Lagos is many things including home right now, but it is not an easy place. It is hectic, it is intense, it is intrusive, and it is sweltering hot corner of the world. Southern Africa is almost everything that Lagos is not. Of course, it is still Africa, where everything works, most of the time, but not all of the time. It is different though. It is open and spacious. It is liberating and cooling, it is a place that makes it easy to escape everything that sticks to you like a sweaty shirt in Lagos.
We decided to explore Namibia this spring for a couple of reasons. Once again, the power of recommendations from parents and other staff was important. However, the key factor was name coolness. “Swakopmund” I am sorry, but that is the greatest name for a city ever and I just had to visit. Another reason that Namibia appealed to us was that you could do a self-driving tour. It would be nice to be independent. Independence can be a little hard to find when you live on a compound, have a driver, and a cook.
It took some work to get to Windhoek, the capital of Namibia, but we managed. It took some adjusting but I figured out how to drive from right hand side of the car. It took a bit of patience, but I figured out how to negotiate the Mercedes mini van on the narrow roads. We checked into a nice bed and breakfast overlooking the city and set out to find food. Our host sent us to Joe’s Bar and Grill, where we set outside in a grass shack, drank icy cold beer from a keg, and feasted on platters of grilled meat. Oh, this was going to be a great vacation.
The next morning after breakfast next to the pool, we loaded the van and prepared to head out on the road. The open road, wide-open spaces, the wind in our hair. Freedom! Well first, a stop at the mall to pick up some road munchies, Cell phone sim cards, and well just to be in a mall. Then we hit the open road. Truly the open road, there were times where we would be the only car on the road. The first day we drove towards the Namib Naukluft National Park. It was a 250-mile trip over gravel roads that were better than the “super highway” in Nigeria. The landscape open in front of us taking us through rocky mountains, plains covered in tall golden grasses, and past giant boulders.
Namib Naukluft Park is home to giant red sand dunes that are part of the oldest desert in the world. The red sands of the dunes fill the background as springbok and oryk graze across the plains. In the morning, the dunes glow as they absorb the red rays of the sunrise. We climbed one of the dunes, hiked through the heated sand to a dried lakebed filled with the skeletons of 1000-year-old acacia trees. We ate a picnic lunch on an acacia shaded rock at the foot of the largest dune in the park. The air was hot and dry and we could see for miles across the plains. It was as far away from Lagos as you could get, and I have never appreciated the distance more.
Swakopmund lived up to its name. A small town on the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, the town was easy to get around in, had a bunch of good restaurants, and lots to do. We went quad biking through the dunes of the Namib Desert. It didn’t take long to feel like we were completely in the dunes. No grass, no trees, just sand until the edge of ocean. The kids and I spent a morning out on the ocean following dolphins and fur seals through the harbor. A pelican escorted us out into the bay, where fur seal after fur seal boarded the boat for a fish appetizer and a hug from the kids.
The next day found us driving north through an area that could have been a stand in for Monument Valley in Utah. We stayed in a lodge that was carved into one of the rock formations. We hiked to the top of one of the buttes and watched the sun settle into the night sky. We sat on the patio of our room and watched kudu come down to the waterhole to drink. The next morning we hiked out to one of the rock formations. Once again being outside and walking are not activities that we get to enjoy a lot in Lagos.
The next stop was Estosha National Park. We stayed inside the park and conducted our own game drives. As I drove around peering out the window trying to pretend like I knew how to share the road with zebras, we passed giraffes and a lion out for a sunset stroll. At night, we watched rhinos and an elephant fill up at the waterhole. On a night drive, with a real guide, we followed a pair of hyenas from the waterhole across the saltpan.
Amazing landscapes, zero traffic unless you count zebras and springbok, Namibia is already on my list of places to visit again.
