Namibia Road Trip – part 1

[columnhelper col-md-4]

[dropcap]After[/dropcap] a 2 am wake up we were on the road by 4 am.  By the time the sun started rising we were well on our way, heading up the N7 towards the border.  We had 800 kms to cover.

By 10:30 we had made it as far as Springbok and after a quick bite to eat and a stop to put in petrol we headed for the border.  Luckily there was hardly anyone there so we were on our way again after about 20 minutes.

The N7 changed to the B1 and scenery seemed to changed with it!  A long straight road all the way to Grunau.

There wasn’t much going on in Grunau.  In fact there was only really a few houses and a few train carriages with not even a proper train station!

[columnhelper col-md-4]

While walking around Grunau we met a local lady who was very interested that we had come all the way from Cape Town.

She was desperate for us to meet her 7 children but we had to turn down the invitation because we weren’t sure how much further we needed to travel before we reached our accommodation.

Grunau was nothing more than a few old house and buildings!

[columnhelper col-md-4]

As it turned out our accommodation was about 20 minutes from Grunau which was great because a whole day on the road can be rather tiring.  We stayed at a little bed and breakfast called Goibib Mountain Lodge.  It suited our needs just fine, comfortable accommodation and good food.

The owners of where we were staying were extremely friendly and they had a prepared a very nice roast lamb for us for dinner.  A lamb striaght from their farm.  I dont think you can better than that!

The stars were amazing.  Photographing them right on the B1 was an experience with massive trucks racing past you at 120km/h!  By 22:00 we were ready for bed!

[columnhelper col-md-4]

[dropcap]We[/dropcap] decided today would be a good day to go see the Fish River Canyon, the largest canyon in Africa, and the second largest canyon in the world.

100 kilometers on dirt in a Chevy Spark was an experience.  Luckily the C road was very well looked after so it wasn’t too bad.

After paying our N$130 entrance fee we had about another 10 kilometres to go before we got to the main view point for the canyon.

The view of the canyon was amazing.  Capturing the canyon was tricky and a single shot wasn’t enough, so I started experimenting with some panoramas which worked much better.  We were lucky enough to have some clouds so we didn’t have a boring sky.

Fish River Canyon from a spot just round from the main view point

[columnhelper col-md-4]

Heading back from the Canyon we decided to stop off at Canyon Road House for a hamburger and a beer, or two.  It was an interesting place with lots of old American cars around the property and inside the walls were covered with posters, car signs and 100’s of number plates.  There was even a resident cat who spent most of his time sleeping on the bonnet of an old Fargo.

Canyon Roadhouse cat rests on an old Fargo

Back on the C road we had to stop as 4 or 5 zebra crossed the road, then a little further along we saw some Oryx on the other side of the railway line, just after a Trans Namib goods train hooted at us as it crawled past, carrying the carriages that we saw the day before at Grunau, as well as a passenger car, with some kids who were very excited to see us.

[columnhelper col-md-4]

After arriving back at our accommodation we went out into the veld for some sunset shots.  The sky that evening was amazing, pink clouds streaked against a blue sky.

We had organised with the owners of Goibib that we would braai and they supplied us with some fantastic lamb chops and sausage.

Star shots that evening were not great as the moon was very bright and there were too many clouds to get anything interesting.  So we called it a night.

More to follow.