Arriving in Cape Town

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Fairly turbulent flight over night to Cape Town, this could have been because the flight flew along the coast of Africa. Probably managed to sleep on and off for 3 hours. Once we reached Namibia, we could see the Namib Desert outside and the sun rising. The landing into Cape Town was smooth and we saw Table Mountain upon landing. We were tired when we arrived from lack of sleep, but the adrenalin pushed us which helped knowing we’d have to drive 560km that day.

It took around 45 minutes to clear customs upon arrival. The luggage was waiting for us as we stepped through customs. Collecting the hire car from Hertz took about 1 hr. We asked for me as an additional driver and we also got documentation to cross the Namibian border. Be prepared to pay a bit extra for additional drivers as well as administration fee for collecting the car. We had an orange Kia Rio 1.4. Europacar car rental queue was huge so we were pleased we’d selected Hertz, many of the people waiting at Europacar were losing their patience. We paid slightly extra for an upgraded car, but the Kia was very basic. However, the car proved very reliable during the entire trip. We suggest though that if you are going to Namibia or intend to travel on gravel roads or in remote areas, get a more powerful car and preferably a 4WD. Unfortunately Hertz no longer rent out 4WD.

Driving out of the airport is slightly confusing and we tried to find N7 which would lead us up north. Instead we ended upon N2 and then N5 leading onto the N7. This wasted a bit of time leaving Cape Town. The N7 leading out of Cape Town is not as boring as we have read on the Internet by those who have driven on it. We drove past an Ostrich farm with the sign outside ‘Don’t use your horn, ostriches getting laid’. We also had a nice view of Table Mountain in the rear view.

We left Cape Town at 1pm and got to Okiep around 7pm. We drove around 100 km/hr. Note that the quality of the road is really good, but there is only one lane and there are many lorries. There is a lot of overtaking going on, sometimes by drivers speeding and risking their lives overtaking in curves. We got braver as we drove along, but we also wanted to enjoy the scenery and not drive too fast. The scenery changes frequently, and in particular we enjoyed the area around Cederberg, Clanwilliam and then into Namaqualand. In spring Namaqualand is covered in wildflowers and it must be a spectacular view.

Drive: 560km north to Okiep.

We had booked a night in Okiep Country Hotel. The hotel is clean and rooms average. Although it’s in a remote area, the village is quite compact and there is a club nearby which was blasting out music in the evening. The hotel has a restaurant serving many local dishes and breakfast was excellent with plenty of fresh fruit, buffet style food and a chef cooking eggs or omelette from scratch in front of you. Our room was near the braai (barbecue) area in the back garden with a swimming pool, and this can also get noisy in the evening. We were shattered after the flight and drive though and slept solidly until early morning.

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Comments

[Nadine]

Brilliant Helena, looking forward to the next instalment!