Day 113 Sea Day and Namibia

WALVIS BAY, NAMIBIA
Named for the whales that lured fishing vessels to its plankton-rich waters, Walvis Bay, or "Whale Bay" in English, enjoys a deep harbor and bthe protection of the Pelican Point sand spit. The port was long valued by explorers making their way around the Cape of Good Hope, but it was the British who occupied it by 1884 and eventually incorporated it into their Cape Colony. Today, Walvis Bay is the gateway to the rich culture of Swakopmund, where German architecture recalls the settlers supported by the Kaiser. Natural beauty can be admired here: The coast is awash in golden dunes spilling over from the Namib Desert. Walvis Bay, Namibia.
“The Namib Naukluft Park is a national park in western Namibia, situated between the coast of the Atlantic Ocean and the edge of the Great Escarpment. It encompasses part of the Namib Desert (considered the world's oldest desert), the Naukluft mountain range, and the lagoon at Sandwich Harbour.
The region is characterised by high, isolated inselbergs and kopjes (the Afrikaans term for rocky outcrops), made up of dramatic blood-red granites, rich in feldspars and sandstone. The easternmost part of the park covers the Naukluft Mountains. More moisture comes in as a fog off the Atlantic Ocean than falls as rain, with the average of 106 millimeters of rainfall per year concentrated in February and April.
The winds that bring in the fog are also responsible for creating the park's towering sand dunes, whose burnt orange color is a sign of their age. The orange color develops over time as iron in the sand is oxidized, like rusty metal; the older the dune, the brighter the color. These dunes are the tallest in the world, in places rising more than 300 meters (almost 1000 feet) above the desert floor. The dunes taper off near the coast, and lagoons, wetlands, and mudflats located along the shore attract hundreds of thousands of birds.
'Namib' means "open space", and the Namib Desert gave its name to form Namibia – "land of open spaces". We arrived in walvis Bay, Namibia at 2:00 pm and we lined up to go into the Star Theater at 2:30 and were not the first to clear customs. We waited for Heather and were interviewed by Namibia TV. We were greeted by local dancers at the port and boarded an off road vehicle for our sunset excursion in the desert. We stopped at the Goanikontes-Oasis and walked around for a time seeing their set up including a children’s petting zoo, play ground, etc. The we continued our adventure to the spot we were entertained by dancers, percussion band and singing. Our cruise director danced with the locals and we climbed to the top of the hills for the best pictures of the area. Were served cheese and crackers and wine and beer before returning to the ship for dinner. Namibia was so clean and had lovely housing near the Port and along the road ways.Les mer