Desert-ed in Namibia

Carissa at the Cape of Good Hope.

After 6 days of traveling in the Intrepidmobile (the name the two of us have given the overland truck our group of 14 people we’re traveling in), we arrived yesterday in Swakopmund, Namibia. This city of approximately 20,000 is an odd oasis in the expansive Namibian desert landscape – imagine a German-styled town (including German street names) with palm trees plunked down between massive sand dunes and the Atlantic coast.


So far we’ve had a great time with the group – an interesting mix of people from Australia, New Zealand, the UK, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, and us—all under the supervision of 3 Kenyans. Linguamorphs that we are, we’ve once again found ourselves using different words and phrases than usual. For example, rather than ‘too’ or ‘also’ we’ve quite quickly adapted to saying ‘as well,’ Other than last night, we’ve been camping in two-person canvas wall tents with wrought-iron poles that are fierce spring-loaded weapons when taking the tent down.

We’ve visited some really beautiful places including the Cape Point and Cape of Good Hope in Table Mountain National Park in South Africa; the Fish River Canyon (southern Namibia) at dusk; and sunrise atop Dune 45 in Namib-Naukluft Park (Namibia). The constantly changing desert in between these sites has been impressive. As we roll by in the Interpidmobile, rocky moonscapes spotted with tufts of grass become barren then trees reappear that Dr. Seuss might have drawn.

Beach at the Cape of Good Hope, South Africa.

Orange River at the border of South Africa and Namibia

Dr. Seuss-ian tree at Fish River Canyon, Namibia

Fish River Canyon, Namibia (World's second deepest and widest canyon, 25km between rims).

Namibian desert and cactus friend.

Nest of social weaver birds (from a distance and up close). Approximately 100 birds live in a nest this size.

Rich with his box of favourite favourites cookies in the Intrepidmobile.

 Rich hiking Dune 45 just before sunrise.

Dune in the Namib-Naukluft Park.

Sossusvlei, Namib-Naukluft Park.

Camping in the middle of the desert.

We're excited to be driving across the Tropic of Capricorn (especially since Rich is a Capricorn).

Though we’ve been enjoying the sights, we (Carissa in particular) have been struggling a bit with our insulation from the communities we’ve passed along the way. The vast majority of people we’ve come across are other tourists or employees of shops, campgrounds, etc. that largely cater to groups like ours or other individuals traveling overland in this region. It feels odd to have such minimal contact with local people and to have learned nearly nothing about the way of life of people living in the region or to not have tasted many local dishes. This is not so different than road-trips we’ve taken in the US where we visit National Parks, maybe have a meal at a local restaurant but mostly don’t interact with the local people in any significant way. For some reason this feels more unsettling/unsatisfying here.

From the early days of planning this trip we’ve been struggling with the idea of being tourists, and trying to determine whether to visit more countries for less time (seeing the sights but perhaps not learning much about what life is like in any given location) or fewer countries for more time (hopefully gaining greater exposure to and understanding about the lives of people living in each country). Though we’d prefer to do the latter, to this point we’ve been reluctant to cross countries off our ‘to visit’ list. Perhaps after a few more weeks of changing our location daily we’ll be more inclined to do so.