in German – when the canyon was first discovered, it took 6 lengths of rope to get water from the canyon to the surface. Now the canyon is dry, although when it rains, it really, really rains.