Swakopmund, Day 12

Early on Friday morning, September 13^th, we made our way out of Etosha National Park toward a town called Swakopmund, approximately 300 miles away.  35 of those miles were getting through Etosha, which of course meant we slowly drove in the hopes of seeing maybe just one more leopard, or maybe even the lion we witnessed by the road.  Sadly, we did not see the lion or the leopard, but we did happen to see 2 more lions (a mother and her mature cub) lounging by a watering hole, watching a herd of hyenas and jackals feast on what appeared to be an elephant carcass (very far away, it was hard to see through the binocs just exactly what it was, but it was HUGE).  So that made us happy that we got to see 2 more cats before making our way out of the park and most likely out of the Wild Kingdom part of Namibia.

After an hour and a half, we ventured out of the park and drove about 5 hours toward the coast.  We didn’t know anything about Swakopmund except that there were sand dunes and that this was the place we were going to play in sand.  Oh, and that there was lots of fresh fish since we were right off the Atlantic.   What we didn’t realize until coming into the town was that a)this was way more than “just a town” in Namibia, this was the vacation spot of Namibia, and b) it was colder than hell.

It was a first wake up call that Namibia is still, in truth, coming out of its winter season.  And for most of Namibia, winter means dry arid land but still hot, while summer means maybe not-so-dry arid land and even hotter.  Swakopmund, on the other hand, located on the far South-central west coast, in the heart of the Namib Desert, is cold.  Bitter cold.  Winter, blustery windy cold.  And the only campsite we could find was right next to the coast.

Luckily, the manager of the campsite assured us the wind would die down as the night came on, and so we did the best we could with our fleece clothes (SOO glad I bought some cold-weather clothes while in Johannesburg!) and campfire.  Of course, the campsite was just off the water and the campfire was right in front of our car and sitting area, which meant the wind would blow over the fire and chill us anyway.  But no worries, we’re camping pros now.  We can handle this.  We’ll just sleep with wool socks, fleece pants, long fleece shirt and 2 fleece jackets.  And a fleece hat.

Have you ever slept in so many clothes??!!??  I haven’t.  It took a little getting used to.  But thankfully, as warm as the tent gets during the daylight hours, it manages to retain some warmth in night, especially when my marvelous husband brings down the top layer over our mesh zipper “door.”  We were snug as bugs in a rug.  All fleece notwithstanding.

Anyway, we managed to stay warm and dry throughout the night, and got up the next morning and headed into the town to have breakfast and watch the South Africa vs. New Zealand rugby game.

Remember how I mentioned earlier that this was a vacation town?  Well, as is common in the states, cold coast towns during winter tend to be cold ghost towns in the winter.  Swakopmund is no different.  I personally LOVED the desolation; I’d had enough of tourists for a while.  And Swakopmund really was the first truly developed town we’d seen since coming to Africa (excluding Joburg); and it appeared that the layout of the town was something out of Malibu, California in the 1960’s.  A lot of cactus, a lot of bright busy homes (but all one level, just like Malibu) and so many shops and grocery stores.  Seriously, I have to admit, being in a country like Namibia I didn’t expect to see what appeared to be  “1^st world development” like this, but I have been proven wrong; they do exist here. 

As a result of the time of year, we found ourselves wondering where to go for rugby in a seemingly sleepy vacation town in the off-season.  Luckily, we found the “Statmitt Café”, a German-based café whose logo is dangerously similar to the Starbucks logo (I’m not sure if I mentioned before that Namibia is primarily a German country; so everywhere you go you see German designs, German food, German people, etc.  Ergo, the “Statmitt Café”).  Not to worry though, the food and coffee were unlike any Starbucks I’d ever encountered.  AND, they had rugby on tv.  Win!

(Actually, South Africa didn’t win, but we did in finding the café.  In case you were confused…)

Anyway, we only had a few hours to watch the rugby game (okay, Ron, Anya and Matt watched the game; I worked on my blog and since it was the first time in a week since we’d had internet I took FULL advantage of their wifi) before we had our excursion du jour: Sandboarding.

But that is for another posting.  Because believe me, it deserves it’s own entry!