The Namibian border crossing couldn’t have
been any easier, quicker or stress free. A quick form to fill out, no entry
visa and we were in and out before you could say Windhoek.
I wish other countries could take note,
however in saying that there was literally no one else bordering crossing. No
cars, no trucks, no people. It was pleasant.
The Namibian landscape is not what I
thought it was, it isn’t as deserty (so far) as I thought it would be. The soil
is dusty and it looks like they haven’t had a whole lot of rain lately, but
there are still a lot of green trees and bushes.
The weather wasn’t too bad today and it was
a quick 10km drive from the border – through a small national park (we saw
Zebras and Elephants) to our campsite where we had lunch.
We spent the rest of the day relaxing, for
some reason there was no power so we couldn’t get anything cold until later in
the day and everyone was feeling lethargic so there wasn’t a whole lot of
interest in doing much.
The campsite does have a little bird
sanctuary hosting a few interesting looking parrots. I am not sure if they are
native to Africa but I did like the look of some of them, they had some very
nice colours.
We were hit by a sudden windstorm right
after dinner, so strong it was blowing our tents to-and-fro before it calmed
down about an hour later. It was strange how quickly it came and went and we
hadn’t a clue. There was lightning and thunder but thankfully no rain.
By the time we fell asleep the wind had
died down to a breeze.
We awoke the next morning and began our
journey to Etosha National Park. The trip took about 8 hours including 2 stops
for food and ATM and then for lunch. We reached Etosha around 3pm.
Etosha is the biggest national park in
Namibia and it covers 20,000 square kilometers. So it’s pretty big.
Camp gates closed at 6pm so we had a
90-minute game drive close to the campsite where we saw A LOT of giraffe. More
than I have seen anywhere else. We also saw a couple of Oryx, which marks a new
animal for me. They are Black and White and quite large with equally large
horns. Aside from a lot of Giraffe’s and the Oryx’s we saw some Zebra’s, a
couple of Mongoose (including 2 at the campsite who didn’t seem to have any
fear of humans) and a male, brown-backed jackal.
A couple of the 3 million Giraffe's we saw in Etosha
The next morning we took another game drive
on our way out of Etosha. Today we saw a lot. No lions or leopards or Cheetahs,
but a lot of giraffes, elephants, oryx, hyenas, jackals and even the rare Black
Rhino. It was a pretty cool drive and I like Etosha a lot, probably one of my
favourite National Parks I’ve been too. We also saw the salt plain, a large
part of Etosha is a former lake-gone-dry and as such is now a salt plain. The
animals largely stay away from it but the sicks ones go there and lay in the
salt to try and draw up the minerals to help them get better.
We camped just outside the national park
gate.
The next day we arrived at a Cheetah park
around midday. The park is a 7000 hectare farmland owned by a family who farm
it, and set up a camping ground but also have permits to own Cheetahs. They
have 4 tame Cheetahs and 15 wild ones in a large pen.
The day was stifling hot and we spent most
of the afternoon in the shade before we were picked up around 4pm to visit the
tame Cheetahs at their house.
There were 4 cheetahs, 3 of which we were
able to play with, the other didn’t like to be patted.
It was so cool to be able to play with
these cats. They are really big, but so skinny. Their fur feels very thick and
you can feel the bumps where their spots are. They were very playful, one of
the cats took Danni’s hat and kept playing with it, batting it around, holding
it in its mouth and running around it. Then when the hat was finally taken
away, the Cheetah decided it would attempt to steal Danni’s thong (flip-flop/sandal
– whatever you call it) and it wouldn’t let it go. The owner finally managed to
get it back but not without a big chunk of it taken out of the back of it.
To my reluctance we had to finish with the
tame cheetahs and jump in a trailer where we were taken to the 15 wild ones.
These wild ones have been saved/rescued/captured by other farms and given to
the park. These Cheetahs have killed cattle or sheep on a farm and instead of
killing them, farmers capture them and give them to the park as a way of preventing
the destruction of the Cheetahs.
Like lions and leopards, once Cheetahs get
the taste of blood for an animal they will continue to hunt them and therefore
cannot be let loose.
The wild cheetahs were split into two
different pens. The first one held 7 Cheetahs who all knew what to expect when
they hear the truck with the trailer coming. Dinner time!
They crowded around waiting for the driver
(one of the farmers) to throw some donkey meat up in the air. It was awesome to
watch them leap in mid-air to capture the meat, fight over it and then run off
with their catch. The good thing was no Cheetah went hungry so they all got a
feed.
The second pen had 5 of the roughest,
scarred Cheetahs I’ve ever seen. They look like they’ve been in a couple of
fights and I get the feeling these ones are more wild than the previous ones.
They were fed the same way but we were outside the pen this time, unlike the
previous one where we were right amongst the Cheetahs.
I went back to the second pen later that
night since it was close where we were camping and they were prowling around
the fence line, one of them even hissed at me and feigned an attack. It scared
the crap out of me. I didn’t expect that at all.
I…I can explain
The next morning I went back to the Cheetah
pens and caught sight of the five wild ones still prowling but at the other
pen, there was a since Cheetah, a young one I think, who sat near the fence,
facing the other pen and kept meowing, as if trying to call one of them from
the other pen.
It was fascinating to see them act like a
domestic house cat, s/he even began rolling on the ground like a house cat.
All in all I was very impressed with the
Cheetah park and would love to spend some more time there. Cheetahs are one of
my favourite animals and as I didn’t really get to see one in the National
Parks (from a distance in the Masai only) I was happy to get a close and in
depth look at how they act, even if they are confined.
We left the Cheetah Park and arrived at
Spitzkoppe during the mid-afternoon. Spitzkoppe is a basic campsite with one
distinguishing feature, it has a lot of huge boulders which meant we were able
to sleep on them under the stars. No tents.
It was freezing cold and we had to use our
sleeping mats for the first time since the first night we started this trip but
it was magnificent. A clear sky allowed us to peer into the heart of the
universe. Stars scattered the sky like freckles scatter the face of the palest
redhead you’ll find, we saw Scorpio and we even saw two shooting stars - a
first for me.
I was quite content to fall asleep under
such a canopy.
The next day we headed to Swakopmund, one
of the bigger tourist destinations in Namibia, situated on both the ocean and
the desert, with a lot of activities to see and things to do. It’s also very
cold.
We spent 3 nights there and naturally with
a whole lot of activities at our disposal we decided on one thing - Quad biking
in the Namib Desert.
The first night we relaxed and explored the
small town, there were a lot of shops and we did a bit of shopping, buying some
shoes, a wetsuit and other clothing. It’s very cheap in Namibia.
That night we went to dinner at an Italian
restaurant, a last night to say goodbye to the 4 people leaving the group here.
The next day was Quad biking. I’ve never
used a quad bike before so I was keen to see how I would go and try not to make
an ass of myself. But, like my sandboarding in Dubai, I was awesome at it from
the outset…granted I used an automatic and all I had to do was steer and make
sure I had enough oomph to get up the steeper dunes.
We departed into the Namib Desert and I was
incredibly surprised at our it looked, especially compared to the Middle
Eastern Deserts we had visited before Africa. The sand here is a lot finer and
the dunes look fake, I felt as if it was merely a background that I would drive
through any second, but it was not to be, the airbrushed dunes were smooth with
shades of red and black from iron in the air caught on the dunes. We rode
through the Desert, riding up and down the dunes, going through what they call
the rollercoaster before stopping at the top of a tall dune where we could see
both the sea and the rest of the desert.
It was great fun.
We relaxed the next day and got some much
needed R&R, it was nice to have a bed for 3 nights before back to camping
so we much as much use of it as we could.
Our next destination was Sossusvlei, home
of the petrified forest, apparently one of the most photographed places in
Namibia and the Southern Hemisphere. It was another stinking hot day and we trudged
through the sand for 20 minutes before reaching the plains where the forest is.
65000 years ago a river ran through the desert and the area was green and lush,
due to the shifting of the sand the river was cut off and then eventually died
out leaving the petrified forest. Upon approach I was a bit underwhelmed by it.
It just looked like a couple of dead trees on a plain but when we reached the
plains and walked amongst the dead trees I felt a little more better about it
all. It is by no means a forest, it’s probably less than 50 trees but it still
was pretty cool once we walked amongst them. We rode out the rest of the day at
camp, relaxing and trying to stay cool.
The next day we headed towards Fish River
Canyon, arriving around 4pm. Fish River Canyon is the second biggest canyon in
the world, behind the Grand. We strolled around the edge of the canyon,
glimpsing the chasms and the dry river down below. The views were great and it
was a relaxing walk, though it is still hot in the afternoon in Namibia.
We relaxed the night in camp and at the
bar, it was a cool night and also our last night in Namibia.
No comments:
Post a Comment