The first holidays

First of all, I want to clarify the expectations that the title of this entry may have created. No, we didn't go away, well sort of, but only for two nights. Despite being here for three weeks, we haven't really seen much of Namibia.

On Monday, September 3rd, the actual volunteer service will finally start, and school will resume after the winter holidays. We are all very excited about that.

Actually, I wanted to report on what we have done so far. The most exciting moments and experiences were probably visiting the small wildlife park near Windhoek and the short trip to Rehoboth.

Originally, we planned to visit the Etosha National Park during the holidays. However, since we are not the greatest planners, we had to quickly abandon this plan. After a (admittedly very last-minute) phone call, we found out that all camping sites were already fully booked.

So, we decided to explore Windhoek and its surroundings a bit more.

First, we planned to have a museum day and visit the National Art Gallery and the Independence Museum. In the end, we didn't manage to do that, but we did spend plenty of time at the National Art Gallery, which currently has an exhibition on the genocide of the Herero and Nama tribes by German colonial rulers.

On August 22nd, we put on our hiking shoes and packed sunscreen and a camera for our trip to the Dan Viljoen game reserve, which is about 20 minutes away from Windhoek. When we left the house, we luckily ran into our landlords, who quickly called two taxis for us and negotiated a fixed fare, which is rather unusual here. Thanks to this little help, we also had a safe way back home, which made us feel confident, as our previous volunteers had to hitchhike home a year ago.

As soon as we left the city, we saw the first animals on the roadside; some warthogs, antelopes, and a mother monkey carrying her baby on her back crossing the road right in front of us. When we entered the reserve's grounds, our taxi driver mentioned that we should have come earlier to see the animals at the watering holes, but we still got lucky and saw about seven giraffes standing less than 50 meters away from the road.

From the reception, we chose a short hiking trail of nine kilometers through the park, hoping to see more animals. Apart from some monkeys in the distance and a warthog, this hope didn't come true, but it was still a beautiful day. The landscape, the vastness, and the view of the mountains surrounding Windhoek and Windhoek itself rewarded the effort of the hike, which had some altitude differences and took place in the midday sun.

Tired from these efforts, we were happy to be back in the taxi, but also a bit sad that we didn't see any zebras. As we were leaving the premises, the taxi drivers suddenly stopped and asked us to get out. And so, we finally saw zebras and kudus in the distance, and everyone was highly satisfied as we could drive back home.

In the following days, we explored the nightlife of Windhoek and we always had visits from other Volunta volunteers who wanted to see Windhoek or simply felt lonely.

At a relatively short notice, we decided to drive to the nearby city of Rehoboth for two nights. It took about an hour by shuttle bus to get there. Once there, one of the local volunteers took us to the dam, a reservoir and hotel. Some did not miss the opportunity to take a short dip in the 12 degrees warm water while it was 20 degrees outside before we drove back home to admire the promised sunset.

The short stay in Rehoboth also had its educational aspects: warm showers are more pleasant than cold ones, like the ones we have at home in Windhoek. But also, paved roads and sidewalks are really comfortable and save some effort when cleaning.