Hitting the beach at Walvis Bay

After continuing our ride along the northern fringes of the Namib Desert we arrived in Swakopmund. It was the first place in some 36h or so where we had a working mobile signal. We did some quick research on what there is actually to do on Walvis Bay and found out about a flamingo bay and some sort of peninsula worth checking out.

The first flamingos we spotted heading into the city. The city itself, hosting the second largest airport in the country, was an industrial hub hosting the most important harbour in the country where essentially all of the import and export was happening at. We didn't really warm up to the city, it had a very strange US vibe to it. Extremely wide roads, a ton of gas stations, indistinct architecture concepts.

The flamingos were cool, and we headed further toward the peninsula we had read about. On the way there we passed large salt pans, big pink basins where the sea water was evaporated to later harvest fresh sea salt. The salt industry seemed very big, but since we had never heard of Namibian sea salt we figured that it was most likely a local product that wasn't exported all the way to Europe.

At some point the road seemed to head directly into the ocean. It was a strange construction, with flamingos and other sea birds in the shallow waters on either side of us. Eventually, the road just stopped, close to where the raging ocean surf was battering the sand beach (it was high tide). One lonely fisherman's truck was parked at the dead end, but we spotted a lot of tracks leaving the tarred road and heading off towards the sandy beachland to either side of the track.

In the briefings we had received, we were told to reduce the tire air pressure to 1.5bar before entering deep sand. Deflating the tires increases the width and therefore traction on the sand. Our truck was well equipped, with pressure gauges, and even a mobile air compressor so we could inflate the tires ourselves after bashing some sand.

But... Neither of us felt like deflating the tires in the midday heat. I was driving at the time, and we both agreed to dig out the car in case we get stuck. I will admit, I was quite worried, if not afraid, to get stuck. Anne had more of a "let's just do it and deal with the fallout later" mentality, which did convince me to go off the road in 4WD, but I was extremely nervous. I did a quick trip down to the beach, while almost getting stuck on a small dune.

I decided that I had had enough and steered us straight back to the tar road - letting out a big sigh, grateful that we didn't get stuck. Anne, contrary to me, hadn't had enough. So we changed seats and she took the truck for a spin. She handled it gracefully and didn't get us stuck. It was a fun few minutes when we were gliding across the sand.

We had gotten hungry, though, and decided to head to the city for some lunch. On the way, we passed alongside some sort of algae fields, which was pretty interesting to look at and touch. Once we had stable signal again closer to the town, we quickly came to realize that a lot of the lunch places were closing at around 3pm. It was already 14:30...

I had selected one place that looked promising at our lunch destination, but we soon learned that the kitchen was officially closed. They did allow us to order a quick pizza though, so this became our lunch. Stuffed and with half a leftover pizza newly added to our fridge, we headed on toward Swakopmund.もっと詳しく