Ghanzi, Botswana to Windhoek, Namibia
Overnight it got cold, really cold! The coldest we've felt while in Africa.
I woke up multiple times to put on my hoodie, tracksuit pants & socks.
At 1am we both woke up needing to use the bathroom & made the sprint together through the cold deep sand.
Once back in our tent, we jumped back into our sleeping bags & zipped them right up so that there was only a breathing hole at the top.
Our alarm went off at 5am & we both acknowledged the lack of sensation in our toes before getting up.
Most people in our tour group were commenting on the temperatures & we heard later that someone even slept in the truck instead of their tent.
By 6.20am everyone was on the truck & ready to leave, 10 minutes early! We were then told the truck wouldn't start & there might be a delay. Thankfully it wasn't a problem & started a short time later.
We have 500km's to travel today, a border crossing & a farewell dinner.
We cross into Namibia today & go straight to the capital of Windhoek, where we say goodbye to 9 of the people who joined us at Victoria falls & welcome 4 new people who will be with us till Cape Town.
We have crossed out of Botswana & into Namibia by 10.42am with 326km's left to go & lunch in our near future thoughts. The border crossing was quick, easy, well organized & free! Our kind of border ;)
Namibia was colonized by German's & is more German than Germany, so Jurumba says. The Germans on our truck dont really agree.
Originally called South West Africa until 1990, when they got independance & it was changed to Namibia.
There is 2.5 million people living in 825,000 square kilometers of land known as Namibia. There is 15 native tribes that came up from what is now known as South Africa. Languages commonly spoken here are German, Afrikaan's, Dutch & Swahili.
After a road side lunch, we continue on "hammering the road" as Jurumba says. I have a nap with my legs over Tom's lap & our papaya in my lap for safe keeping. With the amount of people on board the esky is full to capacity, which is why I'm nursing fruit.
Tom get's sick of listening to music & starts reading my new book; The Bone Field by Simon Kerrick. In 3 hours he has caught up to me at page 88 & looks to be hooked, line & sinker.
I really wanted him to read The Green Mile, but someone more loudly spoken jumped on it as soon as I turned the last page yesterday afternoon.
The view out of the window of the truck at the Namibian scenery is more stimulating than the scenery we had in Botswana. It's not so flat, there is hills & mountains, more trees & we've seen heaps of ostrich next to the road & even a few pumba's.
There are signs warning motorists of the Oryx, a type of black & white antelope only found in southern Africa.
I'm hoping we see them in Etosha National Park as well as some more cheetah.
Dinner at Joe's beer house was really nice, we had some fish & calamari with salad & jacket potatoes. Tom had local beer & I had a couple of glasses of pinotage, a wine from south Africa I adore. The particular brand was called Meerkat & boasts to be South Africas most gregarious wine. It has won awards & was a really nice wine to drink.
We walked back together as a big group & had been warned about the muggings & assaults that are prevalent in the area. Our guide told us it's from a long history of racism in Namibia. The city was built for the white people & the blacks are still living outside the city in villages. The people doing the assaults & muggings are mostly black, targeting white people & especially tourists who are known to walk to the pub.
Joseph told me about a time last year he was doing the groceries for the tour group in a supermarket in Namibia when he was approached by security & asked to leave because he was black.
It deeply saddens me that this still happens.
After arriving back at the camp we briefly went to their bar & used the wifi to look up information on Tom's dual citizenship & the recent NZ Visa changes. What information we've found is hopeful! Tom's dual citizenship should still be considered valid because it was applied for & approved before he was 18. It was also done before 1994 which was when the dual citizenship was no longer allowed in New Zealand.
South Africa still allows dual citizenship. Everything else we read states he hasn't done anything that South Africa would consider as revoking his South African citizenship & should still satisfy their needs, including his current foreign passport.
Just to be certain, we have found some contact numbers to call & verify this information. Being turned back at the border, which is in the middle of the desert is less than desirable.
After this it was time for sleep, we prepared for another cold night but were pleasantly surprised by the warmer temperature & slept right through till our alarms.
- Alli
Overnight it got cold, really cold! The coldest we've felt while in Africa.
I woke up multiple times to put on my hoodie, tracksuit pants & socks.
At 1am we both woke up needing to use the bathroom & made the sprint together through the cold deep sand.
Once back in our tent, we jumped back into our sleeping bags & zipped them right up so that there was only a breathing hole at the top.
Our alarm went off at 5am & we both acknowledged the lack of sensation in our toes before getting up.
Most people in our tour group were commenting on the temperatures & we heard later that someone even slept in the truck instead of their tent.
By 6.20am everyone was on the truck & ready to leave, 10 minutes early! We were then told the truck wouldn't start & there might be a delay. Thankfully it wasn't a problem & started a short time later.
We have 500km's to travel today, a border crossing & a farewell dinner.
We cross into Namibia today & go straight to the capital of Windhoek, where we say goodbye to 9 of the people who joined us at Victoria falls & welcome 4 new people who will be with us till Cape Town.
We have crossed out of Botswana & into Namibia by 10.42am with 326km's left to go & lunch in our near future thoughts. The border crossing was quick, easy, well organized & free! Our kind of border ;)
Namibia was colonized by German's & is more German than Germany, so Jurumba says. The Germans on our truck dont really agree.
Originally called South West Africa until 1990, when they got independance & it was changed to Namibia.
There is 2.5 million people living in 825,000 square kilometers of land known as Namibia. There is 15 native tribes that came up from what is now known as South Africa. Languages commonly spoken here are German, Afrikaan's, Dutch & Swahili.
After a road side lunch, we continue on "hammering the road" as Jurumba says. I have a nap with my legs over Tom's lap & our papaya in my lap for safe keeping. With the amount of people on board the esky is full to capacity, which is why I'm nursing fruit.
Tom get's sick of listening to music & starts reading my new book; The Bone Field by Simon Kerrick. In 3 hours he has caught up to me at page 88 & looks to be hooked, line & sinker.
I really wanted him to read The Green Mile, but someone more loudly spoken jumped on it as soon as I turned the last page yesterday afternoon.
The view out of the window of the truck at the Namibian scenery is more stimulating than the scenery we had in Botswana. It's not so flat, there is hills & mountains, more trees & we've seen heaps of ostrich next to the road & even a few pumba's.
There are signs warning motorists of the Oryx, a type of black & white antelope only found in southern Africa.
I'm hoping we see them in Etosha National Park as well as some more cheetah.
We arrived in Windhoek just before 5pm & had to quickly set up our tents & get ready for dinner at a place called Joe's Beer House. We arrived later than planned due to problems with the truck causing us to pull over & check electrical wires. Our driver also had problems navigating through Windhoek to our camping site, The Urban Camp. It was a pretty good camping site, just not equipped for multiple tour group trucks at one time & we had to set up our tents on rocks. Lucky we got in early & grabbed some of the thicker mattresses.
Dinner at Joe's beer house was really nice, we had some fish & calamari with salad & jacket potatoes. Tom had local beer & I had a couple of glasses of pinotage, a wine from south Africa I adore. The particular brand was called Meerkat & boasts to be South Africas most gregarious wine. It has won awards & was a really nice wine to drink.
The venue was really cool & thoroughly rocking the African x antiques vibe with a mini cooper on the roof, collections of type writers & various animal skulls with horns mounted on the wall. We offered to buy Joseph, Jurumba & Steven a drink on their night off, they only wanted soft drink, which is fine.
We walked back together as a big group & had been warned about the muggings & assaults that are prevalent in the area. Our guide told us it's from a long history of racism in Namibia. The city was built for the white people & the blacks are still living outside the city in villages. The people doing the assaults & muggings are mostly black, targeting white people & especially tourists who are known to walk to the pub.
Joseph told me about a time last year he was doing the groceries for the tour group in a supermarket in Namibia when he was approached by security & asked to leave because he was black.
It deeply saddens me that this still happens.
After arriving back at the camp we briefly went to their bar & used the wifi to look up information on Tom's dual citizenship & the recent NZ Visa changes. What information we've found is hopeful! Tom's dual citizenship should still be considered valid because it was applied for & approved before he was 18. It was also done before 1994 which was when the dual citizenship was no longer allowed in New Zealand.
South Africa still allows dual citizenship. Everything else we read states he hasn't done anything that South Africa would consider as revoking his South African citizenship & should still satisfy their needs, including his current foreign passport.
Just to be certain, we have found some contact numbers to call & verify this information. Being turned back at the border, which is in the middle of the desert is less than desirable.
After this it was time for sleep, we prepared for another cold night but were pleasantly surprised by the warmer temperature & slept right through till our alarms.
- Alli
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