4 Wheel Drive Required at Fish River Canyon!

We have this nice Nissan 4x4 from Namibia Car Rental. And we've had to put it in 4 wheel drive mode twice since we've been here. Once was on a sand road at Sossusvlei, and the only other time was when we almost got stuck in our campsite at Waterburg Plateau.

So when we saw a 10 km (6.2 mile) road at Fish River Canyon that said "4x4 only"...we went for it!

Our thoughts on Africa so far

First of all, we have to remember that Africa is a VERY large continent containing many countries. We have only visited one country so far. Namibia!

So we can only give our views of Namibia. Other parts of the continent of Africa will be very different!

Watching the Social Weavers. And other Namibian wildlife!

The social weavers?

Here in southern Africa, there is a type of bird called the social weaver. Or sociable weaver. We happened to be camped under a tree that contained a social weaver nest, so we spent a fair bit of time watching these interesting little birds go about their daily affairs!

Gorgeous hiking at Klein Aus Vista, Namibia

One of the things the Klein Aus Vista property is known for is it's hiking and mountain biking! There are over 100 kms (62 miles) of well maintained and well marked trails for all levels.

So yesterday, we decided to do one of their intermediate to advanced level hiking trails. A 12.7 km (7.9 mile) route that promised a couple of fantastic views!

Sesriem to Klein-Aus Vista, Namibia

Another long driving day yesterday, but what a location we ended up at!

We did 344 kms (213 miles) from Sesriem to the Gondwana Klein-Aus Vista Resort where we had camping reservations for three nights.

A baking hot day at Sesriem Canyon, Namibia

We tried to get an early start to Sesriem Canyon. And we did pretty well because we got there about 8:45am. The canyon is located only 4 kms (2.5 miles) from our site at Sesriem Campground.

But it was already getting hot.

Amazing sights at Deadvlei and Sossusvlei

We were up at 4:30am Friday morning.

We had been told that in order to get the best photos, you needed to have the early dawn light on the huge sand dunes at Sossusvlei. Also, we had grand ambitions of climbing the highest sand dune in the world, something that needed to be done before the hot sun got too high in the sky.

Swakopmund to Sesriem, Namibia

It was going on 9:00am by the time we left our site at Swakopmund. Again, we had a long drive ahead of us with most of it on dirt roads.

One thing we've learned about driving around Namibia is that there can be long stretches of nothingness in between worthwhile attractions!

Flamingos and Baby Seals

Yesterday, we did a day trip to Walvis Bay. Only 30 kms (18 miles) south of Swakopmund. We have to drive back to that area this morning, but we have a long drive today so would not have had time to stop and see the town.

Glad we went, because we saw some interesting things.

The seaside resort town of Swakopmund, Namibia

This is a strange town. A seaside resort with expensive beach houses lining the shore, only a few hundred miles from people who live in huts without enough to eat. But we've noticed that those extremes are common in this part of Africa.

Now we're camping in style!

We were up early Sunday morning. We knew we had a 320 km (200 mile) drive to do, and it was all on dirt roads! Plus, we were headed for the seaside town of Swakomund and we wanted to get there early enough to enjoy the afternoon there as we only have two more days in the area.

We hit the road by 7:20am.

Flush toilets with bush showers

Okay, so we're always up for a new experience. We had read in our itinerary that our campground at Aabadi Mountain Camp had "flush toilets with bush showers". So we were kinda curious about that.

I showed in today's earlier post that our campground here is pretty basic, and we have no problem with that. But we hadn't seen all of the facilities yet.

Etosha to Damaraland

We had a long drive ahead of us on Saturday. Besides the 360 kms (223 miles) to our next destination, we also wanted to check out along the way two of the Gondwana resort lodges that we hope to be staying at for a few nights in December.

Not only that, but as we were departing Etosha National park, we still had a short route where we could do an hour long safari in case we were lucky enough to come across anything interesting.

And it turns out that we were lucky enough!

Another animal stroked off the list!

We did a bit of a longer safari drive through Etosha National Park on Friday morning. It started off really good, with a group of wildebeast crossing the road. And shortly after that, we saw a head stick up beside a culvert under the road.

It was our second hyena sighting!

Safari day 4 and evening waterhole excitement!

Another restless night because of wind and rain. But we were still up before 6:00am in the morning. We crawled down from the rooftop tent, and what do we see? Something else crawling!