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Dinosaur footprints & mad Germans (again).
Why the car alarm chose to go off at 3am whilst we were camped alone in the middle of nowhere, 4km from Mt Etjo safari lodge is anyone’s guess. Angela and I sat in the roof top tent with rape alarm (mine), pepper spray and hammer thinking the worst, only to conclude that an insect had set it off.
Next day as the early morning sun turned the local sandstone a deep red colour and antelope started drinking at the waterhole in front of us, we chided ourselves on our nervousness and cheered up by exchanging grunts with a troop of over 30 baboons (how I miss work!)
We were at Mt Etjo for a stopover before Etosha. This allowed us to visit Otjihaenamaperero (that’s easy for you to say!) farm, home to a load of dinosaur footprints dating back 200 million years. It is owned by a Namibian of German descent, a lovely dinosaur mad guy whose garden path clearly does not go all the way up to the front door.
The powers that manage Etosha National Park, Namibian Wildlife Resorts Ltd, have chosen the 100th Anniversary of the park to embark on an ambitious re-furbishment and re-build of the 3 camping and chalet sites. This being Africa they have knocked down quite a bit, and not built much in it’s place. As a consequence camping at Halali and Namutoni is the nearest experience you can get of being on a building site without working there.
Strange then that whilst we were at Namutoni two lions decided they preferred living inside the fenced camp than outside. In typical African style no one thought to tell us campers that two of the larger members of the feline family were strolling around frightened, confused and somewhat peckish.
Dragging zebra (dead I hasten to add) around camp from the back of a truck didn’t induce the lions to depart and on our departure we were advised that the rangers had come up with a plan to trap, dart and remove them that evening. This sounded like a cunning plan, until we learnt that the lioness had already been darted and evicted, only to come back with a male friend. We will go back and check what happened, assuming anyone is still alive there to tell us!
At Halali camp we met two Americans, Jim & Sheri, who had just come over the border from Angola, overjoyed to be in civilisation (that tells you how bad Angola is!) They had driven their Toyota 4x4 (complete with bullet proof glass) down from the UK and their stories of having their passports stolen by police in Nigeria, being on the Congo river ferry when the engine stopped and encountering Angolan roads that swallowed trucks confirmed our view that we should limit our trip to the southern countries of Africa.
We hope to meet up with Jim & Sheri again, assuming Jim can get a knee injury repaired in South Africa! They are on a 4 year round world trip and are planning to cycle from Florida to Alaska as part of the adventure. Are there any sane people out there?
Talking of insanity, and also at Halali, we were sat back in our lounger chairs listening to the sounds of wild Africa (generators, road drills and cement mixers) when yet another knackered Toyota Landcruiser engine disturbed the relative peace and quiet.
Yep, those mad Germans, Florian & Susie (who we’d met in Swakopmund) and their two children turned the corner, negotiated several piles of rubble and parked up on a pitch dangerously close to ours. Their yellow Toyota a.k.a. the Custard Bus, famous throughout northern Namibia (the locals don’t get out much!) now had a roof top tent perched permanently and precariously on top of the cab, adding to the perfect aerodynamics of the aluminium workman’s shed perched on the back end.
Possibly pleased to see us they were more pleased to see that we had cold white wine and a fridge full of meat. This was just as well as the Halali campsite shop where you could buy meat was temporarily closed, it’s previous location marked by a pile of rubble!
Despite our best attempts the Kutz family followed us to Namutoni and then we all escaped the lions and rubble of that camp by going to Onguma, a private lodge just outside the east gate of the park. We went from building site to private toilets and showers, swimming pool, loungers and bar staff happy to serve endless Gin & Tonics and Harvey Wallbangers. Strange then that it was actually cheaper to stay there than in the building rubble of Namutoni.
Regular readers will recall my fondness for children so you may be surprised to learn that we became good friends with Franka Kutz, 5 years old, fully conversant in English and a bundle of energy in the swimming pool and on game drives (where every type of antelope we encountered she described as “lion food”) That girl will either end up as chancellor of Germany or go on to something more important!
The departure of the Kutz family gave us mixed feelings, sad to see them go but pleased that we still had 6 bottles of wine left!
To be continued……………
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