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Up The Dunes
Just Given'r. Extremely hung over, extremely windy and extremely cold. It's very similar to hiking at the top of Blackcomb in deep powder.Well, I realize it might have been awhile since my last blog update, and I wasn't entirely clear on where I was going next so hopefully this entry will clear things up. Ryan and I decided to head north into the country of Namibia. This took quite some time to decide because there was a lot in South Africa to see (the whole country really). I guess I look back to the conversation I had with that guy in Punta Arenas who had spent a few years in Cape Town when he told us that at this age we should really go visit more exciting countries than South Africa. I think he was right because as great as Cape Town was, everything was really expensive and touristy so much that it was almost impossible to make any decisions.
After a big night out to say goodbye to Cape Town, Sunday morning Ryan and I went down to the bus station to head north. We had planned to travel from Cape Town to Keetmanshoop. We got to the bus station to sort out our reservation when we found out the bus got to Keetmanshoop at midnight (this was at about 9am)
Elephant
He got so much closer my hands shook worse than Andrews. we figured it was stupid to get there so late, only to pay for a bed somewhere when for the same price we could get all the way too Windhoek. So we paid the extra cost and got on board. The bus was truly horrible, it had no assigned seating so while we were buying our new ticket everyone got on board and what was left were obviously the two worst spots on the bus. Ryan sat by this huge Irish guy who quacked like a duck randomly and I sat by this enormous black woman who easily took up not only her entire seat but 3/4 of mine. I couldn't even get my arm rest down on the aisle side because it was so uncomfortable. At least we only have 19 hours to go. Go we did, I didn't sleep much and the further north we got, to my surprise the colder it became. By the time we crossed the border (which was quite painless) and the sun came up Monday morning it was apparently -3 degrees out and when we got off the bus I had my flip flops on and could essentially see my feet turn blue
Sunrise
Sunrise over Namibia from the tower in Etosha National Park. in front of my eyes.
We got a free ride to the Hostal in Windhoek and made friends with Charlie, an Australian guy on the bus. We took naps then looked into seeing Namibia. As it turns out Charlie is quite a riot, he's from Brisbane and is quite easily the most Australian, Australian I have ever met. People in the Hostal from Melbourne said they couldn't even understand him half the time. Everything was doober-doober, fair dinkum, ridding the bituman, hitting the frog and toad, "fair suck of the save mate!", he went on at length about his iron and his driza-bone, talking about how much he loves acker dacker (AC/DC) going to the dunny, talking about his old sheila, reckoning this country is a dead ringer to Australia and so much more I don't even remember. I think Ryan and I can probably speak fluent Australian now (almost).
Anyhow, we rented another really shitty car and managed to get four people in this time, with Ryan and I along with Charlie and this Austrian girl named Birgit. It was a pretty weird mix but Ry and I were really happy to have avoided any kind of
Ice Cold
Not quite as cold as home, but this would be Charlies first swim in the Atlantic, and for me, I've now swam in the Atlantic off three continents! tour company altogether and just go at it on our own. As it turns out Charlie is a truck driver back in Brisbane and is obviously used to the left hand sides of the road, so he absolutely went nuts and we basically saw the better parts of Namibia in 4 days. We absolutely rat bagged the car and as I write this Ryan is at the car rental office with Charlie trying to explain how the window chipped, the trunk now rattles, the tires were blown, the vomit on the side door, the vomit on the inside (chunder actually) and countless other problems we created by driving the car down 4X4 only roads.
We started things off by heading to the southern coast into Namib Naukluft National Park to visit the sand dunes. To save money Ryan and I slept in the car (me in the trunk and him in the drivers side) while Birgit and Charlie rented foamies and used Charlies tent. In order to fall asleep, and in order to celebrate our first camping trip of the journey, we bought a bottle of grog and drank the whole thing (Ryan and I). Anyhow, that goes to
Charlie
The crazyest man, and the most Australian Australian I have ever had the pleasure of spending time with. explain the aforementioned vomit (chunder) and our ability to sleep in the car. Hours after putting out the fire and going to bed we woke up pre-dawn to go explore the sand dunes. Charlie rat bagged the car once again past all the tour companies en route almost killing us in the process, before we found a restricted dune, hid the car and hiked up it. At the peak we were able to look down on the tour groups at the smaller dunes and relax knowing we did good. After our dune adventure (which was nothing short of amazing) we drove the crappy little car north along all the back roads of the country until we made it to Swakopmund. We also had a meal in Walvis bay which was awesome, and Charlies first feel of the Atlantic Ocean. Swakopmund was nice and we crammed into a tiny two person cabin to save some cash.
Thursday we woke up to go visit the seals just north of Swakopmund and found that to be quite interesting. I've never seen so many seals in my life. There were seals having sex, feeding off each other, fighting, stampeding and in general just
Travel Party
Ryan shot this photo, but here you see me, Charlie and Birgit (along with the tiny car) in Windhoek before departure. hanging out. We took all sorts of photos and got as close as we could to the little buggers, explained to everyone how they club seals in Canada and then quickly hit the road again. We have a long ways to go in order to get up to Etosha National park. We wound our way through more back roads hitting outrageous speeds of 160km/h with Birgit screaming in the back and everyone hanging on for dear life (Charlie has goggles he wears) and somehow or another managing to avoid all the wildlife and locals with only having one near (I repeat extremely near) death experience with a road grater coming around a sharp corner. Once our hearts slowed down we actually got all the way to Etosha before sunset and inside the park boundary. It was really awesome, once we got in we looked over and there were Giraffes just hanging out in the distance having and evening meal. We tried to get pictures but because it was dusk nothing was really turning out, so Charlie and I jumped out of the car to get a better shot when Ryan yelled we weren't aloud, clueing in that there could be
Pit Stop
Somewhere in Namibia. lions or other cats waiting we got right back in and drove off. I guess it was about 200m further in when the most amazing animal I have ever seen in my entire life casually walked out onto the road without even acknowledging us and started towards the car... yes it was a Lion! I can't explain how excited and scared we all were at the same time. It was a full grown male which are about 240KG and with a 4 foot shoulder height, close to 300cm in length this thing made our little car look about half its size. We followed it for a bit even though the English guys in Cape Town said approaching from behind make them angry, and then Charlie did it... he rolled down his window to get a photo and drove by, I can't tell you how loud we all screamed and he just laughed and drove by again while everyone in the back almost blacked out in fear. None of my photos do the experience justice but it was truly unbelievable.
Once in camp Ryan and I setup shop in the car to pass out again and after a meal over
Dune Shot
Just another typical self-shot that I'm sure you're all used to at this point. the fire we went to watch the Rhinos drinking from the water hole (another awesome animal) and then went to sleep. I woke up with pains in my legs after a few hours in the trunk and went to the park tower to catch a glimpse of sunrise. After everyone else got up we went on an adventure in the park. We saw no more Lions even though we tried our hardest, but we did see a Caracal (Randy would have loved it) a spotted Hyena, dozens of jackals (black backed and side striped), warthogs (awesome!), hundreds of Zebras/baby zebras, hundreds of Steenbok, more Giraffes, Impalas, loads of Springbok, the awesome, awesome black wildebeest (they rock), Gemsbok, squirrels and by far the most exciting was the African Elephant. We found Elephant shit on the road and it just seemed to get fresher and fresher until Charlie did a four wheel drift around this one corner and right in front of us was the largest land animal on earth. Of course we waited for it to get closer, and waited for it to flap its ears and get mad, then twitch his eyes and do everything that's not supposed to happen
Global Protection
Well, we figured since Jord isn't able to protect in Australia, we'd just do a pincer move on the tropic of Capricorn and protect it from this continent while he can do his best on his continent. I hope he can find it! before once again everyone completely lost it on Charlie and just when the bloody thing could have stepped on the car and Ryan was readying the side door to just run away into the bush Charlie finally drove off, but of course not before purposely stalling the car just so if we weren't scared enough we would remember the whole experience for the rest of our lives.
The park was truly awesome, the animals nothing like I've ever seen before, nothing like in the zoo, nothing like the cautious and enormous safari wagons that cruised around the park with dozens of tourists not going close, not letting people out, not opening windows... it was simply incredible. After all that we bolted back to Windhoek last night and feel asleep utterly exhausted after our quite thorough adventure. I'm certain that I've written this far too quickly and also missed quite a bit of detail but the internet here is quite expensive and thus I will try to let my photos do most of the talking!
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Ginette
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Wow!
Hey, you probably don't remember me, but I was one of the four Canadian girls you met with Ryan in San Pedro, at Lago Atitlán in Guatamala. I can't believe you guys are still travelling!!! That's awesome! I'm so jealous. How much longer are you travelling for? I was hoping to get back on the road this summer, but I ended up getting a job for the Spanish programs at Radio Canada International in Montreal. So if you boys are ever out East, give me a shout. But till then, keep that blog rolling. Your photos are amazing! And good luck with the rest of your trip! Say hi to Ryan for me.