As no one answered the phone Erika held up to her ear, I looked around the cozy confines of our Fiat Cinquecento. I guess it wouldn’t be so bad to sleep in here, I thought. On the drive up to Lake Como, we’d stopped for a long time at a Carrefour, to buy a massive amount of food and supplies for our road trip. We’d figured since we’d have the car for so long, we could just keep everything in…
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…
Our “relaxing” time back home was anything but. It was, maybe, the most stressful time we’d had all year. We had just under two weeks before leaving for Namibia, which we were looking forward to using to reload and recharge. But in the days leading up to leaving Mexico, our to-do list grew and grew. We had to buy new toiletries and supplies for Phase 2, and get my phone fixed, and fully catch up on laundry, and actually book…
It was finally here: the beast, the event that made planning South America so hard, the reason for our REI registry and huge REI shopping trips. Torres del Paine! Multi-night trips in Torres need to be planned fairly well in advance, because it’s super popular and campsite reservations are mandatory. Thus, we’ve had our trip to the Torres planted as a stake in the ground for quite a while now. We’ll have another post discussing logistics and planning for this…
