After crossing the border between Namibia and Botswana, our first stop is in Ghanzi, home of the Bushmen, the oldest group of humans, at about 100 000 years. These tribes are spread between different countries and are becoming fewer and fewer over the years. Nowadays, they have rights to live over most of the land, but still have a hard time to be able to continue their traditions, like hunting and migrating. The Bushmen are highly respected here, they are considered wise and strong. They live all their lives outside and when you look at them you feel they have an incredible sense of confidence. It is almost like you are immediately convinced that they know better. Many young people from this group has tried to go to school, but most fail and go back to their groups. I ask the guy who is bringing us around how old the oldest woman is, he translates to her and then she looks at me and starts talking. Her skin is thick and dry, the wrinkles are deep, but she is extremely agile and flexible, she could be 80, but she sits on the ground and gets up very quickly, like a kid. I don’t understand anything and just nod (like Merly Streep in Out of Africa, talking to the chief of the Kikuyu), but I feel an immense sense of respect for her. She doesn’t know how old she is, there is not such thing as birth certificate, she just remembers that when she was a kid there were no cars around…
Our next destination is Etosha National Park in the north of Namibia. Everybody on the truck is extremely excited about seeing some animals, because after all this is Africa! We get there in time for a game drive before sunset. The park, in particular this time of year, is an enormous dry plane, with little vegetation and little water. The main attractions of the park are its water holes. The first one we see is still quiet, only an old elephant there trying to cool down by spraying mud and water over himself.
After a hot coffee it’s time to leave. We get in the truck with all the warm clothes we have and still feel kind of cold as it’s just sun rise.After not many kilometers, the truck is having some more troubles and we have to stop to let the engine cool down once again! We give it one more try, but it looks like something cannot be fixed, and we need to get a new truck which will be sent from Cape Town. It will take the whole day to come here, so as scary as it is we need to get back to the coldest camping site on Earth! As the sun gets higher it’s getting warmer though, so we can enjoy some wine and cheese just sitting outside. The mood of the group is really good, and before it’s getting dark, Mike, a nice guy from Taupo traveling with his wife, collects plenty of wood for the fire. The new truck arrives at 3 in the night, and at 6.30 we get up and start transferring all the stock and luggage to the new truck. Again, the night was very cold, and some (smart) people decided to sleep in camp site’s bathrooms instead of their tents! The process is taking about 2 hours, but after that we are ready to leave for the Naukluft Park and its huge red dunes. More »