9.04.2016 – 9.04.2016  31 °C

Had a good sleep in this morning as we say goodbye to Soussevlei and hello to Swakopmund (pronounced Swock-o-mun). We all thought the drive was going to be a bit boring but it was anything but!. An hour out of Soussevlei and the landscape had changed significantly.. gone was the big mountains of rock and in was a flat, flat plains of nothing but yellowish sand (sand and small rocks)… Plenty of mirages shimmering.. Such a change from the orange and browns! Our time on the plains saw us cross the Tropic of Capricorn which again never ceases to amaze me how much of Africa is in northern hemisphere (or how low down AU is!)

Another hour down the road and we ran into big shale hills.. rolling hills of nothing but shale, quartz and little scrubby plants.. Like nothing I’ve seen before. We actually got out of the car a couple of times to just marvel at these hills… Honestly, if it was devoid of plants I would have thought we were looking out over a moon type scape.

Before we arrived into Swakopmund we returned to flat plains (but with big white sand hills on the horizon).. Mum + Dad decided this must be where Mad Max was filmed.. I haven’t seen it so can’t comment—they assure me it had to have been outside of Swak!

We arrived into Walvis Bay (just south of Swak) just after 2pm and headed to the waterfront in search of some lunch. The fish we had for lunch out on the bay was extraordinary—Kingklip + Monkfish. Both super duper sweet and tasty! Gotta get me some more fish whilst I’m here in Namibia. On our way to our digs we called in to see the Walvis Bay Lagoon. A huge wetland area that is home to thousands of flamingos. The flamingos weren’t as pink as some I have seen in the past, which means not as many shrimp and algae in this water than in others!

Walvis Bay is an interesting place. It is one of the few deep water ports on the western side of Africa. For many years it was part of South Africa and was only handed back to Namibia in the mid 90s. The town itself reminds me a bit of a cross between Florida and Dubai. The town is surrounded by big yellow sand dunes and the roads are lined with date palms (that are irrigated). The whole town exists to support the port (and some tourism) and feels quite fake. No other way to describe it…. Similar is Swakopmund… Driving to Swak we had to drive thru very heavy fog. The water off the coast is usually between 7-12 deg but the air in the desert is in excess of 30 so the two combined make some pretty impressive sea fog. The town of Swak was swathed in sea fog but we could still see the town… Again, very weird. For starters, very quiet, mainly built in the 60s-80s… And well, nothing! We had been warned by others that we would find Swak and Walvis Bay strange and I’d agree. Very hard to describe except by saying weird. Its like a piece of Florida come English countryside but here in Africa…….