Month: July 2015

We packed up the car and drove off into the desert. We caught our last views of sossosvlei and headed to Solitaire. Solitaire is a super small town with only four buildings. One of the buildings is a bakery where it is said that they have the best apple pie in the world. It was delicious. Then we drove up into the mountains. In the mountains, I saw some aloe trees.

 

We stopped at a place called gecko camp, but when the woman there told us that there where poachers in the mountains, and we asked what they where poaching, she said “animals.” We kept going until we came to another campground with 4 cats, 4 dogs, 2 horses, and a bunch of goats and cattle. One of the cats, called Zorro, was a wildcat that became a domestic cat. Daddy said that the campground was the best campground he’d ever seen.

Kittsy

Pepper

 

That morning we drove into sossosvlei and the dunes were gorgeous.

 

 

Our plan was to drive up to dead vlei and then to hidden vlei. Dead vlei could have been more incredible if it weren’t for all the people there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We had a picknick and when we gave a droplet of water to an ant, the ant was so excited that it stopped what it was doing and drank. The birds were also up to something. On the way back to hidden vlei, we saw an incredible sand dune

At hidden vlei, there was nobody.,

 

 

 

 

 

Hidden vlei

That night we saw the sunset.

 

The plastic duck floated across the pond. We had pushed it along, pretending it was a ferry boat. But when it got stuck in the reeds, we could not get it back. Then, we played a game where Leo was King Leopold the 1st. While he was away, we took turns guarding the throne from Sam. Cute kitty Pheobe did some impressive actions.

 

 

 

 

 

Just before we left zebra River, Sam and I found the other cat.

We drove to Sossusvlei, a place where there are many red-orange sand dunes. On the way, the mountains looked like they’d be right at home in Death Valley.

In Sossusvlei, we found a campground and then headed to Sossusvlei. It was beautiful! We even climbed the tallest sand dune in the world called dune 45. On the way to Sossusvlei, we saw a mutated oryx. It had one horn sticking strait up and one horn pointing sideways in the direction of Sossusvlei like it was showing us the way there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dune 45

The sand

 

 

 

 

This was only the tip of the iceberg, as the next day we had a full day of it.

 

Zebra River Lodge is known for its geology. That is why we were going to take a hike there. But it was a while before we got to go on the hike. We played with Leo and Audrey and made a manikin called Henry. Before then, we saw a group of guinea fowl.

Henry.

Henry had been bitten by a black mamba, wich live in the hills above the zebra River lodge. We gave him surgery. We also played with Phoebe. At lunch we ate the food we had stored up, since they didn’t serve lunch. After lunch, we got ready for our hike. Then we drove to where it started. Mama was excited because there were fossilized stromatolites. I was excited because I found a baobab tree.

The stromatolites and the baobab

Then, we moved on to see the namacalothus fossils. They only are found in southern Namibia and far northern Canada.

Namacalothus

When we got back to the lodge, we hiked up a hill to see the sunset. At the top, we saw an aloe tree.

We also saw a herd of mountan zebras.

Can you see the zebras?

At dinner, the waitresses and waiters sang us a song that they made up.

We drove back to Windhoek and Mama & Daddy had some coffe and lunch at their favorite coffe shop in Windhoek called “The Joy of Food.” On our way out of Windhoek, we saw many baboons. Sam saw their bottoms, wich pleased him very much. On our way into the Namib desert, the scenery looked like the Mojave desert, but with out the Joshua Trees.

 

The drive out of Windhoek

The Mojaveish scenery.

Our destination was the Zebra River Lodge, a lodge in the middle of endless plateaus and mountain ranges. We had to drive through the beautiful Namib naukluft national park.

Namib Naukluft

On the way to Zebra River it was also beautiful.

On the way to zebra River

Once we got to Zebra River Lodge, a woman was already waiting with tall glasses of orange juice for each of us. There was also a cat that was half wildcat half housecat. That cat wasn’t like normal cats. She could jump remarkably high and would attack just about anything that moved ( including us ). The cats name was Phoebe

Phoebe

At dinner, I was the only kid in the lodge who was awake. Our hotel building was a stone house that’s bathroom door would lock on the inside if closed. Luckily, we had another bathroom. Each one of the beds had mosquito netting so that when I pulled it down I felt like a princess. I want one of those over my bed at home.

 

The next day was the day we left Etosha. That night, Daddy saw a male and a female lion at the waterhole! Now we were egear for more. We drove along the lakeside, looking for waterholes, but they were all dry. We did see some ostriches on the way. Once we didn’t see the waterhole where the zebras and springbok were drinking. On the way to the end of Etosha, we saw a group of elephants cross the road in front of us.

After those elephants, we came to a waterhole that had water.

The waterhole had herds of ostriches,gemsbok and springbok

Near the exit, we climed a tower in a campground called Okaujo.

Unfortunately, this picture is sideways, but it is the tower.

We drove through scrub all the way to a town called Otjiwarongo, where we got on to a dirt road and saw a dump, a work camp, and a truckload of tree trimmers. At the end of this dirt road we found the Cheetah Conservation Fund

The cheetah conservation fund is a recovery program for cheetahs. Orphaned or injured cheetahs are found and brought to here. If the cheetahs cannot be released into the wild, it will spend its time in the cheetah conservation funds cheetah pens. We got there in time for feeding. The cheetahs stopped with what ever they were doing and ran to the place where they were to be fed.

Cheetah waiting to be fed.

After the feeding, we decided to go on the tour of the cheetah pens. We saw some old cheetahs there.

The cheetah toilet

The CCF also bred dogs and goats. Why? Because they wanted the dogs to keep the cheetahs away, not the farmer’s guns. The goats were there to help the dogs get used to the goats. They made goat cheese and ice cream out of the goats’ milk.

We came to a place on the way back from the cheetah fund, where all but one cow crossed the road and the dog that should have been helping relaxed in the bushes and watched the cow try to cross the road. The sun hid behind the clouds.

We stayed in a hotel where the guinea fowl said “no smoking.”

After the rinocerus experience, we were very excited. That night, we had heard the bonechilling roar of a male lion and it was still roaring then to. When we got to the waterhole, nothing happened except for the presence of a springbok, so, we drove of to see wildlife at the other waterholes. We drove right by the helio waterhole because it was man made, but we had more success with the man made ones. At the next waterhole, we had no success, but after that, we came to a place where zebras, kudus, and springbok were throwing a party.

Zebra on its way to the waterhole

 

Heartabeast at the water hole

The waterhole

 

Heartebeasts and zebras

Heartebeast drinking

Before the successful waterhole, we had driven out onto the Etosha Pan. There were many mirages.

 

The Etosha Pan

After the successful waterhole, we came to one that had nothing except for some ducks and a springbok. Then we ate lunch. After lunch, mama dilly-dallied in the the tourist giftshop, so it was a little while before we saw the fort. On the way to lunch, we saw giraffes and wildebeest.

 

The fort was interesting

The fort

After the fort, we headed for the waterholes. At the next hole, there were some zebras, 7 giraffes, a giant herd of guinea fowl, a bustard, many springbok, and a skiddish kudu who was scared of a butterfly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In all the excitement, Sam had to pee. We had to drive back to the fort place and after Sam was finished, we saw the waterhole there and it wasn’t very exciting. Once we got back in the car and drove of, we didn’t have high hopes for the man made waterhole coming up next, but when the car infront of us stopped for twenty long minuets to look for a cheetah that had ran away into the brush twenty-three minuets ago, I was annoyed,especially when they broke the rules and leaned out of the window to “see the cheetah with their own eyes.” But wat happened at the waterhole made us forget all this. A giant herd of elephants, with still more coming, were drinking and dusting themselves 100m away from us!

One baby’s father was up ahead, and it would run from its mother with the other elephants and to its father to hold his tail. And then back to its mother again. Another baby was nursing.

 

 

 

Once we left the herd of elephants,it was hard to believe we’d missed them before! Elephants were everywhere!

When we got back, Pippa and Aleyne were here, and at the moringa waterhole,we saw rinos once more.

 

The next day we drove out of the Riverbead to Outjo, a city in Namibia where streetsellers sell Christmas ornaments made of stones or seeds and engraved with animals. We went to lunch at a restraunt where the waitress stood next to us picking her fingers. Mama went to the grocery store and there were only three shelves that were mostly bare. After that, we drove to Etosha. In Etosha, we saw a giraffe, and some ostriches. Springbok and kudus grazed in the grass, and a blockade of three cars were stopped on the road for a yellow hyenaish thing. Mama almost got out of the car to tell the blockade to move, but that would have been a bad mistake, because the yellow hyenaish thing was actually a female lion.

 

Can you see the lion?

It was almost dark when we got back, and if you get back after sunset, you aren’t allowed in. Once we set up the campsite, we set of for moringa waterhole, a man-made waterhole named after a succulent. When we got there, two rinos ambled out of the brush. One of them was very bossy and wouldn’t let any other rinos to come near the waterhole.

The bossy rinocerus drinking

We ran back to tell Daddy about the rinos. When he came to the waterhole, there were four rinos drinking. The bossy one fought with the other ones

The rinos fighting

The bossy rino wouldn’t let even a rabbit have a drink, so when the bossy rinocerus was distracted, the dachshunds that someone had let on the loose (these were realy jackals) and a hyena came to drink before the bossy rinocerus sent them away. After the bossy rinocerus went away, Sam got too tired to stay, so he and Mama left. After they left, a family of rinos came. The father went of to chase away the hyenas, wile the mother came to drink and the baby started nursing.

Nursing Baby

When the father failed in keeping the hyenas away, the mother put herself between the hyenas and the baby so the baby would be safe.

 

That morning we decided to stay with Paul Hoffman for 1 more night. Since Pipa’s tire popped, they drove to Khorixas, and we drove to the petrefied forest. It was a long drive to the petrefied forest and we saw elephant poop all over. At the petrefied forest, we found our guide, and he took us first to the welwitschias. There were petrefied logs from pine trees that grow in Arizona, Patagonia, and Madagascar. But they don’t grow in mainland africa anymore.

The biggest log

Lizard on a log turned to stone.

There were also a lot of lizards.

At the end of the tour, we went to the gift shop. There, Daddy bought a springbok horn beer opener and I bought a springbok jawbone. Sam bought a slingshot. On the way to the next campsite, we stopped by Khorixas to pick up Pipa and his family. There, I met two little kids who only spoke Afrikaans. On the way to the upper Huab river, we drove down a road where a herd of elephants had walked. There was poop, footprints, and nocked down trees everywhere. At the campsite we saw a magnificent view.

 

Veiw from our campsite.

 

 

the next morning we walked into the mountains. At the base of the mountains, Pipa and Alene turned back around, and we followed them. We got in the car and drove through the Huab Riverbead, looking for elephants the whole time. We stopped at a tiny settlement and bought a bracelet and a Namibian flag. We gave them a toy airplane. On the way to the other section of the Huab, we stopped at a place where Pipa had seen a cheetah. It looked like the American south-west, but it was really the African south-west. Here are some pictures…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the way to the upper Huab, the other car popped their tyre. We were in the barren Namib desert.

A bit of the barren desert

The tyre had to be replaced with another leaky tyre. We decided to turn back after that.

The dead beetles had been bleached by the sun.

On the way back, we drove through through the Huab Riverbead. Nocked down trees and elephant poop & footprints, but we didn’t see any elephants at all.

The Namib Desert