I am back in Africa and it feels great. Straight from the rush of Korea to the vast landscapes of Namibia.
Namibia has received lots of rain in the past months and what once was bare desert and barren country is now covered in lush grass fields and thick vegetation.
I had the opportunity to visit Namibia in September 2009 when I hitch hiked to the deserts edge and beyond (Slideshow of the previous trip). This time round I went with my parents, brother and Clementine in one fully loaded vehicle.
The five of us camped out under the stars and spent many hours in the car as we covered a big section of Namibia. Roughly 6000km through the second least densely populated country in the world – a big contrast to where I found myself only weeks before.
In two weeks we visited the south and its deserted landscapes, the Namib Desert under a green coat of grass and flowers, the west coast with its abundance of overweight holiday goers and up through Damaraland to the wet Etosha pan with all its wildlife.
I’ve recently returned from a 2 week trip to Namibia. My long time school friend Emile Borman currently resides in Windhoek Namibia where he is a pilot. We remain in contact all the time and he’s been telling me about all the great places he’s been to in Namibia. He also told me that he flies over the Namib Desert for scenic flights and that there are often an extra spot on the plane.
“Albert, I am quite sure that if you make it to the Desert next week, then I’ll be able to take you on a scenic flight” – Emile Borman.
With this opportunity in mind, I started to plan a trip up North. Last year I went traveling through Southern Africa and paid a brief visit to Namibia. I haven’t been to the Namib Desert since 1997 when I had the opportunity to go with my parents. In April 2008 I visited the Southof Namibia, but I’d always wanted to go back to the Desert.
I arranged a lift with a truck driver last year before leaving to Namibia for my Southern Africa trip. Unfortunately the Margarine order due for Windhoek that time failed and I opted to go up with the bus. This time, a year later, I contacted the same truck driver and asked for a lift up to Windhoek.
With hardly any money I would try to make use of free or cheap transport to visit Emile and hopefully be able to get a scenic flight over the Namib Desert.
The journey up north started on Sunday morning. My father dropped me at Fritz Brandt the truck driver’s house in Porterville. We journeyed up to the Namibian border through Namakwaland’s flower region. The sceneries up to Namibia were beautiful. Past the border we stopped for a braai next to the highway and grilled some lamb chops and sausage.
I would catch this free lift with Fritz and then hitch to the deserts edge to meet up with Emile. I packed enough food for the road to last me 2 days. With my tent, sleeping bag, gas stove, pots, canned Tuna and water bottles I was prepared for the adventure that lay ahead.
Fritz dropped me early on Monday morning in Windhoek where I met up with Emile for a brief hour. He was on his way to fly a group of tourists to a lodge in the desert. Luckily I had made it in time to meet up with Emile in Windhoek as we shared valuable information about the travels ahead. I took a quick shower at Emile’s flat, filled my water bottles and told him that I’d most likely make it to our meeting point in 2 days time.
He then dropped me at the side of the B1 highway to start my hitchhiking journey westwards to meet up with him again.
Within 20 minutes I was off with my first lift. This lift took me back south to Mariental where I climbed off and headed west to Maltahohe. The man that had picked me up was originally from Denmark and had been traveling and working through out the world as a UN refugee consultant. He’d been traveling through Africa numerous times and all the stories inspired me for my journey ahead.
At the turn off westwards I got a lift with a baster from Rheboth. He and his farm worker drove into town to buy bullets to kill the baboons on the farm as they were a threat to his livestock. He poured himself a double brandy and coke in a foamlite glass and said that it’s because of the baboons that he was drinking. This lift took me only halfway to Maltahohe and I had to wait 3 hours for my next lift.
A grumpy old man picked me up and took me to Maltahohe. The only words of this trip were at the end when he asked me if I had enough water for the road ahead. So I went to the only café in town and bought a 1.5 liter water to add to my 1.5L I already had. Never through out the journey did I buy water again as I always filled my bottles with tap water.
If there’s no tap water then you drink Beer!
I got a lift on the back of a bakkie from Matlahohe in the direction of Sossusvlei. By this time my boere-tan started to take shape.
I was dropped at an intersection and within 10min a German women and her son picked me up. This was my first encounter with the Germans as Namibia has more German tourists than Jacob Zuma has wives. I climbed into the rented car with Sonja and Felix and we started off with a wheel spin. At first they thought I was from England and when I told then I was from Cape Town they thought I was American. Welcome to Africa, Cape Town is 1600km south from here, be careful of the lions. They dropped me at the intersection I had to take and took off in the sunset.
As the sun started to set the horizon became more colourful and I realized that this would be where I’d have to spend the night. In 2 hours not a single car had passed and I started to walk to the nearest tree. The girl in me decided to build a fence with thorn branches incase there were some Hyenas. I started up my gas stove and made a filling tuna meal where after I went to bed in my one man tent. That night there were no hyenas though I was kept awake by an owl in the tree above me.
At sunrise I was up and standing next to the road. The first 4x4 convey that came past picked me up. We did not have much to say to each other as they were Italian and I was American/English/South African.
I was only 60km away from where I was supposed to meet Emile. The Italian group took me to the turn off for the lodge and Emile told me that there would be cellphone reception at the gate (I bought a Namibian Simcard in Windhoek). Arriving at the gate there was no cellphone signal. It was a 20km hike to the lodge and there was no way I would make it. I only had 500ml of water left.
A German group in a rented 4x4 came from the opposite direction and I opened the gate for them. They looked at me as if I got paid to stand there for a day opening gates. Before driving off I stopped them and asked for some water. Again they looked at me as if I was some dirty backpacker Bushman with hidden water in Ostrich eggs behind the gate that I open for the 5 cars that pass per day.
Off they went without giving me water (I hope they got a puncture and could not read the instructions on how to use a jack and ended up being dehydrated). I had 500ml left, so I would make it.
Within 5min the staff of the lodge arrived at the gate. I asked them for a lift in to the lodge and 20min later I knocked on Emile’s door where he was still in his boxers watching The Hangover.
It was Tuesday morning and I had made it to the edge of the Desert. I washed all the desert dust off, drank a cooldrink and joined Emile to watch The Hangover.
The day before I was nursing a boere-tan, taking a shit in the bush and being a girl about Hyenas. Here I was clean and chilling at a 5 star lodge with 3 meals a day having a laugh with one of my best mates.
Emile had a scenic flight booked for the Wednesday morning. A French couple on their honeymoon wanted to view Sossusvlei from the air and this gave me the opportunity to join. Emile asked them if I could join and they approved.
At 07:00 we where up and flying across the dunes. I had the front seat next to Emile which gave me a great opportunity for taking photos. Flying over the desert gives you a different perspective and you realize the sheer size of this massive sand landscape. We took an hour flight and only viewed the start of this enormous desert.
Everywhere you would look there would just be more and more dunes. I am sure that some pilots could become bored by this landscape over time, though I was so excited and privileged to be flying over the Namib Desert I did not want the flight to ever end.
The scenic flight took us up to Sossusvlei, Deadvlei and through the dune corridor back to the Lodge.
Emile and Norman Esplin refueled the planes and we spent the rest of the afternoon just chilling.
The whole mission to get here was worth it. I had the opportunity to fly over the Namib – for free!
That night we drank lots of beers and red wine. I had a 4 course meal in the lodge and went to bed quite late.
Life in the desert can become lonely as one of the staff members pointed out:
“Tjom, dis die woestyn die, hier naai ek enige iets met ‘n hardklop, behalwe ‘n pofadder” – I am not going to translate that into English.
Both Emile and Norman would leave the next day to take their guests to other lodges. I arranged a lift with the lodge’s staff shuttle to Sesriem for the next morning to go view the dunes from ground level.
At 06:00 I was on the shuttle still half drunk driving to Sesriem. The August east winds were blowing sand into my eyes and I was not excited to be standing next to the road. I left my backpack at reception, bought my park ticket, filled my water bottles and went to stand next to the road to hitch a lift in to Sossusvlei.
At first no one wanted to pick met up, could they see I had a hangover? Then a French group stopped to pick me up. The Combi’s door opened and there sat a beautiful girl. Hell yeah, driving into the desert with a hot girl. I then found out they where French and could hardly speak a word of English. The girl sat in front of me reading the whole way. Could she also see I was hung-over? Her brother with his designer clothes sat next to me also reading. He did not look up once. I wanted to tell him: dude, look out the window, you’re in the f**king desert! But who am I other than a hitchhiker. At the drop off to Sossusvlei he grabbed his jacket and bubblegum and walked to the shuttle thinking he was boarding a party bus with his hot sister. From the drop off to Sossusvlei is 5km and you can only cover it in a 4x4 vehicle. If you don’t have a 4x4 then you take the shuttle for R110 or you walk like me.
I started to walk and thought I was never going to reach my destination. Even the crows knew I was hungover as they kept hovering over my head. Then as most tourist destinations would have it an idiot would get stuck in the sand. I helped them along with some other people and grabbed a lift with one of the other helpers for the last 2km to Sossusvlei. At first I paid a visit to Deadvlei and it was amazing. All the dead trees standing between the dunes like statues. I took lots of photos while raping my water.
I then walked across to Sossusvlei, but before I could climb the dune I had to take a nap under a tree. It was in the heat of the day and I first had to get my powers back. The hot French girl and her gay brother passed me on their shuttle heading out. They had taken all their photos and were heading home while I still had/wanted to climb the dune.
I eventually reached the top with each step feeling like I might be climbing Everest. Took my photos and back down I went. An empty shuttle passed me and picked me up – for free. He could see I had a hangover that by this time was close to heatstroke.
From the drop off to Sesriem I got a lift with an Overland truck. They stopped halfway for lunch and I went to go lie under a tree again. Before departure one of the German tourists asked if she could empty the sand in her shoes in the parking lot. O my God, you’re in the f**king desert, look at all the sand around you! What question is that?
Back at reception I made some enquiries about camping. At first I thought it would be R150 to camp, cool, but then they informed me it would be R150 pp plus R300 for the site totaling to R450. I hadn’t even spent that much money to reach Sesriem. So I walked to the only garage, filled my water bottles, bought a sandwich, lost my South African simcard between the rocks and took off in the direction of the mountains to find a quiet place to camp. Getting back into the Sossusvlei nature reserve to find a tree or something would be a different story as the fences where raised and the park rangers where driving Germans around for sundowners or something. I felt like a Kudu looking for a place to jump the fence. Up and over the fence I speed walked to the river bed, hiding behind the bushed as the Land Rovers came past. I pitched my tent camouflaged between the bushes and made the same old tuna meal while the jackals kept crying in the mountain. The morning I woke up to the sound of a grunt. I zipped open my tent and saw a heard of Springbok standing around my tent also camouflaged from the German tourists.
Just after sunrise I was back at the garage for breakfast and on the road again north towards to Swakopmund.
