Like Johannesburg, Zimbabwe was a place we had no intention of visiting before this trip. In Zimbabwe’s case, it was on account of the political unrest there. However, shortly before we left for Phase 2 of the trip, Erika’s sister’s father-in-law (“I am your father’s brother’s nephew’s cousin’s former roommate”) went to Harare for a few months of work, and was going to be there when we’d be in southern Africa. So, suddenly, we had something of a reason to…
We had no intention of going to Johannesburg. On top of being “just another big city,” we both independently felt like it was one of the more dangerous places we considered going. South Africa in general, to put it lightly, has some issues with crime. “Oh, it’d be the greatest country in the world if it weren’t for all the crime,” a South African we met in Istanbul airport, months later, said to us. He may not be a wrong…
Since we started planning this journey, Cape Town was one of the places we very much wanted to go. But by the time the trip started back in January, visiting Cape Town was looking fairly dicey. They were in the middle of an epic two-year-plus drought, water restrictions were in place, and there was talk of the city completely running out of water by April. Fortunately, enough rains had come and pushed that zero-day date out to 2019 at least,…
The morning dawned on the last full day of our Namibia Travels, with Erika bruised from her sand boarding falls, and Brennan bruised from being thrown repeatedly by his horse. Yeah! Seems like his horse was particularly cranky, and actually threw him twice. I know you’re supposed to “get back up on the horse” and all that, but I’m pretty confident I will never be thrown by a horse twice. Day 9 After a wonderful day of barely being in…
Erika and I had had enough of the early waking up, it turned out. So when Brennan and Sarah suggested getting up early the next day to go out to Dune 45, we encouraged them to go without us. We got to sleep in a sweet extra hour! When we woke up, we decided, you know what, we don’t feel like making breakfast this morning, so we went to get breakfast at the cafe at the campsite. Breakfast was… well…
After the stunning experience of the dunes the day before, we were hungry for some more time outdoors. We’d each found a hike in our guidebooks that was “nearby” Sesriem, so that made an easy decision. For day 6, let’s go hiking! Day 6 “Nearby” is something I hadn’t fully calibrated to Namibia yet. Sure, the trail-head was only 90 kilometers away, but it still hadn’t sunk in yet just how long that takes on Namibian dirt roads. Over 2…
Our start came early again, as usual. Fortunately, Erika and I were sleeping well in the tent now. Exhaustion helps with that. We were even better at getting camp packed up this time, and were easily able to hit our planned 8am departure time. We had a date with the dunes, and Erika, especially, was excited. The dunes were all I really knew about Namibia before this trip, and that’s because Erika has long wanted to come see them. It’s…
Wiping all the dirt off (literal and metaphorical) that we felt like we’d picked up in Kolmanskop, we were back in the cars. We took back to the B4 and headed east, retracing the path we’d taken last night, back toward the town of Aus. From Aus, we’d say goodbye to paved roads and start heading north. Day 4 Day 4 was, thankfully, considerably less driving than we’d done the first two driving days. But, as I mentioned above, it…
We’ll never really know if the apfel strudel woman was right with what she said about Lüderitz, as we never really saw it. We got in after dark, and the next morning we were up early and back on the road, with no time to spend in Lüderitz itself. It seemed cute enough. Though as we saw now driving out in the daylight: the surrounding area is harsh, ugly desert. Sands routinely blow across the roadway and obscure the road….
Namibia is a big country, it turns out. And, we saw an awful lot of it thru the windows of our cars. No more so than on day 3 of the trip, a day we spent almost the entirety of in the car. Most of it on low-quality dirt roads. Day 3 After fueling up in Keetmanshoop, we got back on the B1 heading south, before switching to the B4 west, another of the few paved roads in Namibia. Day…
