Swakopmund - Oshakati

Hello everyone…here our story continues. We absolutely loved Swakopmund, but today we have to move on. Thank you again to the Bardenhorst family for their friendly help. 

Goodbye Swakop

With a long day ahead we headed off to Henties Bay early morning on what the Namibian’s call a salt road (Skeleton Coast). Kind of like tar but not, and very slippery when wet. Lucky for us it was dry, but colder than expected and we were wearing all our warm clothes on top of each other. The road was rather earie, misty and cool but yet barren and alone.

The road to Henties

We stopped in Henties for a breakfast and a quick look around.

Henties Bay

Our next stop, only 65km on, was Cape Cross, famous for its seal colony. Motorbikes are not permitted, but the couple of Owambo words we had learnt up to now worked like magic and we quickly became the exception to the rule. At Cape Cross there were thousands and thousands of seals everywhere, the sea was full of them, the beach was full of them. Crazy! But even more impressive to see was the beautiful left hand point break that would have been great for a surf. 

Cape Cross Seal Colony

 

Mia could not handle the smell, which was caused by a mixture between massive amounts of seal excrement and dead decaying seal bodies (yip..that bad) so we did not stay very long.

We followed the road up to Mile 108 and turned inland towards the Burnt Mountains where we were planning to camp that night. This took us onto a district road which is something like a secondary gravel road. This last 190 km stretch turned out to be extremely challenging. Within half an hour we were back in the dry hot dessert area and had to make a stop to take off all the layers of clothing we had on. As we were gaining altitude the landscapes and colors kept on changing. Even the color of the road kept changing, from red to purple, maroon, pink and white, and with every change the condition changed as well… this meant hard work on our part and required an extreme high level of concentration.

Just as we thought things could not get any worse, whalla… our friend “ sand” arrived! 

Mia walks the canary through the sand

It was very tough and very slow! But eventually at 18:30 we arrived at the camp! Exhausted and dead tired! 

The “Brandberg White Lady Lodge” provided us with a warm welcome and lots of unusual staff members, like a dwarf python, which helped us forget about our tough day.

Dwarf Python

The Lodge looked out onto the “The Burnt Mountains” with scenery I can not express.

Beautiful Brandberg

And again..

After chatting to some locals and other travelers about our planned route, we both agreed to change our plans and take easier roads.

Kamanjab was to be our next destination as it was on a good gravel road. We stopped to take a photo with some tradition Herero women who sell their crafts next to the road. 

Herero women

We arrived in Kamanjab nice and early and found a private farm called ALPEC Bushcamp and Game Park, with a wonderful campsite. The farm is run by Pieter and Alene Pretorius, who in true Namibian style, made us feel very welcome. They joined us at the campsite for a braai and we had a great evening together. Thank you Pieter and Alene for your company, the lessons about Jagermeister and the home grown butternut!

Hennie, Mia, Alene and Pieter

Tar road to Opuwo was a welcome change. In Herero language, Opuwo means “the end” which is certainly a fitting name for this dusty collection of concrete commercial buildings ringed by traditional rondavels and huts. We found an expensive lodge with a cheap but stunning campsite, on recommendation from Tannie Andriette. (Dankie Tannie!) So we could enjoy the beautiful pool and setting while sipping a Malawian shandy….now we’re on holiday!

The end of civilization - Opuwo

We left civilization towards the Epupa falls and found the road winding between little green hills and rocky open plains. This was to be our taste of the Koakoveld which is often described as one of the last true wildernesses in Southern Africa with free roaming desert elephants and lions. On the road we passed many Himba villages.

Hennie with two Himba Boys

The Himbas are a semi-nomadic pastoral people that continue to live much as they have for generations on end. The women smear themselves with a mixture of animal fat, bush herbs and red powder/stone which dyes their skin a burnt-orange color. This serves as a natural sun block and insect repellent, so apparently there is no need to bath. They use this to cover their braided hair and wear nothing but an animal skin around their waists. Though this is supposed to be a big attraction to tourists I think the fact that we come from South Africa and have seen these traditional outfits in our Zulu’s made it a little less exciting for us. We found the Himba’s to be pushy and near aggressive trying to sell their crafts to you, so really a bit scary and smelly. The fact that they wanted $50 for a photo was ridiculous.

A Himba woman and her baby

We arrived at Epupa (Falling Waters in Herero) early afternoon with enough time to swim in some of the pools next to the waterfall( apparently crocodile free), save a local donkey trapped in the rope tying him to a tree near the river and check out the view from a close by hill for a sundowner.

Swimming in the pools of Epupa

Epupa waterfall

Camp at Epupa

Here we met two couples, Oom Koos & Tannie Willemien Croucamp and Oom Michael and Tannie Marieta Holland-Muter.

Oom Michael &Tannie Marieta,Oom Koos & Tannie Willemien

What a treat! They are all from South Africa and we got to know them quite well over the next two days as they traveled with us to Ruacana. We really enjoyed their company and spent most of the time laughing at Oom Michael’s stories about all his many girlfriends.

We left after them the next day but met up again when we stopped for a drink at Kasane River Lodge. Here we decided to travel together, which really was a blessing as the 48km to Ruacana was to be the most testing road we’ve had.

By now you will have realized that we write a lot about the road and its condition which may sound boring but if you spend 8hrs a day on a motorbike the road condition is what keeps you busy and determines what happens that day. So please bear with us…

Anyway, on the road from our stop to Ruacana, Hennie’s motorbike (Taruk) got stuck in a deep mud pit and the Yellow Canary (AKA Night Fury!) had a pull him out…lol.

Taruk in trouble

He nearly did it again when he hit a deep water trench and soaked his side panniers…which means he was nearly deep enough to swim. Just after that Night Fury/Yellow Canary had a lie down in her own muddy pit and again on a very rocky downhill. Nothing broke and no one got hurt so all and all a brilliant day full of fun and games. The Fortuner in front of us (Oom Michael and Tannie Marieta) had no problems but the other Fortuner behind us (Oom Koos and Tannie Willemien) very nearly got stuck and spun out half of Ovambo land’s mud to free themselves.

We camped at Ruacana with our new friends and laughed and chatted until 1am the next morning. Thank you to the Croucamp’s and Holland-Muter’s for their special company and the way they took care of us those two days! Zahelo.

Tuesday 13 March we had a short tarred journey to Oshakati where we abused Namibian hospitality and went looking for Braam, Nico’s friend. He was kind enough to help us fix the canary’s right mirror and even braaied for us that evening. We woke up on Wednesday in pouring rain and decided to stay another day to do some washing, blogging and resting. Braam, we cannot thank you enough for your hospitality and help. We hope to return the favor with a visit in Canada or else pay it forward.

So hopefully tomorrow will be dry enough that we can take on the long road (Tarred – yeah!) to Rundu and so start our Caprivi expedition. We are trying to convince Braam to join us for a long weekend on his motorbike.