An African Odyssey

Stopped in at the famous Cape Seal colony as we wound our way down the Skeleton Coast, named due to the amount of shipwrecks along the uninspiring rocky coastline. Thankfully the weather was cool and wind was in our favour so the smell of the numerous seals was actually bearable whereas usually it overwhelms the most hardened olfactory senses. So it was the cool breeze and our keenness to get to Swakopmund that made our visit to the colony a short one.

Swakopmund is the adventure capital of Namibia – think Vic Falls with sand instead of water. It is literally a city built on sand with the reputedly highest dunes in the world towering over the city a stones throw away. The city itself reflects its German origins in the architecture and great food – must say that we definitely took advantage of the numerous restaurants and gorged ourselves stupid for several days with the best food we’d had in weeks. Another reason to love Swakopmund was that we had beds to sleep in, although at 10 to a dorm had more privacy and less snoring in the tent!!

First night was a big night on the town to celebrate Jesse’s birthday and return to civilization. Our star spotting antennae were out but we didn’t see Wesley Snipes who is in town filming a movie and usually hangs out at the bar next door to the hostel…

Next morning we went sandboarding, and with gloves, elbow pads and helmets took on the towering dunes on our high-tech speed machines (yep, a basic slippery board!) – what an adrenalin buzz lying head first at the slip face and rocketing down the slope at high speed. Started off nice and tame, then onto a tandem ride (we canned out half way down but a soft and hilarious landing in the sand) and then onto the highlight of the day – the terrible twin dunes Lizzie and Dizzie. Aptly named as the speed was definitely dizzying at over 75km/hr!!! They actually have a speed gun at the bottom so you know your top speed and can challenge other contenders. It was so much fun although enough to the get the nerves going before descending each slippery slope. A few of the others tried out the stand up version which is basically snowboarding on sand – a lot harder and not as much speed involved. One way to ease the pain in our muscles clambering back up the dunes was to watch Trudi, one of the larger members of our group, struggle up the dunes on her hands and knees with shoes on her hands!!! Following a great lunch and all the excitement, spent the afternoon having an unexpected nap before venturing out to do exciting things like laundry… then more food and wine. Really will not return from Africa any thinner than when I started!!

Unfortunately we were in Swakopmund on the weekend so being Sunday there was not a lot of things open the following day. Basically hung out (doing internet and finding the only open café for coffee) until our next adventure of quad biking in the afternoon. Most of our group was on automatics, though the experienced petrol heads had manual bikes to churn up the sand with. Was great fun zooming round the dunes, doing ‘roller coasters’ up, down and around the place. Took me awhile to get the hang of the leaning into the curves but soon was hooning over the dunes with abandon and loving it!! Had a few rest stops to enjoy the views of the seemingly unending dunes and then the unexpected view of the sea and city that suddenly appeared over a dune. Saw one of the guys on a manual have a spectacular wipeout but thankfully unhurt due to the soft sand landing. Must say particularly enjoyed bottle of wine that evening after all the excitement of the previous few days.