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Published: April 3rd 2008
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Wow! What a trip. I’ve just got back into Cape Town last night from a nine day trip to Namibia and the west coast of South Africa (Check out the posted map for a visual of where this actually is). I went with three of my housemates and we rented a car and drove all the way up to the Soussevlei dunes and back. It was a lot of driving, but we were able to see so much. It’s amazing how the landscapes change so drastically from city to hilly, to really green vegetation (the west coast is known for its vineyards and citrus fruits, and much more, obviously), to semi-arid desert, to desert. And, I must say, it’s the healthiest roadtrip I’ve ever been on. We bought our own groceries and made our own healthy meals in backpacker (self-catering places with communal kitchens and bathroom facilities) kitchens, at picnic tables on the side of the highway, or in the fire at night if there were no kitchens available. And, we were able to save a lot of money by bringing our own camping equipment on the trip (that we borrowed from Mountain and Ski Club). And it was really nice
A boy at a petrol station
He was making music to pass the time. sleeping underneath the stars some nights, and nice to have a tent others when there were too many mosquitoes (don’t worry, we weren’t in a malaria infected area).
But first, I want to say that I’m sad that I wasn’t able to make a post before I left, the electricity went out one day, came back in the house the next, and then went out only in my room for a couple of days in my room. And the internet, of course, wasn’t working during these times. Escom (the electricity company) was doing some more “load-sharing” and chose to shut off power in my neighborhood the night before a paper of mine was due and then the next day at school, we experienced our first time this school year of load-sharing outages. It kind of drives you crazy when you depend on using a computer so much. I was able to test out my kind of new headlamp during the outages, including packing for my trip with it- fun stuff.
I wasn’t really worried about going on a trip with three guys, and I was right to assume the best (maybe this is because we were able to
Our tent next to the picture frame
And there was an open wallto be able see the awesome landscape. shower every day : -) ). My friends Tom, Fabian, and Simon enjoyed each others’ company and this made for a relaxing trip. On our first night, we ran into some of our classmates on an organized trip (with tour guides and a chef, etc) and we again realized we were glad to be on our own, at our own pace.
We crossed the Namibian border to see Fish River Canyon, to find out that the normal route was closed off at the southern end, so we had to drive around to the northern border at Hobas campgrounds.
We also went to the Soussevlei to see the dunes, including the famous Dune 45. Its edges have a 45 degree angle, as I’ve learned in my environmental geology class, this is the “angle of repose,” and things naturally try to get to this state if it is initially at a steeper angle.
We also went to the city of Luderitz, which is nestled in between the Namib Desert and the restricted area for diamond mining. It’s amazing how large this section really is (look it up on Google, if you’re curious). This was the most modern city we went
Sunset in my hands
Thanks Fabian for taking the picture. :-D to- they even had an internet café and tourist centre. We walked a little while here in search of the internet café on a map in our Lonely Planet travel guide, to find we were looking in the wrong place. But we were able to see what the typical neighborhoods looked like and the sponsored murals by NAMEB, the diamond company. We also went to the museum here, and most of the captions were in German. So I was glad to be with two people that spoke Swiss-German. Thanks, guys! The next day, we went to the ghost town of Kolmannskuppe. Here, we took a tour and saw what remained of a German settlement built in 1908 for controlling the new mining developments in the German territory of what is now called Namibia. It was interesting to see how technologically advanced this town of a little over 1.000 people compared to the rest of the country and continent, really. They even had their own refrigeration system in the middle of the desert. I swear this was the hottest place I was at the entire trip.
It was nice seeing other cities, though, too, that weren’t as developed. It was
Namibia
Views from the car window. funny to see on the roadmap a city in large font, and then when we got there, we were a little surprised at how really it was in large letters because they had three gas stations instead of one, lol (not literally, but you get my point). And all throughout our trip, we encountered the situation where there are white land and property owners with black helpers, employees. It was a really strange thing to experience so consistently. It makes me want to look into the history and politics of Namibia. The sociologist in me wants to look at the forces that are shaping this pattern, and not at the individual cases we saw.
On our last couple of days, we went to the city of Paternoster, on the west coast of South Africa. We stayed at this neat place called the Beach Camp. And here, we splurged a little bit and slept in beds inside of the tents already set up for guests. It was amazing that this entire place ran without electricity, and instead had outhouses for bathrooms and a water system working some other way from the ocean. And the water was heated from this box
near the wash basin, where you could see the flames inside. I wish I knew the details, but I’m not really familiar with this kind of thing. And we were so close to the water, it was really nice- similar to how close we were to at the Shark Island camp in Luderitz.
Well, I’ve written as much as I can right now, and I’ll have to update sometime soon (really, I know, soon…). But I hope everything is well, and those Michigan students got their football tickets because I missed the deadline. And I wish friends at UofM good luck in studying for their exams coming up pretty soon.
(P.S. I'm posting this a lot later than I planned on doing it...I've been being flexible with internet failures or my computer not being able to upload photos. There are a lot more photos I'd like to add some other time. But right now I'm on a university computer (shhh! I shouldn't be on here).
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