Namibia - (Day 8-9) - Windhoek - Maun, Botswana and back home to Francistown

Driving through the heavy fog

some animals on the way



Back home with the bush car

We are now home and Lennox calculated the total journey’s distance travelled was 4,200km, in the 9 days; we drove for 48 hours straight, 24 hours each, all I can say is WOW.

Leaving Windhoek, 9:00am (April 17) and going through the border it took us literally 15 minutes, first the Namibian side then the Botswana side, yes literally 15 minutes total.  We got there at 10:00am and this was a Tuesday.  As we were making good time we decided to drive past Ghanzi on to Maun, and depending on the time we got to Maun we will either stay there the night, or try and make Gweta, between all these villages in Botswana the distances could be approximately 200+ km.  But guess what, we had to slow down a lot as we were back in the land of the donkeys, cows, horses, you name it all in the road.

We made it as far as Maun, it was now just after 4:00pm and to get to Gweta it will be after 6:00 with night falling, we were tired and just stayed in Maun the night, we stayed at the Cresta Rileys Hotel, not our first choice but Maun Lodge was full.

So the following day (April 18), we still had about 500+km to drive, we took our time, filling up at the filling stations along the way, and dodging the cows and donkeys.  We are now glad to be home in Francistown, and are busy planning on leaving Botswana after two unforgettable years living here.  We thoroughly enjoyed our journey to Namibia, driving is a beautiful way to see Africa.

Blessings from the Francis’ back in Francistown

After driving 4,200km in 9 days here are a few tips, for those who want to make this journey:

<!--[if !supportLists]-->1.    <!--[endif]--> You have to be compatible with whoever you will be making this long trip with.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->2.    <!--[endif]-->Stop at all the filling stations you see to top up, especially in Botswana, and do not forget the jerry can of diesel at home.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->3.    <!--[endif]-->We are sorry we did not stay in Swakopmund and Windhoek another night, I think it would have made the journey less tiring.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->4.    <!--[endif]-->Make sure you have a good car with good tires.  Check tires, oil and windshield washer every morning.  Our bush car is a 1996 Toyota Prado diesel, turbo charged, and the best bush car around.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->5.    <!--[endif]-->On this journey, with diesel, hotel rooms, food, souvenirs we spent approximately 15,000pulas (US$2,200).  And that was because we had a friends place to stay in Swakopmund.  So plan on bringing cash (Rand, US$, and Namibian $), they do take visa at most filling stations and hotels/lodges

.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->6.    <!--[endif]-->DO NOT FORGET YOUR CAMERA.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->7.    <!--[endif]-->You can buy internet service if you are not staying at a hotel with wi fi.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->8.    <!--[endif]-->DO NOT FORGET DRINKING WATER, lots of water.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->9.    <!--[endif]-->The key thing is to smile with everyone, a smile goes a long way, even if they do not understand you, they understand a smile.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->10.                       <!--[endif]-->Always plan ahead, know your distances, how far you will be going, and book your hotel/lodges ahead of time.  We booked our forward trip, but not our return, which was not bad, because it is still not the true tourist season yet!!

Have a wonderful time on your journey, we hope these few details will help you through your stay in Namibia, it was truly awesome!!



the game food you will encounter at Soussesvlei Lodge

Namibia - (Day 7) - Swakopmund to Windhoek (on the return journey)

We have now traveled over 2,600 km from Francistown, Botswana.  The distances have been vast, and we have seen mountains, desert, dunes, rivers (without water), towns, big cities, vast areas and some wildlife.  Thank God we both drive; we cannot go more than 500 km a day.  We are now back in Namibia’s capital Windhoek (April 16), leaving this morning at 9:00am after making sure Sam’s house (which is situated in an oasis in the middle of the desert, on a 18 hole golf course and they use recycled sewerage water) was clean, locked up and everything turned off.

We drove about 50km up the skeleton coast, the bushmen call this area “The Land God Made in Anger” while the Portuguese once referred to it as “The Gates of Hell”.  On this coast there is an upwelling of the cold Benguela current which gives rise to dense ocean fog (called “cassimbo”), and we saw this heavy fog a couple of times.  The coast is named for the whale and seal bones which covered the shore when the whaling industry was still active, as well as the skeletal shipwrecks caused by rocks offshore in the dense fog.  More than 1,000 vessels of various sizes still litter this coast.  Today Swakopmund is a well developed tourist town (somehow reminded me a little of Key West), which we are told is packed to capacity during the height of the season (winter months- June – September).  We only made 50km driving up the coast, and there are many more kilometers to go, these are good roads, but we understand from our map the road will deteriorate.

We stopped on two occasions just to get out of the bush car and smell the Atlantic and to pick up some of those beautiful stones.  We eventually get on our way back to Windhoek driving the 320km from Swakopmund, just savoring what we have done and what we have seen.  We try as best we can to describe this adventure, but it is not easy, the distances are far, sometimes the landscape changes dramatically.  We drive past about three mines, one of which is uranium, and about three towns Osakos, Karibib, Okahandja on our way back to Windhoek, just one long road.

We arrive in Windhoek at 2:30pm, get our room at the Pension Bogainvilla, have lunch, freshen up and head out to see just a little more of Windhoek and find the Himba women.  The Himba peoples live mostly in the northern region of Namibia, and Windhoek is located in the center of Namibia.  They are semi-nomadic and are closely related to the Herero peoples.  The Himba breed cattle and goats.  The responsibility for rearing the livestock, the children and all the labour intensive work including carrying water lies with the women.  Men handle the “political tasks” and “legal” issues.  The Himba are famous for covering themselves with otjize, which is a mixture of butter fat and ochre, possible to protect them from insects and the sun.  This gives them a reddish tinge, and symbolizes earth’s rich red colour and blood that symbolizes life and is consistent with the Himba ideal of beauty.  We got to the craft center which was easy following our GPS, we spot two Himba women, we do not understand them and they do not understand us (but then what did we expect), they are selling craft items, someone comes along and translates, we buy souvenirs from them and take their picture.  Very young women, with beautiful skin, you can see this through the red ochre, and they have more jewelry than clothes on.  Kate really wants to talk to them, but that is impossible.

Windhoek is a beautiful city, rolling hills and valleys, orderly, clean, and the German influence is everywhere.

We head back to the Pension Bougainvillea for the night to plan our exit out of Namibia the following day.  We are not sure if after the border we will stop in Ghanzi, Maun, or Nata, all are far distances, the furthest being Nata.  We will see how the border treats us tomorrow, with prayer I know we will be in good hands.

Blessings from the Francis’ still in Namibia

Namibia - (Day 5-6) - Swakopmund - Solitaire - Soussusvlei and back to Swakopmund

This morning (April 14) we decided to wake up early and set our time to alarm at 4:30am, but we forgot that in April Namibia sets their time back 1 hour GMT and we woke up at 3:30am, left at 5:00, it was a true blessing to wake up an hour early, we had 370km to travel on really rough roads.  Our total distance travelled from Francistown is now 2,000km (give or take scenic adventures).

We travelled on the road that led us out of Swakopmund to Walvis Bay (one of the biggest shipping ports on the western side of Africa) skirting the Atlantic coast still pitch black, and we saw nothing, but our  trusted GPS told us we were travelling along the coast as on the GSP we saw water on the right and desert on the left, good roads, reflectors and some street lights to Walvis Bay (31km from Swakupmond).  We bypassed Walvis Bay and headed South 220km towards Solitaire and heavy fog on paved roads for about 15km then rough roads, some really bad, but some you can travel on at 100km and some you have to slow down to 20km, watch the ditches and bumps in the road, you have to have a 4x4, driving through the heart of the Namib desert and across the Tropic of Capricorn (again).  You drive through Gaub Pass through mountains and valleys, very winding, full concentration.  We did see some 2x4 cars , so it is not impossible, you just have to pick the time of year to travel.  Between the two of us sharing the driving, we made it to Solitaire at 9:30am.

I just have to tell you about Solitaire; that is definitely a one horse town if ever we saw one (gas station, general dealer, restaurant, one lodge and a bakery).  Francistown is a big metropolitan city compared to Solitaire.  Driving into this little town there are old, scrapped vehicles (including an old model T), all lined up to welcome you to Solitare.  Luckily the gas station (filling station) has diesel (this is the first gas station we have seen since Swakopmund),  always remember to fill up when you see a gas station.  All I can tell you about Solitaire is that there are some true “characters” that live here, one being the owner of the Desert Bakery, his name is Moose McGregor, and he is famous for his apple pies, and quite proud of it, one big Zambian, he got his name Moose from some American Soldiers and his grandfather was also famous and Liam Nielsen played him in a movie (we had to leave and I forgot to get the name of the movie).  We spent little time here as we still had 80km to travel.

We spent the night at Soussesvlei Desert Camp www.desertcamp.com, one of the best tented camps we have seen, and in the two years living in Botswana, we have seen many, well appointed with everything, including a kitchenette and if you want a chef to cook that can be arranged, lovely looking out at the wide open space of the desert, with the Naukluft mountains in the distance.  As we have to head back to Swakopmund the next day, and it was still early we wanted to get to Sossusvlei as soon as possible, the reason why these Jamaicans made it this far in the first place.

In the middle of the oldest desert in the world, the Namib desert, there is this vlei (marshy area) and then these there are these massive stunning ochre dunes.  Our guide tells us that it rained here heavily two weeks ago, and no one could drive in the Park, and it has rained in this area two years in a row.  Before that, it has not rained in seven years straight; there is still water in the vlei, and signs of dried mud everywhere.  The dunes are amazing, you have Big Pappa (300 metres) and Mamma and Dune 45 (the tourist dune), just rising out of the ground.  Kate picked the tourist thing to do and climbed a little way up dune 45, and slid down, filling a bottle of the ochre sand from Big Mamma and Dune 45, just for keepsake, and taking pictures of the fog beetles on the dunes, they have special bumps on their backs that condenses the morning fog into water for their survival.  Now getting to Deadvlei is 1km off the main road, you have to walk, it is now 3:00, and we were just too tired.  The Deadvlei are like the petrified trees, preserved like stones, and over 9,000 years old, it is said that this area was a forest many years ago, and now a desert, we wanted so bad to see this, but if we could not drive there, we were not going to walk there, the sun was blazing.  This Park is truly amazing; you have to pay park fees for yourselves and your car (not much).  You drive 60km then get to this area that leads you to the mammas and pappas that is 5km of solid sand, you can drive your 4x4 or get a guide to drive you in (not a bad idea).  We saw many people climbing these dunes, amazing, most from Europe mainly Swiss, English and German.

We had an incredible dinner at Sossusvlei Lodge about 4km from our little haven for the night.  Dinner was fantastic,, a four course meal, including all the game (wildebeest, oryx (gemsbok), warthog, ostrich, bushbuck, eland, kudu, impala, springbok) done on a braii, we went African and had the warthog, eland and oryx, out of the three we decided that the oryx was the most tender, a must try if you are even in this neck of the woods.

On our Namibian adventure this is as far south as we are going to go and , so the following morning we took our time driving back the same way we came, the 370km, back to Swakopmund.  A very trying drive, but well worth it.  We got in at 3:00pm, and will get to the Skeleton Coast tomorrow, before our journey back to Windhoek.    What a time these Jamaicans are having.

Blessings from Namibia

Namibia (Day 3-4) Windhoek - Swakopmund

We are here in Swakopmund looking at the Atlantic Ocean and dreaming of our home Jamaica.  Today we drove another 350km to Swakopmund, for a total distance travelled of 1,650km from Francistown, Botswana. 

Last night we had a wonderful dinner at Joe’s Beerhouse, and we were seated with three people from County Cork in Ireland who have been in Africa for the past two weeks and leaving the next day, wonderful people and good company.   Then Charmaine’s son William and his girlfriend Charne joined us for a drink.  We had a really great night at Joe’s, we had to leave William and Charne with the Irish, and trusted our once again loyal GPS to get us back to Pension Bougainvilla.

We drove around Windhoek the following day and found Fidel Castro Drive, and some craft items, driving out of Windhoek Kate spotted some Himba women, another picture moment missed.

The drive from Windhoek to Swakopmund was something else, beautiful, mountains in the distance, and then driving through the Namib desert coming closer to Swakopmund, just a beautiful drive.  We drove on a two lane highway, and lots of fully loaded huge trucks coming in the other direction, as we are going towards a big shipping port Walvis Bay. 

We drove past the Rossmund golf course where we were going to stay, but we just had to see the sea.  Approximately 50km out of Swakopmund there was this mist or big cloud which spanned the horizon in front of us, driving closer it got bigger, and bigger.  Driving into Swakopmund we realize it is the mist coming off the Atlantic ocean.  When we saw the ocean we almost cried, what a feeling, we have not seen this in two years.  Kate had to get her feet wet and feel the real sea sand (lovely).  The water is cold, no shells, no crabs.

So we then had to get back to Rossmund where we were staying at Samantha Bain’s country home, she lives in Johannesburg.  Getting to the golf course was easy, we drive through the boom (guard gate).

The guard said that #16 is straight ahead, we arrive at one of the homes on the golf course and the keys just do not fit.  We now drive past the guard and get to the receptionist who says there are apartments too, we head to those find a number 16, the keys do not fit, we call Sam who says it is number 16 or it could be number 14, we find number 14 the keys do not fit.  We call Di and James French, who we picked up the keys from at Nata, Botswana, they were just at the apartment and then James tries to direct us, he says, find the garages, we have garage 23, look for the garbage bin beside the door, then walk past the fire hydrant, he heard dogs barking through the phone, he said we are heading in the right direction, look for the white with tan Jack Russell dog, he will take you to Nick his owner who will show you where the house is.  I am here to tell you that the dog did show us where Sam’s townhouse was!!!  It is a lovely two bedroom two and ½ bathroom house, equipped with everything, including TV.  We feel like we have arrived back in Jamaica and on our back patio at 10 Norbrook Drive.

                                                   

My husband made reservations at a place called Tug Restaurant www.tugrestaurant.com right on the ocean, with the best window seats, just love him.  We have a really great meal of kingklip and prawns/shrimp with a bottle of the best South African red.

So here we are in Swakopmund for two nights and will attempt the drive to Sossusvlei tomorrow, it will be about 300km and six hours drive into the heart of the Namib desert, driving on 4X4 roads.

Blessings from the Francis’ in Swakopmund.

  

Namibia - (Day 2) - Ghanzi - Windhoek

Travelled over another 500+ km today, leaving Ghanzi this morning at 8:00am, it took us two hours to the border - Manumo  in Botswana and Boitepos  on the Namibian side.  The holdup being on the Namibian side, a bus load of people made it before we did, so we just had to be patient and wait.  It was really not bad the time spent at this border, and the people were very pleasant on both ends.  So the bush car made it through with us paying about US$30 to drive in Namibia, which includes insurance, and not checking anything in the car.  The first stop is a rest stop on the Namibian border, where we check out if we can stay “just in case” coming back on April 17 or 18.  They do have rooms (we will see).  We stop at every gas station along the way to top up, just in case, the distances are vast and in Botswana gas stations are miles apart.

Our first impression driving in Namibia is order.  There were absolutely no donkeys or cows anywhere near the road, we did see one or two scattered around, but they were behind fences, where they should be.  The place is clean, even the rest stops (remember these are just concrete benches and tables under trees) do not have garbage falling out of the bins, fixed up and painted nicely.  So we realize this is a different ball game, and just have to obey all stop signs, including the stop lights, and we do not see anyone else disobeying the rules too.  Mind you we just arrived in Namibia.

Our trusted GPS (smile) take us to Windhoek and Sam Nujoma street, then on to Nelson Mandela street to our hotel where we are booked for the night.  We have to ring a bell for them to open this massive gate.  We drive in and this place is lovely, an old refurbished 1912 German home with newly built rooms around a small pool on this massive property in the middle of Windhoek we are at Pension Bougainvilla –  www.pensionbougainvilla.com we will wait to see the city tomorrow as being on the road for six hours has taken its toll.  We have made reservations at world famous Joe’s Beerhouse – www.joesbeerhouse.com  for dinner and will leave early to see a bit of the city.  We will see more tomorrow as our drive is not as tedious and the first two days.

Besides the cleanliness of this place, we did spot a loan wildebeest and a mommy warthog and her babies along the road.

So we have so far travelled a distance of 1,125km.  We have another 300 km to get to Swakopmund tomorrow and staying at a friend we met through Barbara, her name is Sam Baine and she has allowed us to stay at her country home at the Rossmund a golf course in Swakopmund.  We cannot wait to see the ocean, and put even one toe in that water, we are told it is cold, I think we are prepared with extra blankets, jackets, pillows, and each other.

Blessings from these Jamaicans in Namibia

Namibia (Day 1) - Francistown - Ghanzi

Leaving Francistown this morning at 6:30am (April 10), we arrive in Ghanzi, Botswana, (2:00pm) 7 ½ hours and 780km later.  We took turns every 200 km (more or less).  The roads are really good; the best part of the drive was between Maun and Ghanzi (280km).  You have to dodge the donkeys and the cows, and watch out for the monitor lizard crossing the road.  As children we would have loved to have grown up in Botswana with all the donkeys playing our favourite game driving “buddy”, to see who would spot the most donkeys, I think literally we passed more than 100 donkeys along the way, and that is a rough estimate.  The cows were a lot smarter though, when crossing the road some even stopped to let us pass.  On these roads you can travel 120km/hr or more, when not in a village, otherwise you have to go between 80 and 60km.  Otherwise, slow down for those asses!

OK, so we forgot to bring our jerry can with diesel.  So we filled up yesterday, but made a trip out to the Painter Farm for a lovely lunch the day before our adventure is to start, never “topping up” with diesel in Francistown.  Off we go, Lennox driving, we never filled up in Nata (200km out of Francistown), with the lovely Caltex gas station (as we usually do when driving in this direction), another small error, we decided to fill up at Gweta (100km out of Nata), big mistake, the little rundown  gas station neither has diesel or gas.  The man says, you have to go back to Nata, no diesel or petrol in Gweta (and we are heading in the other direction).  We now have less than ½ tank of diesel, with 220km to drive to Maun.  Kate takes the wheel, drives, the car made it to the gas station in Maun on fumes (whooo), you see how dangerously our life has gotten!!! 

So here we are at Ghanzi for the night, staying at the Ghanzi Khalahari Arms Hotel, not bad for a stopover, maybe two nights, basic, clean, you can get ice, AC, TV.  The people around are friendly and nice, they all look just like the San people, little, brown skinned.  Kate is dying to take a picture with one of them.  There are a couple of Herero people walking around too, Kate wants to snap them too.

We will see how the night goes in Ghanzi, we want to get an early start for the border, Manumo on the Botswana side and Buitepos on the Namibia side.  Tomorrow we have 500km to drive to Windhoek (Namibia’s capital) where we plan to overnight.

Blessings from the Francis in Ghanzi

Lekhubu Island - One week before Namibia

It never ceases to amaze me, but my adventurous husband decided for us to jump in the bush car for a visit to Lekhubu Island on April 3, exactly one week before our trek to Namibia.  Wonderful! What a day, Botswana certainly has opened his appetite for great things.  Just a bit about Lekhubu Island, it is approximately 310km from Francistown, it is said to be very “spiritual” and this “island” was formed many years ago, it is in the Sowa Pans, which borders on the Makghadighadi Pans, not too far from Nata.

So off we go in the bush car waking up at 5:45am to leave at the latest 6:30am, we did it, packing the bush car for one night at Nata Lodge.  We drove to Nata, and then depended on the GPS for navigation after that, big mistake, big, big mistake.  The GPS took us whizzing past a sign that said Kubu Island (we both saw the sign, not too big), and then the GPS took us on a dirt road and that was it, all we got out of it was “recalculate”, nothing more, where have we heard that before, here we go again, Lennox gets flustered, Kate is cool (smile).  We turn around (wasting ½ hour or more), drive back to the sign that we both saw that said Kubu Island and turn left, we had shut off the GPS, but turn it on again just to be used as a compass, because my husband knew Lekhubu island should be due south and approximately 95km off the main highway.  Ok then, we trust our own instincts (smile again).  Lennox had read all instructions from home on the shell road map for Botswana how to get to Lekhubu Island and punched in all the coordinates on the GPS, well the instructions said that 11.5km we should see a group of Boabab trees, and then another 17.6 we see a pump house with a domed roof and then another 46 km a village called Thabatshukubu.  Well I must tell you that after the first 15-20km and we did not see the Boababs we realized that we had to depend on ourselves and our navigational skills, calculating our mileage, and hopefully we will see some sign that said Kubu Island pointing us in the right direction.  Kate is navigator (smile again).  We eventually see another sign about 30 km down the road; whew we were heading in the right direction.  We drove right pass someone’s cattle kraal, stopped to ask directions and he said, just continue on and we will see another sign.  We saw a sign that said Makghadighadi Adventure Camp, there was remnants of another sign, but nothing that said Lekhubu or Kubu, we trusted our compass and the distance we travelled.  We see another sign, and then the village, then we drive through Tswagong Veterinary fence.  We realize we are almost at Lekhubu island whoooo, we did, with Kate’s superb navigational skills, calculating the 95km from the main road, we have driven on strictly, dirt, sand, rocks, flat, bushveld roads for the past 4 hours.  By the way, we had enough water, even camping gas, camping light, food, diesel just in case, hubby thought of everything!!!  There was a camp site with a long drop by the “island”.  No water facilities anywhere, in any direction, bring your own water, a must.

 Lekhubu island, is not what we expect an island to be, but maybe it could have been, as these pans (nxai, makghadighadi and sowa pans) around Botswana, which are thousands of square kilometers were many, many years ago vast lakes.  The pan that we are now in is the Sowa Pans, a vast area, flat, white sand, no trees, for miles around (except on this “island”).  This island is formed by granite rocks, massive boababs trees  (mowana), African star chestnut trees (mokakata), acacia, and other trees we cannot identify.  Some view it as spiritual, and that the Basarwa (san) people believed that their ancestors were there, and that in the beginning God lived below the walls, and they still believe that today, but I think it gives a feeling of just being eerie because it is so isolated.  The Basarwa still visit the site to ask God for rain, and make offerings.  This island is 1km long and maybe just as wide and about 20meters high, just arising out of this huge salt pan.  You look for miles and there is nothing but flat, calcrete pans, lots of breeze whipping up the sand into dust devils. 

We drive around this island, as far as we can go, turn back.  We feel like driving off into the pans, but the books we read tells us that the vehicle may just sink (sounds like quicksand to me), so we are adventurous, but not that bad!!!  Starting this morning from 6:30am it took us 2 hours to drive to Nata and 4 hours to drive to Lekhubu Island (adding the slight diversion).  Was it worth it?  I think it was, it is well worth going there, the vastness of this pan, then this island arising out of nowhere. 

We stay at Nata Lodge, just because it is another 180km back to Francistown and we have to do our final preparations for Namibia.

Blessings from the Francis in Francistown

PS:  www.kubuisland.com/  bring plenty of extra water for people along the way and sweets for the children