Sand territory! Sculptures, textures, colours and unbelievable vistas ...

Sunday / Monday 12^th & 13^th May 2012

We were both looking forward to a coffee this morning at Mariental.  It was our first coffee in over a week, and the girl in the shop cum breakfast area had assured us that they did indeed have a coffee machine.

If any of you are coming to the Bastion to stay, I would certainly recommend it.  But it’s best to bear in mind that you could go and order your coffee, then go back to your room and have a shower, then pack up your gear, get it all into the car and then wander back and wait for your coffee.  It would seem that their version of a coffee machine didn’t quite match what we had in mind, but suffice it to say that after about 20 minutes, she did appear with two drinkable coffees.

I can't show you a photo of the coffees because we were parched by the time they arrived, and so we actually drunk them without photographing them first!  Very remiss, I know.  To make up for that, I do have a photo of the place

And one other note.  The beds were really comfortable, and the rooms were great.  Remember I said about the amount of crafy things they had just about everywhere?  Well, can you imagine waking up in the morning, in a darkened room, and looking at this first thing in the morning - you know, before you've really woken up?

Isn't that sight enough to make sure you're awake?  (ps - the crack in the wall was indeed very real ...)

We headed back into town to have a look at some of the very “African English” shops and also fill up with petrol.

 I guess in Mariental they really can't have a "White Lady Funerals" now can they?

The road to Maltahuhe was good bitumen – very flat countryside and it looked like it would continue like this all day.  Just after Maltahuhe we turned off on the C14 road – a really good dirt road but very well graded.  The Zaris pass and valley we descended into was as spectacular as it was unexpected.

After a few very necessary photo stops, we arrived at the Sossus Dune Lodge just before 2pm.  We’re staying here tonight because it affords us the best advantage for the dunes tomorrow.  There’s quite a big choice of accommodation in this area but the reason you come here is to see the Sossusvlei sand dunes, and the best time to see the dunes is at sunrise.  There are two park gates, and if you stay at the lodges or campsites outside the first gate, you have a very long drive to the actual dunes, and the outside gate at Sesreim opens at sunrise.  Because we’re staying at the only place inside the second gate, we have a time advantage.  So tomorrow morning we’re leaving here at 5am (with a packed picnic breakfast box they supply) and we have a short drive to the Big Daddy dune.

This afternoon we went out to Dune 45.  Even the drive out is absolutely stunning.  The whole valley and endless dunes are utterly spectacular.  You could spend days here and not tire of the drive or the views, or the artistic or photographic opportunities.  Even if you were not interested in picking up a camera, you would still just love the scenery.

Actually, when we unpacked the car, we did remember the Esky/Chilly bin/Cooler but we forgot the rest of the stuff, so we ended up with a very healthy lunch!  Enough to fortify us for a heavy afternoon running around dunes.

The time we had at Dune 45 just flew, and all too soon the sun was setting.  Here it’s not a case of the sun slowly setting, it just seems to drop and by 5:45pm it’s gone and the very short twilight period starts.  We had to be back at the Lodge 30 minutes after the sun had set and by the time we arrived back, it was hard to believe that we’d been out for a tad over 3 hours.

Dinner is included in the tariff, and it was a set 4 course meal.  We’re used to having a few things on the braai, so the meal was quite daunting.  Some of the menus in different countries can be unintentionally hilarious.  This didn’t fall into that category, but an English teacher would cringe at the Starter of “Mediterian Salad” (this turned out to be cold deep fried calamari on top of lettuce, tomato and cucumber which were all swimming in salad dressing).  The starter was followed by “Pea’s Soup” and after the Mains, the Dessert was “Kahluwa Panacotta”.

Sunday morning saw us up at 4:30, packed and heading out to the Dunes by 5am.  We spent a magical 4 hours there, which seemed like about 45 minutes. 

 

Yes, there is a certain amount of work involved!  How else do you celebrate such a wonderful sunrise?

 And to reassure you all, we still had an opportunity to keep our game spotting skills updated.

I’ll try not to wax lyrical about the dunes too much.  For those of you who’ve been here, you’ll completely understand.  For those who haven’t – yet – been here, you will probably wonder why a sand dune is worth so many paragraphs.  I’m not talking about the Avalon sand dunes, or even Stockton Beach.  I’m talking about sand dunes that cover an area larger than some of the tiny European countries, and it would seem probably not much smaller than Tasmania.

On the way back on the 4WD shuttle to the car park where the 2WDs had to park, we met Kelly, a Canadian guy from Calgary.  Spoke very briefly about photography and then said good-bye.

The lodge had given us a breakfast pack and that turned out to cover us for breakfast, lunch and dinner on Sunday and I’m having the last part for breakfast now on Monday.  We set off in good time to get to Swakopmund, but got as far as Solitaire to refuel and then found that they’d run out, and “might get some on Tuesday if we’d like to wait”.  Well, we really couldn’t, so we had to drive back to Sesreim and refuel, and then drive back.  Thankfully the scenery is just sooooo stunning (have I mentioned this before?) that in one way it was a pleasure!

Look what happened to the last person who decided to wait at Solitaire for the petrol tanker to arrive!

This meant that we were still driving while the sun quickly plopped in a bath of glorious colour.  After that, we really knew that we were the only car on the road.  We were glad to arrive in Swakopmund and we’re at the Desert Backpackers.  They have a house with apparently really good rooms with all facilities but they have what looks like a great back garden – lovely grass, picnic areas etc and that’s the camping area.  The first person we saw, standing outside the kitchen, was Kelly.

We pitched our tents in the dark, which actually was quite easy, and then rocked up to the kitchen.  The American girl was in the process of making everyone coffee, so timing was perfect!  This is the other great part about travelling – the people one meets.  There was a Spanish girl, who will call London home (as you do) who had just finished a few months working as a zoologist in Madagascar.  A Scottish girl who has just finished her Philosophy degree, the American girl who is a scuba diving instructor and 2 guys, on Brit and a Swiss guy – they headed off somewhere.  Then Kelly came in – he’s from Calgary and is, not surprisingly, a lumberjack.  But his “other job” is the RV park he owns, and he’s a motorbike enthusiast (as well as a pilot).  He runs a BMW Challenge each year, which is growing in popularity, and one of his friends runs BMW rides from Cape Town to Vic Falls.  He’s also into photography ….. so you can guess that we had a lot to talk about.  It will be continued tonight!