Swakopmund & Sossusvlei
Accommodated Adventure

Day 1: Thursday Windhoek – Hotel A La Mer, Swakopmund – 420 km
You will be collected from your accommodation within the Windhoek city limits at 07:15 and transferred to Chameleon Safaris Head Office for a short pre-departure meeting.
We first drive north via the small town of Okahandja, but soon we head west, past the tiny centres of Karibib and Usakos, to the port town of Walvis Bay. The edge of Africa and the Skeleton Coast. Walvis Bay lagoon is an internationally recognised Ramsar site (Convention on Wetlands of International Importance Especially as Waterfowl Habitat) and is justly renowned for its birdlife. Flamingo, pelican, African oyster catcher and turnstone, to name but a few of the more than 50 bird species occurring here. This, along with other aquatic fauna, including bottlenose and Heaviside dolphins, humpbacked and southern right whales, ocean sunfish, and Cape fur seals, all add up to make Walvis Bay lagoon a wetland wonderland.

In particular, we are here to see the flamingos, which are usually abundant and found within easy photo distance from the shore. There are two types of flamingo to see, lessor and greater, and they accumulate here because Namibia’s Atlantic coast is abundant with both phytoplankton and zooplankton. Flamingos do not enjoy a solid diet; they live on microorganisms such as plankton and are filter feeders, much like oysters. They rinse the seawater through their beaks, and tiny filaments filter out the nutrients as it swishes by. Flamingos are unable to eat unless their heads are fully inverted, and, while feeding, they walk around in a circle, stirring the sand and mud with their feet to release the nutrients. Certain types of these microorganisms turn reddish-pink when they die, which accounts for the pink colour of the birds.

Flamingos do not breed in Walvis Bay. The tides here are not usually very steep, but occasional spring tides can bring deeper waters, and this is not suitable for the specialised nest constructed by the birds. Flamingos build a nest, called a cone, out of sand and mud, which has a hollow top into which they lay a single egg. This cone is designed to keep the egg out of the water, and so a tidal environment does not work. Instead, vast flocks of birds typically head for the Etosha Pan or the Makgadikgadi Pan in Botswana for breeding. Both these mineral pans are seasonal and are usually dry, but can flood when there is sufficient rain. It is still not fully understood how flamingos determine when there has been suitable rainfall in these relatively distant catchment areas. Still, somehow they do know, and they leave the coast in great flocks that streak the horizon pink as they head inland.

We complete the final leg of our journey to Swakopmund and check into our accommodation at the centrally located Hotel A La Mer. Swakopmund is a fascinating place, to say the least, founded by Captain Kurt von François of the Imperial German colonial army in 1892. (He also founded Windhoek in 1890). It is bounded to the north, the east and the south by the mighty dunes of the Namib Desert and to the west by the Atlantic Ocean. There are still many examples of colonial German architecture to be seen, and the German language remains widely spoken. Swakopmund offers numerous opportunities to keep us busy during our stay. The town centre is small and easily explored on foot, but there are also many extra, optional activities available. Scenic flights over the desert are very popular, and for the more adventurous, consider trying skydiving or quad biking over and within the Namib dunes. Our guide will discuss all the options with you in advance and will be able to facilitate any bookings that we would like to make.

Dinner tonight is for your own account. Swakopmund boasts some truly excellent restaurants, and again, our guide will be able to help you with recommendations and bookings.

Accommodation: Twin share rooms, en-suite bathroom
Meals: Lunch

Day 2: Friday Swakopmund – Accommodation, near Sesriem – 350 km
We have the option to have a more leisurely start this morning, as we are only leaving Swakopmund in the mid-morning. If you choose not to have a lie-in, then Swakopmund offers many opportunities to keep us busy during our morning here. The town centre is small and easily explored on foot, but there are also many extra, optional activities available. For those with a love of adrenaline, quad biking and sandboarding are also very popular if you fancy careering down the slip face of a dune at 60 km per hour. Our guide will discuss all the options with you in advance and will be able to facilitate any bookings that we would like to make.

Departing Swakopmund at 11h30, we head east into the desert. We first cross the Namib gravel plains, large areas of flat and seemingly barren terrain broken up by huge mountain inselbergs. We have two mountain passes to traverse this afternoon, the first is the mighty Kuiseb Pass, and we follow the road from the top of the hills, dropping steeply down into the canyon carved over aeons by the Kuiseb River on its way to debouch into the ocean at the port town of Walvis Bay. We climb up from the banks of the river and over the pass, travelling through the mountain peaks and on to the second, smaller canyon of the Gaub River, a tributary of the Kuiseb. We emerge from the mountains onto a flat road, and almost immediately we cross the Tropic of Capricorn at 23.5 degrees south. There is a signpost at this auspicious spot, and we stop along the road for photos. Onwards again to our destination for today. We aim to arrive in the late afternoon, and there will be time for a short walk to see the sun dip below the impressive Naukluft Mountains.

Accommodation: Twin share, en-suite bathroom (Desert Camp, Desert Quiver Camp)
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Day 3: Sossusvlei – 120 km
Getting into the dune area as early as possible this morning is our aim, and that means a pre-dawn start and breakfast on the go. As we are staying outside the national park, we will enter the dune area as soon as the gate opens at sunrise.
The best time to photograph the dunes is around sunrise and sunset. This is when you can see towering dunes illuminated a glowing orange, apricot red on one side and swathed in shadow on the other. The depth of field is spectacular at this time of day. From Sesriem, we cover the 60 km into the dunes quickly and arrive at the 2×4 car park where all 2-wheel drive vehicles have to stop. From here, we enter the ancient Tsauchab River-bed for the last 5km leg to Sossusvlei itself.

The Tsauchab River is ephemeral; it only flows seasonally, when there is enough rain, and for the most part, the riverbed is dry. Aeons ago, during these rare floods, the Tsauchab sometimes received enough water to flow all the way to the Atlantic Ocean. However, as the millennia passed and the dune fields began to form (around five million years ago), wind-blown sand invaded the riverbeds. The rivers became more and more constricted by sand, until eventually the occasional floods could not break through the sand barriers that the wind had erected. The valley we drove along this morning to get here is kept free of sand by the Tsauchab, but Sossusvlei is now at the end of the water. Sossusvlei still occasionally floods (perhaps once every decade). After good rains in the Naukluft Mountains, where the river originates, Sossusvlei can become inundated, and the resulting lake can persist for many months. However, the river can no longer find its original path to the Atlantic.

There is a 4×4 shuttle service that will transport us through the sandy terrain of the riverbed. We will visit Dead Vlei, an ancient pan surrounded by dunes, which is strikingly populated with dead, skeletal camel thorn trees. These trees have been a feature of this landscape for over 1000 years. Sossusvlei is almost surrounded by dunes, just one narrow path kept open by the Tsauchab River. We have time to explore the area on foot and to climb one of the highest dunes in the world, some towering 300 m above us; the views are breathtaking and justly famous. We drive back the way we came (there is only one road), stopping at the iconic Dune 45 (so named as it is 45 km from Sesriem. There is time to climb Dune 45 if you still have energy, or sitting in the shade at the base of the dune will suffice.

Driving back to Sesriem, we take a short excursion to see the Sesriem Canyon. Only four km from Sesriem, this canyon has been carved out of the landscape by the Tsauchab River. Approximately two million years ago, a period of intense cold known as an ice age occurred in Europe. This caused glaciers to form and led to a global decline in sea level. The knock-on effect of this at Sesriem Canyon was that it increased the length and water flow of the Tsauchab River. This greater force of water allowed the Tsauchab to begin cutting through the terrain, resulting in the canyon we can see today. We can easily walk into the riverbed, it is usually much cooler in the canyon, and we can follow the river for some way along its journey to Sossusvlei. We head back to our accommodation in the late afternoon.

Accommodation: Twin share, en-suite bathroom (Desert Camp, Desert Quiver Camp)
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Day 4: Sunday – Windhoek – 320 km
Today is our last day, but excitement is still on the menu. We head back to Solitaire, and our guide will get us a sample of the apple pie that has made this homestead famous.

There is some lovely mountain scenery on our drive back to Windhoek. The road climbs up onto and over Namibia’s central plateau, and we return to Windhoek via the small community of BűellsPort and the small town of Rehoboth. We arrive mid-afternoon and will be dropped off at the accommodation of our choice within Windhoek city limits.

Accommodation: None
Meals: Breakfast