As soon as we crossed the border into Namibia, we noticed a difference. Suddenly there were shops with everything you could want after being on the road and ‘in transit’ for a long time, eating ‘floorboard specials’. Most of our small gang headed straight for the KFC – and again we made a guessing game of how much Josh would spend at KFC. He was joking he’d buy one of everything – and to be honest, he wasn’t far off from doing so!
I headed straight for the fresh fruit, cheese, icecream (Kit Kat flavour) and South African Simba chips with tonnes of flavour…yum!
Our first stop was Ruacana Falls, and it was a breath of fresh air. We stayed at an actual campsite, put up our tent and didn’t have to move for two nights. There were showers (relatively open but with flowing water nonetheless), toilets (actual seats but a long drop underneath), a power point, and a running tap near the campsite. What more could you want?! The only thing we had to be wary of were the hippos which would come out at night to graze on the grass near our tents. It took me about half an hour to muster up the courage to go to the toilet one night as I was petrified a hippo would be chomping on grass right nearby. Might I add I only pee’d right by my tent as we were instructed to do at night! We also shared our campsite with a large Christian group who were extremely polite, asking us if we’d mind if they ran their generator at night and have a ‘bit of a party’ – of course we didn’t. We were probably capable of making way more noise than them and their generator in any case!
The next morning, we visited the falls, which had been dammed by Angola and the flow can often change from being impressive to just a trickle. Luckily we got to see it with quite a large amount of water flowing down it, and a rainbow peeking out from behind it. The falls are just over an Angolan border crossing though you don’t need your passport if you’re just visiting the falls.
After a quick visit to Ruacana town (supermarket and service station), we had the rest of the afternoon free and we all made the most of it.
We recharged everything making the campsite look like a business centre,
did all our washing (including my 100 dollar bill shoes which are now bright white again!), and had showers, etc. Lee opted for a long overdue pedicure and spent about 2 hours trying to get her feet back to normal!
It was great having time out after the long drive days, and being able to get ourselves a bit more organised and clean.
The next day we arranged a visit to a Himba tribe village.
Apparently there are only about 50,000 Himba people and they try to retain as much of their culture as possible. This village’s kids do not go to school; instead they tend to their livestock. The kids have interesting hairstyles,
but not nearly as impressive as the women, who cover their hair in a red ochre, giving it almost a dreadlock type appearance. The women apparently never wash, and also cover their bodies in red ochre.
As we were leaving, a Himba man and woman asked us for a lift down the road, so we took them in our truck, much to their amusement. They lay down a sheet so she wouldn’t leave red ochre on the seats!
Our next stop was Tsumeb, where we also spent two nights. The campsite was a beautiful resort with an ATM, shop, restaurant, pool and beautiful green lawn so we were all extremely excited. Our excitement dampened only slightly on the first night when it began to pelt down with rain and we had to dart out of and back under cover when cooking. The meal more than made it up for it though – Kristy made a delicious, thick pumpkin soup, roasted tomato and bread (with butter!) for her and I (the only two vegos on this leg of the trip). The following night, we ate at the restaurant. Or should I say we consumed a lot at the restaurant, including a hell of a lot of strawberry daiquiris! We were all overly excited by the menu, as was I when I could finally order the calamari I had been craving for the last few months.
We took a side trip to the Hoba Meteorite, the ‘largest known in the world’, thought to have hit the earth approximately 80,000 years ago. It weighs approximately 50 tonne and measures about 3 metres long and 1 metre wide.
From Tsumeb, it was roughly a six hour drive to Windhoek. Suddenly, after all of these months of overlanding, it no longer seemed appropriate to wear shabby overlanding clothes. Plus it was a lot cooler, so getting around in shorts was less viable. I had to go to the mall and buy some jeans and mascara in order to try and look as ‘normal’ as possible. It was a bit of a culture shock as we weren’t used to seeing so many people dressed in Western clothing or so many fancy shops.
Showers were also now a requirement daily or at least every second day, as was changing our clothes. No longer was it appropriate to wear the same outfit for five days…unfortunately so I must say as it’s much easier when you don’t have to think about what to wear!
Here we were reunited with about half of our group – and spent much of the time catching up at our hostel, at an Angolan restaurant, and at Joe’s Beer House where many of them tried zebra, oryx, ostrich and springbok.
Whilst I was excited to be reunited with half of our truck family, I was also excited to visit my Dad in Jo’burg and have a bit of a break from truck life. So I waved goodbye to the truck family and caught a plane to Jo’burg that afternoon. I was very surprised to find an Angolan presence at Windhoek airport
including a whole array of Angolan souvenirs – such as these magnets showing every manner of transport that will take you to Angola – ironic as most of our group couldn’t get there via any means of transport.
Nonetheless, this next magnet of Miss Angola was my favourite.
Clearly I still need to reintegrate better into normal society as I was overly excited by the haloumi cheese wholemeal sandwich and chocolate bar I got on BA. Hopefully my stint in Jo’burg will do the trick.
No comments:
Post a Comment