Namibia is Africa Hot!!!
Trip Start
Oct 06, 2008
1
3
15
Trip End
Nov 17, 2008
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Sossusvlei, Namibia
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
The views from the flight were very cool, but it was bumpy and extremely loud. Without Dramamine, the plane ride really would have been intolerable. The inventor of Dramamine should be made a saint, I swear. We landed on a gravel airstrip in the middle of nowhere with an orange wind sock and a medic cart being the only things marking it as an airport.
Tiuk, our guide during our stay, was waiting with the 4WD safari Land Rover and it was HOT. On the 10 minute drive from the airstrip to the Sossusvlei Wilderness Camp we saw an oryx and several springbok. Our lodge is cool, built into the side of a hill and each room is its own chalet. It overlooks a huge desert plain with the red dunes in the background, and we see animals at the watering hole out front all the time.
Our room has a plunge pool which we've found essential when the afternoon temperature hits over 100 degrees and the wind is like a furnace. Even the cold tap gives hot water then! Somehow the plunge pool stays cool and refreshing. Here our days are set up like the animals - we wake up before dawn and head out for an activity in the morning while it's still cool. We usually have lunch at the lodge and then "siesta" all afternoon when it's super hot. Then in the evening there's another activity before a nice dinner with everyone at the lodge.
The first night we went on a nature walk in the desert plain below the lodge. We walked down a dry riverbed and stopped to look at a tree with a bird condo built in it - they're called sociable weavers and they build individual apartments for each bird couple but they are all together in huge groups of 500 birds in one tree. I spotted a horned adder eating a lizard below one of the trees we looked at - we were happy it had already found dinner.
As the sun started to set our nature guide Thomas pulled out a bottle of wine and we stood in the shade having our first "sundowner" of the trip.
After dinner we got to see the southern night sky in nearly all its glory - except that the moon is almost full so it makes the sky brighter than normal. One of the guides, Sebastian, is an astrological junkie and equipped with a laser highlighter showed us some of the constellations. Of course the Southern Cross was first. It looks nothing like the display on the Australian flag, but its navigational guide has been essential for travelers of all sorts for years. The cross makes a triangle that at its intersecting point is due south.
Even more impressive, and both our favorite, Scorpio is huge and needs little imagination to figure out the scorpion shape. The constellation as a whole has 15 or 20 stars in it and dominates the night sky. In the next couple weeks when the full moon retreats, we should be able to see the Milky Way which looks like a dusting of stars across the sky.
We were woken our first day at 5 am in order to give us breakfast and get to the dunes for some sunrise views. As we approached the red dunes in our Land Rover 4x4 they started to rise into the sky and seem to go one forever. The only way into the dunes by car is a paved highway that is on top of a dried river bed that' splits the dunes in two. The word Sossusvlei means "sponge" in local language and is called that because when the river bed is flooded the water soaks into the ground under the dunes and travels into the Atlantic Ocean 55 kms away.
Katie needed a break, Tim here. We stopped a few times for pictures and then at a dune they call Dune 45, because of the angle to the ground, and we were given the chance to climb up the enormous monster. Not the largest of them, Big Daddy which measures 388 meters or 1140 feet or taller than the Sears Tower is the king of the dunes, our dune is still one of the largest in the world. Katie and I were the only ones in our group to make it too the top, we're also the only ones under the age of 60 in our group, and the views from up top were worth all the hard work. A tip for the next time you're climbing up a dune is to walk directly in the foot steps of the person in front of you. The footsteps are a more compressed sand that won't slip as much as sand that's walked on for the first time. Knowing that Katie, or Kate as everyone here loves to call her, was right behind me for the entire walk up the dune.
Once we descended Dune 45, the last quarter of which I sprinted down the front face galloping to the ground to which someone called me a "springbok", we headed to a part of the dunes they call the dead forest. It was basically a forest of dead tree skeletons still upright and standing in a dry, white lake among the red dunes. Originally there had been a lake there which supplied the trees with water, but a dune cut off the lake from the water supply and the trees died when the water dried up, leaving a layer of calcium carbonate that makes the lake bed white today. The trees have been frozen there for the last 600-900 years.
OK, Katie again. Thoroughly exhausted and sweaty, we were very ready for our brunch in the shade. Tiuk pulled out tables and chairs and set up a "bush brunch" in the shade of one of the trees. We had veggies and salads with plates, silverware and everything! Very cool.
After that we drove the rocky roads back to camp for a well deserved plunge and nap.
Before dinner we took a drive into the mountains to experience a different sundown view. We saw some cool fairy circles which are round patches where no plants will grow - they don't know why. At the top of the mountain we sat and sipped wine and watched the sun set. Dinner was fun with a large group tonight that are in to do a wing safari where they fly from camp to camp after about 2 days in each.
Then next morning with another predawn wake up (yep! 3 days in a row!) we headed out for our sunrise hot air balloon ride. We climbed into the big basket with about 12 other people and took off! We were up to about 3000 feet and could see the dunes stretching all the way to the ocean. It also allowed us to see how much the floods change where the plants are and how the land is shaped. Even though it's entirely dry right now, it's easy to see where the river goes when it rains and how the land floods. The landing was hilarious. The balloon captain kept radioing our ground team - seriously there were like 6 cars that followed us - to check the wind and the ground team had to keep moving forward and back as the wind changed. We got to about a foot off the ground and then a team of men grabbed the basket and pulled it 50 feet over to the trailer where we finally set down. We all stayed in the basket and as the balloon came down it rained sand on all of us and the balloon itself fell on our heads! Too funny.
Right next to the dunes, they had set up a luxurious champagne brunch for us - tables, linens, and all. The guys opened the champagne with sabers (see the pic!) and then we had a delicious breakfast of crepes and other yummy stuff... and Tim ate smoked Zebra!! He said it was OK, but he'd never have it again because it looks too much like a horse.
We slept all afternoon again, enjoyed the sunset from the lodge deck with a fun group of people. Tim tried antelope at dinner - Kudu- and said it was really good. I had fish.
The next day we - gasp - slept in!!! It was SO nice to sleep during the cool part of the day! Then we decided to continue the relaxation and headed over to the spa about 30 minutes away. It's in huge castle like buildling and we walked into the arched door to find a true desert oasis with green grass around a big pool!!! We swam and relaxed then got massages. They were pretty normal except inexpensive and they massaged my ears, and there was a strange energy thing she did. We both felt great afterwards.
Next stop - Victoria Falls!!
Comments
my favorite pic...
is the one of Katie on the Dune! That is so cool! Love the postings. Can't wait to hear more when you get back! xoxo