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So just two months ago I hadn't even heard of the country and thought it was called "nambia". And this past weekend, I had the opportunity to see and experience much of this beautiful south west African country for three days and two nights.
I traveled in Namibia with Kate (LLC and my Spain travel friend) and Nathan (IT Coordinator) which was a nice and small group (and a needed break from students!). It worked out well as we were all flexible and positive travelers. Nathan had actually lived in Namibia for a summer when he interned in Windhoek (the capital) about six years ago, so he was pretty familiar with the territory. Both Nathan and Kate had sailed with SAS as students, so I was lucky as they are both experienced travelers.
ETOSHA NATIONAL PARK- Saturday, Feb 14th- Sunday Feb 15th
After about a 5 hour drive in our Hyundai Accent through sand dunes and a lot of desert area we arrived at the entrance to Etosha around 7pm, which was close because gates closed at sunset. Literally within seconds of pulling into the park we spotted a couple zebras and a little further down the road we had two huge giraffe cross in front of our car (these were my favorites). I couldn't believe my eyes. As the sun set we pulled into our camp site in Okaukuejo where we stayed in a somewhat luxurius bungalow fit with a mosquito net over our bed. That night, we soon discovered that it was rainy season and the watering holes which normally attract many animals were barely being used so we didn't get to see much after sunset. Before going to bed, it was raining pretty hard, and I just sat in our bungalow listening to the rain fall while trying to conceptualized being surrounded by wildlife and being in Africa.
The next morning we set out on a four hour drive through the park in our hyundai accent. WOW, the park is so beautiful. We got to see amazing wildlife upclose and personal. There were so many animals all over the park, beautiful trees, and emaculate open African sky always in the backdrop. It really felt like we were in a movie or national geographic special. One of the highlights was spotting two lions under a tree digesting their recently killed zebra. They were a bit far away, but it was surreal to see them right after a kill! In addition to the lions, we also saw a lot of zebra, girraffes, springbok, gemsbok (oryx), one hyena, ostridges, wildebeasts, and some jackals. I basically drove around with a huge perma-grin on my face soaking up the experience. Many of you know i get giddy when around nature and animals.
WINDHOEK- Sunday Late Night to Monday, Feb 16th
After a 6 hours of driving through the park, we headed right down to Windhoek, the capital city of Namibia and arrived there around 9:30pm. Windhoek is where Nathan worked as an intern at the Namibian craft center which we visited the next day. That night, he took us to a place called "Joe's Beerhouse" which was a really fun environment and we enjoyed some delicious game meat. Somewhat ironic as we were just hours before admiring their beauty (Zebra, Kudu, Oryx, and Ostridge meat!). We crashed in a hotel that night and were exhausted.
Monday morning we visited the Craft Center walked around the city a bit. Windhoek was a neat little city and the craft center was really cool to see artwork from all over the country and beyond. Nathan was able to reconnect with some old coworkers and we also got to hear some artists speaking in clicking languages, which was quite amusing. It took us about four hours to get back to the port. Driving there is a bit stressfull as the whole left side of the road thing is a big adjustment. They also mostly have one lane highways with ongoing traffic, so there was a lot of high adrenaline passing of cars against oncoming traffic. Twice wild baboons ran in front of our car in the middle of the highway, it was a memorable scene. We actually barely made it back to the ship ontime after washing and returning our car (it was filthy).
Overall, Namibia was an amazing experience. I obviously spent most of the time in Etosha with my jaw dropped as i tried to take-in driving around with lions, zebras, and giraffe. The country is so sparsely populated and had a lot of seemingly uninhabited desert area. Three days definitely was just scratching the surface. There was a lot more to see in Namibia, and I would love to come back in the future.
btw...just about everyone in Namibia speaks english
btw2.there was a surprising amount of white people in the coastal cities
btw3.i have to 'axe' myself "where am I?" a couple times a day...
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