The Real Namibian Adventure!

Monday Madness

On Monday I marked the start of my adventure around Namibia. The night before I hardly got any rest (too excited) and a very bad sunburn made me look like a chocolate Sunday with a cherry on top… some areas of my body white, some brown, and my chest completely lobster red! But regardless of that, we headed out at 7am to the airport where we would pick up our car. We rented a double cab 4x4 with rooftop tents, which would be ideal for the environment we were going to explore. Getting the car took a long, long time (4 hours!!!) but once everything was finally sorted we headed out of Windhoek towards Tsumeb, which lies around 500km north of the capital. Because of the long car procedure we were in a race against the sun, as it is highly recommended not to drive at night. Nevertheless a stop in Okahanja, where there is a very famous craft market, was still going to happen, and I’m glad it did because it was really interesting. Not only was the art craft very unique but the people were a great laugh. We were told right away that “In Namibia, business is talk” which referred to us saying the price we wanted for the art and slowly negotiating till we agreed on an amount. I’m not gonna lie, this was quite fun especially as they were very friendly (got away with some great deals!) 

The Okahanja Craft Market

After our stop in Okahanja we were destined for a 4 hour ride to Tsumeb, which was a long way. The Namibian radio stations kept us occupied for the first hour with the latest afrobeats and classics, but this ended once we went further and further north. As the sunset we were starting to worry that we wouldn’t make it in time, so I put the pedal to the metal (went a bit over the speed limit) and ensured we made it to the town just as it got dark. We found a campsite, cooked ourselves some nice pasta, and called it an early night.

We Made it to Tsumeb!

 Etosha Experience

The Gates to Etosha

Tuesday, 4:30am

At 4:30am we set our alarms in an attempt to reach Etosha national park by sunrise. Not many sane people would do this, but we thought if we were here anyway we might as well make the most of it. So by 6:30am we made it to the gates of Etosha where our search for Giraffe’s, Elephants, Rhino’s, and over exotic animals began. Within 5 minutes of entering the park we were greeted with a herd of 5 giraffe’s right next to the road. This of course completely woke us up (we were still half asleep) and really got us excited for what we would see over the course of the 2 days we had at Etosha. The whole day we spent driving around going to different waterholes and trying to spot all the wildlife. Rather than explaining every animal we saw, I’ve added a lot of photos showing what we saw. One exception is the breath taking moment a herd of elephants walked a stones throw away from our car. Not knowing whether they were going to charge towards the car, the adrenaline was just pumping through our bodies.

A Sole Springbok

Literally Zebra Crossing

A Beautiful Waterhole

The Etosha Pan

Elephants a stones throw from our car

So Cool!

Elephant Herd Crossing :)

Yeah... I really like Elephants!

Ostrich!

At night we had booked to stay at a campsite inside the park which had a floodlit waterhole to spot animals at night. This again was an amazing opportunity for us to spot spotted hyena, rhino’s, and even more elephants :) The next morning we continued on our game drives and towards the afternoon we headed out of the park towards Palmswag which would set us up for our drive down skeleton coast to Swakopmund.

Black Horned Rhino

Elephants at the floodlit waterhole

Giraffe

Our First Sighting of the Day

Cheeky Selfie! 

Hartebeest taking over!

MasterChef

Our Ride!

Sleeping in the Savanna

Once we left Etosha we had a 3 hour drive to Palmswag, which on the map seemed like a big town the guaranteed campsites… we were wrong! Like the first day we were in a race against the sun to make it to the town and when we made it there we were completely in shock. The only thing in the “town” was an animal disease control stop. So we got our of the car cleaned our shoes whilst they sprayed the wheels and asked them where the town was, only to be told that ‘this is the town”. There was absolutely nothing, except a couple of huts. This created a dilemma… where would we spend the night. With not many options I suggested we go camping in the bush, which is just what we did. So just past the checkpoint we spotted a hill about 100 meters from the road, did a bit of off road driving and found ourselves the perfect spot for the night. We quickly set up the tents, had a quick bite, and dived into our tents as it was, well, “adventurous”. What I mean by adventurous is that within 5 minutes of getting on our tents we heard footsteps getting closer, and closer, and closer, till there was something around our car. With no idea was it was/could be we were dead silent, not daring to say a word. Having visitors throughout the night ensured that we wouldn’t get lonely!! When the sun rose early in the morning we all sighed in relief that we had survived the night. Upon climbing down the ladder we saw the car completely surround by animal poo, and some bones, which reaffirmed our relief that we made it through the night. 

A Beautiful view/drive

Camping in the Middle of Nowhere

The Whole View

Little "Shops" selling traditional artwork

A Day of Drama

After our night in the bush we headed out towards skeleton coast (the western coast of Namibia) down towards the city of Swakopmund. It’s a bit ironic that i’m saying that we “headed” to skeleton coast because for the first 2 hours we were going in the completely opposite direction. You would think that with so few roads it would be hard to get lost, but hey! we did it!! Thus after a frustrating 3.5 hours going the wrong way and driving back we got back to the place we spent the night. Which is when we went on the right track towards the skeleton coast entrance (its considered a national park). Within an hour of driving we were hit with a sudden BANG!!! What we had hoped would never happen, happened… our tire blew up. It didn’t just get punctuated, it completely blew up as you can see from the photo. So I had to do what I had to do and changed the tire in the middle of the dessert, whilst the girls took the opportunity to make themselves a sandwich… We found out that this was quite common as our tire joined the over 32 spotted on the side of the road. Let me tell you that the moment we entered Etosha, we had only been driving on sand/salt/gravel roads, which is most likely what caused the tire to explode. 

Well....Shit!

Hard at Work!

There's the First Warning!

Amazing Sights!

And More!

Finally we made it to the coast

Eeeeh!! Shipwreck!

After the minor inconvenience we continued our way towards the coast and slowly down south towards Swakopmund. What was amazing to see was the vast difference in sceneries we encountered during our drive. From the mountains, the desert, the dunes, to the coast, absolutely stunning! Whilst driving parallel to the coast we a saw a sign indicating a shipwreck which was only accessible with a 4x4 vehicle. So without thinking twice I was curious to put my driving ability to the test and get to this shipwreck. The whole drive along the coast was challenging as the back wheels would constantly slide from left to right, but no real problems yet. This however changed as we approached the edge of the coast. You can probably imagine what happened next. We got stuck in the sand, deep sand! So there we were, in the middle of nowhere, not having seen another car/person for 16 hours and stuck in the sand by the coast. We had been warned about only staying on the main road and that many people have died in the skeleton coast, we in my head I was thinking about getting a nice stone for my grave! Yeah, Yeah, a bit dramatic, but with the girls digging the sand from under the wheels, and my 5 star driving (which was the main reason! haha) we managed to get out of the deep sand and put us back on track towards Swakopmund, which is where we would be staying for 2 nights. I’m gonna end it here, and write the second half of my adventure sometime next week, but as you can tell from my access to internet, I have made it safely to Swakop!

Yeah...this wasn't too great!

Anyway, Cheers from Swakopmund!!