Ahhh Swakopmund...located along the infamous Skeleton Coast and the adventure capital of Namibia. Though this small German established town is located in the middle of nowhere it offers activities like skydiving, sandboarding, and quadbiking to name a few. For me, one of the most exciting things about the town is that we had our first opportunity to do laundry, "YAY"!
Normally laundry wouldn't excite me but when you're stuck on a 24-seater bus filled with twenty-four people you begin to worry about stinking out your neighbor especially when you've been busy with some of our activities.
Prior to Swakopmund we were busy hiking around the Fish River Canyon, Namibia's version of the Grand Canyon. We also spent time in the Sossusvlei which is in the heart of the Namib Desert and is a huge clay pan, enclosed by giant sand dunes. Some of these are, at a height of 300 metres, the highest in the world. One of our mornings had a very, very early morning wake up in order for us to hike a 120m (396ft) sand dune, the infamous Dune 45 where we watched a spectacular sunrise. Hiking a steep gradient in loose sand will really get your heartrate going, especially at 5:30 in the morning!
On our desert bushwalk in Sossuvlei we learned about the shifting of the sands by wind and the formation of the salt pans. It was after climbing a high dune that our guide taught us how to 'frolick' down the dune face. He demonstrated with a perfect interpretation of a kangaroo springing down the dune face, about 1m or 3ft off the ground. None of us could achieve his height or his grace but what a reward it was after the uphill hike! Some of the guys simply rolled into a ball and plopped their way down while poor Jenny tripped halfway and tumbled to the bottom to arrive COMPLETELY covered from head to toe in brilliant red sand. After our exploration of the dunes and the salt pan we made our return (all 24 of us were crammed into the back of a mini pickup truck like cattle on the way to slaughter!) but only after our guide showed us dancing for good nights sleep: complete stillness of the upper torso while the hips wiggle back and forth to the beat of the snapping fingers. Who knew it would leave such an impression on us and we would continue to use those moves on the dancefloor for the rest of our time in Africa.
