Sossusvlei

Our African adventure got off to a rather inauspicious start when the airport hotel that I had booked us into at Jo'berg airport for a one night stopover turned out to be having a power cut. However, the darkness was slightly compensated by the free wine being served in the lobby, and, with the power restored, the WiFi allowed us to make final preparations for our Namibia trip. Next morning we were up at dawn and back to the airport to meet my mother fresh off an overnight flight from London. She has been wanting to visit Namibia for ages so this was a good opportunity to achieve this and for us to catch up.















Things were looking up as Richard and I were upgraded to business class. Unfortunately, the flight to Windhoek is only two hours so apart from a pleasant lunch and a few glasses of bubbly we didn't get much time to enjoy it. This was the end of our luck for the day however, as after waiting for an hour at the airport, the pick up from the the car hire company still hadn't turned up. Finally we gave up and got in a taxi to be driven into town by a guy who didn't appear to know how to drive - Richard had show him how to get the car out of reverse.















First impressions of the beast (a Nissan 4x4 double cab) that was to be our transport for the week were not great and this wasn't helped at all when we heard the almighty racket it made when we started the engine. Well, what do you expect when you hire from a company called Value Car Rental. After considerable faffing around making sure all the camping equipment was loaded and a whistle stop tour of the supermarket to get supplies, we were on our way much later than planed. We needed to make the campsite at Sesriem before sunset (they apparently shut the gates), so we zoomed off south.














After about an hour on a decent tarred road we turned off onto a good quality gravel road. Already the scenery was stunning with vast areas of bush and dramatic mountain ranges looming in the distance; it felt very isolated with not another car in sight. Gradually the road got rougher and much to our dismay the sun got lower – every guide book we have read says you should not drive at night because of the poor quality of the roads and chances of hitting an animal.














Finally, after an hour and half driving in the dark (and four hours out of Windhoek) on some pretty hairy bumpy roads (very well managed by Richard of course – I'm sure controlling that skid was skill and not luck), we arrived at the Sesriem campsite. The gates were locked but thanks to having made a booking and some sweet talking followed by insistence and desperation on my part the security guard let us in. Despite the dark we found ourselves a very lovely and campsite under a tree. All we had to do now was put up the tents, light a fire and cook our dinner. However, to our horror, when we went to the back of the car to remove the two gas cannisters which were to provide our light and heat for cooking, we found that they had gone, presumably having leapt out on one of the very large bumps we had driven over. Not to be perturbed we hunted in the dark for our torches, procured some large pieces of fire wood and set to work. Unfortunately, owing to a lack of kindling or fire-lighters, the darned wood would not burn so we resorted drinking our bottle of wine and eating bread and cheese by torch light listening to the howl of hyenas. Not quite what we had imagined, but hey, we got here and were sat out under the stars which in itself felt like an achievement.














We were up at 4am the next morning to see the famous Sossusvlei sand dunes. One of the advantages of staying at the Sesriem campsite is that you can enter the park early than if you stay outside which allows you to get the the dunes for sun rise. Our luck and clearly not turned as just at the entrance to the park we realised that the awful noise that the car was making was indeed a puncture. With a little help from one of the park guards we had changed the tire and were on our way. Being on the late side we unfortunately didn't have time to stop for photos of our first game spots (ostrich, springbok and gemsbok). We were also too late to watch the sun rise from the top of the dunes (it popped up as we got to dune 45), but still the early morning light lit the dunes beautifully. I will let the photos do the talking, but suffice to say this really is a spectacular area.














With the sun fully up, we moved on to Dead Vlei, which is accessed via a 5km soft sand 4x4 track. This is a large pan surrounded on three sides by enormous dunes, with a collection of eerie skeleton trees on the northern edge. Some people walk along the dune ridge right to the largest dune at the south end of the pan, before running/falling down the front face. We were content just to walk across the crazy paving of the pan.














Back at camp for lunch, we stopped in at the garage to get our tire fixed (we really didn't want to start the next long drive with only 1 spare tire given our track record so far), before visiting the poor relation of Sossusvlei - Sesriem Canyon. Having also managed to secure some fire lighters we were much more successful in lighting a fire and managed to produce a pretty decent dinner. Early to bed to rest before the next long drive through the wilderness to Swakopmund.