Day 39 - Naute Dam to Klein Aus (31/10)

Happy Hallowe'en (not a lot of ghouls or beasties here!)

Up just after dawn for views of the dam and bird-life stirring.  Then the long straight road 

towards next place of any size (for a post office at last, let alone provisions) is Aus - though we stop first at another Commonwealth cemetery where, mysteriously, poor German souls look to have died after the war ended

The tiny information centre in town sheds light on why so many German soldiers died in Nov 1918 : on the German surrender in 1915, a POW camp had been established close by, and a 'flu epidemic in Autumn 1918 wiped out both German prisoners and South African guards. What a way to end your war.

On the road from Aus west towards Luderitz on the Atlantic coast is the Garub pan which attracts Namibia's population of local wild horses

You're warned not to leave your car or go a-wandering off the road as cuts through "the forbidden zone" - namely where the diamond mines are!  Later we see helicopters tracking the road - hopefully  scenic tourist flights rather than men with guns... 

The road views are spectacular and, on our return to camp, D climbs one of the surrounding hills for a view – super shots of the camp and the pan

Day 38 - Gondwana NP to Naute Dam (30/10)

Final views of Gondwana NP. 

Along the road, we see signs for "biltong" and "kudu pies" - who could need more invitation to investigate?  It turns out to be a well-stocked farm-shop manned by a Cape Town girl, married to a Namib boy and planning a campsite.  Sadly, all of the 90 pies which she baked on  Sunday had gone but at least there's home-made kudu biltong.

Further on, we see a road to the Naute Dam; past wide green Naute grape-fields, we find a campsite with a great view across the water (and dam wall) and surrounding hills and a single shaded plot.

Apart from the occasional German tourist passing by, we're left all alone with the sunset and then the white shining moon

Day 37 - Ai-Ais to Gondwana National Park (29/10)

It's been a nice quiet day (apart from an early baboon raid when D left the car door open to air for 2 minutes) 

We retraced our steps to the Roadhouse hotel and campsite in Gondwana NP,

 D took a walk up a nearby hill 

while I lazed by the teeny-tiny, v cold, pool while trying to upload a few pics and watched the local bird life.

Day 36 - Ai-Ais (28/10)

We're leaving the views of the canyon for Ai-Ais (literally "burning water") hot springs which is on the canyon on the banks of the Fish River.  One last pop to the main viewing point, where we get some more perspective on size

On the DR324 to Ai-Ais, mountain zebras as we stop to admire the rockface,

nest in quiver tree

and lots of 4x4s charging along too fast - duuuusty!

Boulders and piles of rubble lie around - it looks like a building site, with glimpses of hills through the mounds every now and again.

Eventually a green patch - trees and bushes, and we're at Ai-Ais.

Not unexpectedly, there are thermal baths here so, for the princely sum of N$10 (50p), we have a soak - and then a cold shower (hot baths not being required when it's 90 outside!)

Knocking together a spot of lunch, S is the hapless victim of baboon robbery-with-menaces from the picnic table (he makes off, lightning-fast, with his swag bag full of still-wrapped-up loaf of bread, four rusks and a handful of travel-sweets, wrappers and all!)  Bold as brass and with big shiny-sharp teeth bared when I clap and shout at him (none of which has much impact so I decide that retreat is regrettable but inevitable).  Let's hope he gets indigestion.

On the plus side, D has espied eland steak on the restaurant menu - turns out to have been yesterday's offering but tonight it 's springbok and the chef understands what we mean by "rare please" - it's perfectly cooked and with nice potatoes, cauliflower and (little bit unusual) beetroot. Outstanding if belated birthday dinner.

Day 35 - Fish River Canyon (27/10)

The Canyon road is stony and twisty and gives magnificent views down 500m into Fish River bed (where just a glimmer of water is visible around the classic postcard shot of an Isle-of-Dogs horseshoe).

We start off at the platform where all tourist buses congregate (though, to be fair, even busy isn't busy by normal standards), 

then work our way along to a further vantage point which is less well frequented

and then pick our way the length - probably 20km each way - along the canyon-rim, mainly on 4x4 roads and mostly with terrific scenes of the canyon or surrounding areas.  The actual river winds southwards for about 85km along to Ai-Ais hot springs; in season - i.e. when you don't risk frying to death or being washed away in the rare event that it rains - you can hike the river bed/canyon floor over 4-5 days to Ai-Ais.

Gorgeous

via Sulphur Springs and Southern lookouts (got so excited, we resorted to selfies again!)

It's windy now for tonight's braai but it takes surprisingly well, burning fast; a silver of a moon is shining in the east as the sunset sky burns.

Day 34 - Quiver Tree to Gondwana Park via Klein Karas Mountains (26/10)

Goodbye forest (you won't be shocked to hear that we completely missed the pre-6am sunrise). The sun was in full swing by the time we made it to the "Giants' Playground" of huge balanced stones (apparently left after the sediment which acted as mortar has been blown/washed away) - reminds us a bit of Zimbabwe (but it's a poor imitation - we've been spoiled!)

Our stock-up/refuel spot is Keetmanshoop (somewhat smaller than expected given this is the gateway from S Africa) - at least it has a cathedral and former German East Africa PO.

Last sighting of B1 for a while as we turn onto DR ("Dirt Road"?!) 608 for 118km of rollercoaster gravel, sand

could easily be Colorado or Arizona.

The purpose of coming down here is the canyon of Namibia's longest river, the Fish River which (though a bit smaller than the Grand Canyon - it's not even the biggest canyon in Africa apparently, that's in Ethiopia) is supposed to be spectacular.  We'll see tomorrow

Day 33 - Camp Bastion to Quiver Tree Forest, Keetmanshoop (25/10)

A slowish start to another jolly hot day. We're back on the B1 again towards Keetmanshoop - this is what passes for a motorway

Wide open spaces and impressive, flat-topped hills, with some friendly co-travellers

Intrigued by a "Commonwealth War Graves" sign, we make a detour at Gibeon. It's a small memorial with a collection of era and nationalities, reflecting Namibia's chequered past : 1905s German soldiers and also more recent 27-28 April 1915 with South African  regiments who fell in battle at Gibeon. 

We'd expected to head into the Brukarros Mountains, to a campsite with a rave write-up, managed by the local community. On arrival, it looks fairly promising

so we let ourselves in, and look for someone to pay but it quickly becomes clear that the site is now dilapidated and deserted - or at best unloved. At least the view is still good but no good to stay, so we press on instead towards the next planned stop near the southern town of Keetmanshoop : the Quiver Tree Forest.  A national monument park since 1959 of protected aloe trees - usually they grow singly but here there are a few dozen so it's been ambitiously upgraded to a forest!

The San and Nama used to hollow out the lightweight trunks for their arrows - hence the name.  They're actually very lovely - I'm looking forward to seeing them at dawn (or thereabouts!)

Day 32 - Rehoboth to "Camp Bastion", north of Mariental (24/10)

Waving goodbye to our view of the dam

and the enormous cactus next to our camp-spot, 

we passed the Tropic of Capricorn on our route southwards,
 

only to find that our intended overnight stop was closed - but we've landed on our feet with "Camp Bastion" (I assume the Helmand Province connotation was lost on the owners!!) which is comfortably equipped and has (free, to boot) WiFi.

Day 31 - Okahandja to Lake Oanob, Rehoboth via Heroes' Acre (23/10)

Windy overnight and some rain but the clouds cleared and warmed up. Back on the B1 "motorway" through Windhoek, we stopped at Heroes' Acre, inaugurated in 2002 to mark Namibia's 10 years of independence

and consisting of a parade ground, 30m tall white obelisk on the hill,

 

and, up steps informally guarded by baboons, an 8m statue of the Unknown Soldier.  It was deserted apart from us and we wondered whether it isn't a bit of a (US$10m apparently) white elephant. 

Now in a site near to Lake Oanob -  we chose "Palm Beach"(!) with lovely view over the lake. 

And Duncan is keeping his nose to the grindstone

Supplemental - a quick Etosha round-up

Top "spots" were

[1] a honey badger (he darted out in front of us unexpectedly on the road  - too quickly and I was admiring him too much for a pic),

[2] two leopards very late one night at the Halali watering-hole (sadly those midnight photos didn't come out either), where we'd been watching,

[3] thirteen black rhino fighting it out for the honour of the female - a lot of dust, testosterone, threatening grunting and horn-to-horn twisting and thumping (it seems it's all about how strong your jaw and neck muscles are, but no one looks actually to get hurt).  When all was said and done and the champ presented himself to the lady however, she flatly refused him and he was still continuing his attempts to win her over when we left him to his starry-nighted wooing.

[4] the successful rescue of a baby black rhino who'd got himself stuck in a (man-made)

watering-hole. It looked bleak for a while (and frankly as though the wildlife chaps didn't really know what to do)

but, despite the fact that he'd obviously been trying jolly hard already, their cajoling seemed to do the trick and he hauled himself out, very wobbly-legged (Lord knows where his mummy was)

Hurrah!

Less memorable moments were when a bull elephant decided to engulf himself (and, consequently, us as there was a fair wind blowing in our direction) with a new line in gentlemen's talcum powder : dust containing (by the distinct, pervading smell of it) ground elephant and rhino poo.

But the scariest thing we saw all week...

Six cracking days - a few other shots of favourite moments...