Sossusvlei

After our test-camping night we headed back to Windhoek to stock up with water (beginners that we are we’d forgotten about it) and a fry-pan. But then we were ready for the big trip and wanted to travel south to Sossusvlei, a national park with impressive red sand dunes and huge white pans. Shortly after we left the city the road turned gravel and didn’t change back. 80km/h is the max speed you would want (and are allowed) to drive on gravel roads so we had lots of time to enjoy the dreary, reddish, rocky landscape. No animals crossed our way and so all we had to look out for were potholes. As we are blessed with air-condition in the car we didn’t realize how the temperatures increased the further we went south and so suddenly, when we got out of the car at our campsite 4 hours later, we were hit by 31 degrees and a warm strong desert wind. It was too late in the day to check out the dunes immediately so we set up the tent and admired the facilities. We had our own shower and toilet directly onto a shady patio next to which we parked the car. We were the only guests and yes, everything around us looked very desert-ly, were scarce, no people or animals in sight. But… what was this? A pool in the middle of the desert! Knowing that it might not be the most environmentally friendly thing to set up in a dry country, we were more than happy about the refreshment in our private oasis!

The darker it got, the more animals came out and we felt very exposed to springboks, jackals and who-knows-what-else. But god thanks we have a rooftop tent! As usual in the desert, it got rather cold at night, so an additional blanket over the sleeping bags was needed.

Even though I had a horrible night (feeling like the only 2 persons in the desert where nobody would hear you scream didn’t give me good dreams at all) the next morning was beautiful with coffee in the warming sunshine, little birds crowding the patio and all facilities so conveniently close by. It didn’t feel like camping to be fair, but it made everything sooo easy. For long we should dream of this camp site as it was hard to find something similar.

However, we had dune to climb and another 1 hour drive in the national park (with tarred road, because everybody paid entrance fee) took us to “Big mama” the highest dune in the national park. Even though we didn’t see many cars, the parking lot there was very busy and the dune itself, too. We started at about 9:30 a.m. which is definitely the last possibility in the morning to do this because the later you started, the hotter it got. The ridge of the dune was well worn out but therefore better to climb. It was hot, the desert wind was hot and the sun was shining merciless, the landscape was red and all you could see were dunes and white pans, but the 2 adventurers of has had a target and that was the peak. After a lot of sweat & swearing we reached it, but the real highlight was the way down: direct way down, one step – 2 meters covered, sand in the shoes? Yes, definitely, but sooo much fun. And as we’d already learned from Walt Disney: the desert is alive, so sand beetles and little geckos witnessed our trip. And a lonely, unhappy looking oryx was standing in the middle of the empty “Dead Pan”, unsure, what it wanted there, the next food or water source miles away…

As no wind was blowin on the way back, we were dying to reach the car and happily called it a day even though it was only noon. Okay, one last stopover at the Sesriem Canyon and then we spent the rest of the day at our desert pool, getting blow dried by the warm desert wind.

 Namibian landscape

our "house"

our pool

  our neighbours

dune up

 dune down

 oryx in the white pan... can you see it?

Sesriem Canyon