Swakopmund & Spitzkoppe 🇳🇦

After the desert, we went back to a city. The excitement over having a proper bed and spending 2 nights in the same place at a hostel in civilization was high. On the way there, we made a quick stop in Walvis Bay to see flamingos. Everyone who knows me can imagine how excited I was and how big my grin was. We then continued on to Swakopmund. After a brief briefing on what we could do, we strolled into the city. However, we quickly noticed that not much was happening here. Almost everything was closed and it was quite deserted. So we headed to the beach and dipped our feet into the Atlantic. On the way back, we found a local market with souvenirs. But the vendors were all so pushy that we didn't stay too long. Women from indigenous tribes were also present at the market, which shocked Steven when he saw that the women sat there without any tops. After that shock, we all needed some coffee. Unfortunately, it wasn’t that easy because everything was closed. After half an hour of searching, we found a small café along the beachfront. In the evening, we all went out for dinner and enjoyed a private concert from a local a cappella group. After that, we held our own concerts at karaoke. The next morning, right after breakfast, we headed back to the desert for sandboarding. We spent our morning there until we were covered in sand. But we had an incredible amount of fun! I can hardly wait for winter now. We also had lunch and earned a beer in the desert. After that, we headed back to the city. Unfortunately, one of our group members injured herself while going down the dunes and decided that she should have it checked out at the hospital. We ended up spending the rest of the day there. I felt really sorry for her, but what could be better for a nurse than to visit a hospital in another country? It was really interesting to see how things worked there. Thankfully, we had the owner of the sandboarding company with us as a local, because otherwise, I honestly think nothing much would have happened. She was able to share many interesting stories with us while we waited. After we took care of all the health-related issues, we were all super hungry and went out to eat together as a group. Since you can really still sense the German influence in Swakopmund, be it in the street names, house signs, flags, and architecture, we also went to a German restaurant. It was probably a bit strange and unfortunately, not very good. But, well, it was worth the experience. The next morning, we had free time until we moved on. Since the doctor at the hospital was a bit strange and told Miriam she had to come back to his office to pay before we left, we, of course, did that. In this hospital, there was a doctor for locals and one for tourists. So we went back to the tourist doctor to pay. After that, we got some coffee and slowly strolled back through the city. Until the end, I must honestly say I didn’t quite warm up to this city. The atmosphere was totally odd and there was still a lot of German war influence. We saw not just once a picture of Hitler or other signs of World War II. So we weren’t too offended to move on. We went to the northernmost point of Namibia for this trip, to Spitzkoppe. To get there, you have to pass through a few villages, which was unfortunately quite sad to see. But the campsite was just perfect. For miles around, nothing but red sand and perfectly shaped red sandstone formations and mountains. We all set off together for an exploration tour and were shown by a local a small tour, where we could see rock paintings from 4000 years ago. After a really good dinner and a brief spider incident, Katie, Tom, Anni, and I decided to sleep under the stars that night. We carried our mattresses up a hill and slept there. Unfortunately, it was a bit cloudy when we fell asleep but were awakened by the starry sky and moon at 5 AM. That was definitely a night I won’t forget quickly. We enjoyed breakfast there and then moved on to the next adventure! 🫶🏼