Toulouse-to-Tolou's

2009-07-26T23:00:00.000-07:00

Toulouse to Tolou's, Southwest France to South West Africa, these are some highlights of Harry's Big Namibian Adventure in March 2009. I hope you enjoy the photos; feel free to leave comments.

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I had long admired photos of the world's largest sand dunes in Namibia and so when I heard about the workshop being run there by our friend Nicole Palmer just a few days after we were due to leave South Africa, I thought it would be worth the wait. I had nine days before the workshop started and so decided to see some other parts of Namibia. I flew from Cape Town to the capital of Namibia,Windhoek, and picked up a 4X4 SUV.

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I started in Windhoek and drove north passing termite mounds, springbok and ingenious weaver birds.

My first destination was Etosha National Park where I hoped to see some game.
There had been a lot of rain for several months, which meant the animals had no need to come to the water holes.

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Okaukuejo Rest Camp in Etosha National Park

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Springbok
(Antidorcas marsupialis)
South African national symbol and tasty dinner item.

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Burchell's Zebra
( Equus burchelli)
As yet un-tasted.

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Spotted Hyena
(Crocuta crocuta)

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The un-used water hole at Okaukuejo Rest Camp

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Blue Wildebeest
(Connochaetes taurinus)

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The rare and elusive Black Korhaan (Eupodotis afra) whose call sounds like broken machinery.

To hear it, go to ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vynOWqccq5I

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Small horns but BIG ears!

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Still no visitors at sunset.

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Full moon over Etosha.

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Typical landscape north of Windhoek. Very round, green hills, which put me in mind of the Teletubbies ...

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and very rare sign ......
most of the roads run as straight as a die for miles and miles.

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The gravel roads are kept in great shape by teams of grader operators who live with their equipment.

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Some people will go to great lengths to try to distract you from the superb landscape. These appeared to be mud sculptures of various animals.

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Quiver Tree (Aloe dichotoma), Khorixas

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Although everyone said how unusual the rain was this year, there were so many of these signs indicating a flooded road, that I thought rain wasn't so rare.

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Namib Diary - Day Five

Up with the sun and away by 7:30, direction Twyfelfontein. It will take 2 1/2 hours to go 100 kms there and the same to get back.
Khorixas was the end of the paved road and now it's gravel that has not been treated kindly by the rains. The worst conditions I've ever seen on something that can still be called a road (apart from Ontario in the winter). Pot holes, washed out gullies, creeks running across, mud, sand,you name it. There'll be a flat bit for a few hundred meters and all of a sudden a gully so one is constantly braking, and gearing up and down, mostly from 2nd to third and back. Luckily there hadn't been any rain very recently so the worst muddy parts had dried out some. There were graders at work but it's a slow process and they can't do it all at once.
Arrived at the site to find I must go with a guide, N$30 plus N$10 for parking. She was not very communicative. Although English is the official language of Namibia, it's not everyone's first, and some are better with it than others. Then I don't speak Afrikaans or German or Damara either.
She showed me around seven sites with engravings (not paintings), all in an impressive cathedral-like natural setting. Quite rough ground and much scrambling up and over rocks. Now very hot and not for the faint hearted or infirm. Twyfelfontein means doubtful fountain and there are the remains of a small house where some fool lived who tried to run a sheep farm here back in the fifties.
After an hour of that I decided I didn't need the second part of the tour and headed off to the
Twyfelfontein Country Lodge just down the road. This is a large, luxurious resort with a huge restaurant/bar area and several guest cottages. It is either on the verge of bankruptcy or the front for drug money as I saw no-one other than staff in the hour and a half I was there. I had a Tafel at the bar while waiting for the resto to open then had beef and kudu stir fry and a 'Dinky' of Cape white wine. It turns out to be a 187 ml bottle, a reasonable glass. This was followed by the most intense, moistest chocolate layer cake I've ever had. All quite astonishing in the middle of a desert.

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Location of the Twyfelfontein engravings. Temperatures were at least 40C +

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Even in a rugged and hostile terrain there is life.

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Interesting engravings but primitive. I remind myself that I live next to some of the worlds' finest cave paintings at Lascaux.

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Most of the roads in Namibia are very good, even the un-paved ones, but once in awhile a river runs through and there's not much road left.

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Spitzkoppe

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Local residents with rocks for sale. As far as I could tell, kids were the only things made around here.

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sometimes the rocks almost seemed alive....

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under the Bridge

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the wonder of it all ......

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The Coca-Cola Building, Walvis Bay with matching vehicles.

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Sometimes the bridges catch the debris, if you're lucky......

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Le Mirage Desert Lodge & Spa .... unfortunately it wasn't a mirage .....

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The road to Tolous. The Desert Light workshop was based here. The small Dina dunes are behind me.

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Tolou's Lodge, built by two guys named Lourens, Lou for short, who dropped the w from two.... so I was told. I still think they misplaced the apostrophe.

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Dina dunes

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We often think of the desert as a barren, lifeless place. In fact there are many life forms, large and small, who manage to survive there.

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After two and a half days at Tolous Lodge we moved on to the main event, the magnificent dunes at Sossusvlei

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where we stayed at the Sossus Dune Lodge ...

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.... Luxury in the desert!

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The sociable weaver bird builds large nests so that many families can live together. They will continue to enlarge these until the tree falls down.

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These trees are in the Deadvlei, (dead lake) and are believed to be a thousand years old.

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The Germans, who like to climb the dunes and get in the shot, are not so old.

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Some say that the dunes are quite sensual. Tom Lehrer said " when correctly viewed, everything is lewd! I could tell you things about Peter Pan, and the Wizard of Oz - there's a dirty old man!"

2009-07-26T22:02:00.000-07:00

For those who'd like hard copy, I've made a small coffee-table book version with a few more photos and better panoramas.

It's available here -

NAMIBIA ROCKS!

By RH Neal

Book Preview

at the same price I pay - no markup.

2009-07-26T21:00:00.000-07:00

If you liked that collection, I've just finished another of photos from our trip to Uzbekistan. Have a look -

Ten Days with ...

By R.H. Neal

Book Preview