Walvis Bay, Namibia

This is quite a modern town, but the main attraction is a very large lagoon which attracts birds at certain times of the year. Just our luck that there were no birds during our stay! After wandering around the town for twenty minutes, there really was nothing else to do but we were approached by some fellow passengers and asked if we would join them in hiring a taxi and visiting Dune 7, the highest sand dune in this part of the desert and also visiting Swakopmund, an old German colonial town located nineteen miles away. We agreed and six of us negotiated a four to five hours drive with Eugene, a taxi driver, at a cost of just over £5 each. Dune 7 is located just three miles outside of Walvis Bay and is situated by a small oasis in the desert. We parked at the foot of the dune, which is 167 meters high. We tried to climb a little way up but the sand was so hot that it was impossible. Down by the palm trees, we noticed some very large flying insects, which I did not recognise but turned out to be locusts. We continued driving through the desert on a good tarmac road to Swakopmund, which is located on the coast. The town is a strange mixture of African, German and English. The official language is English but many of the road signs and names of buildings are in German. It is quite an attractive town with some good quality shops and attractive buildings and an attractive sea front. We had lunch in a cafe with cold Windhoek brewed beer. We rejoined the taxi for our return journey, stopping off at one point where some of the others took a camel ride further into the desert and then back to Walvis Bay and the ship. This had been a fascinating day, much, much better than we had at first anticipated.Read more