Jemma and the cats having safely been packed off on a flight to Windhoek in the afternoon, Glenn and I packed up the rest of the stuff from the house into the car. Glenn had arranged for a friend of his to come round to collect the furniture that he had bought, although he turned up about 4 hours late. By this point we were sat on the floor with hardly anything left in the house. He came in and started loading everything onto his bukki with the help of his brother and 2 young boys. Whilst simultaneously asking me to be his wife (he actually already had a wife but his religion allows him to have more than one), he packed everything up and tried to haggle with Glenn for a few of the other things left. Finally when they had cleared everything and given up trying to buy the TV screen, they left us to it. There was nothing left except the airbed I was sleeping on and Glenn and Jem’s bed which was being left behind. Glenn and I headed off to our beds as we had an early start the next day.
At 2.30am my alarm went off, having had all of about 2 hours sleep. I got up, had a quick shower and crammed the rest of my stuff into the car. It was absolutely jammed full. After getting petrol and some drinks we set off on our long journey to Windhoek. I promptly fell asleep and woke up just as the sun was rising at about 6.30am. We stopped by the side of the road to have a toilet break and as I walked back to the car I noticed Glenn trying to remove a very brightly colored dead bird from the grill. He quickly told me to turn around so I wouldn’t have to watch the gruesome sight, then once all was sorted we set off again. Unlike the UK where there are towns and villages everywhere, Namibia has hundreds of kilometers of nothing but bush, so it is quite common to see people weeing at the side of the road as there’s nowhere else to go. Apparently it’s not rude to do it, but it’s rude to watch someone. It was quite a fun journey, we chatted a lot and I read my Harry Potter book which I was quite engrossed in by then. I certainly got to see a lot of Namibia. We stopped at one of the small towns called Rundu on the way to have breakfast. It was interesting to see how different the towns were compared to Katima, which really is the back of beyond. I took photos of a cow-pulled plough, a small boy rolling a tyre, the pottery markets all by the side of the road etc, pretty much all the things you wouldn’t see in England.
Our first planned stop we’d decided on was to see the Hoba meteorite near Grootfontein. After a good 8 hours of driving already behind us we started to draw near to the destination of it so took a slight detour from our journey to make this stop. It is the largest known meteorite in the world that is still in one piece. The crater it made is immense… it’s so big I didn’t notice that we were driving through it until Glenn pointed out that the valley we were in was formed by the collision. It was quite interesting to see, and being Africa there weren’t any restrictions so I happily went and stood on it.
At 2.30am my alarm went off, having had all of about 2 hours sleep. I got up, had a quick shower and crammed the rest of my stuff into the car. It was absolutely jammed full. After getting petrol and some drinks we set off on our long journey to Windhoek. I promptly fell asleep and woke up just as the sun was rising at about 6.30am. We stopped by the side of the road to have a toilet break and as I walked back to the car I noticed Glenn trying to remove a very brightly colored dead bird from the grill. He quickly told me to turn around so I wouldn’t have to watch the gruesome sight, then once all was sorted we set off again. Unlike the UK where there are towns and villages everywhere, Namibia has hundreds of kilometers of nothing but bush, so it is quite common to see people weeing at the side of the road as there’s nowhere else to go. Apparently it’s not rude to do it, but it’s rude to watch someone. It was quite a fun journey, we chatted a lot and I read my Harry Potter book which I was quite engrossed in by then. I certainly got to see a lot of Namibia. We stopped at one of the small towns called Rundu on the way to have breakfast. It was interesting to see how different the towns were compared to Katima, which really is the back of beyond. I took photos of a cow-pulled plough, a small boy rolling a tyre, the pottery markets all by the side of the road etc, pretty much all the things you wouldn’t see in England.
Our first planned stop we’d decided on was to see the Hoba meteorite near Grootfontein. After a good 8 hours of driving already behind us we started to draw near to the destination of it so took a slight detour from our journey to make this stop. It is the largest known meteorite in the world that is still in one piece. The crater it made is immense… it’s so big I didn’t notice that we were driving through it until Glenn pointed out that the valley we were in was formed by the collision. It was quite interesting to see, and being Africa there weren’t any restrictions so I happily went and stood on it.
After a few more hours of driving, lots of reading, smoking and chatting, we stopped off at a petrol station in Otavi to grab some more drinks and also see if we could find the camel farm I had heard about and wanted to see. It turns out it is not actually a farm but a private house who’s owner is particularly fond of stray animals. After some gentle persuasion from Glenn the manager of the petrol station rang the owner of the house and he agreed to meet us. He was a really lovely guy. He took us on a tour of his own garden and introduced us to all his animals. He liked to give them good homes if they were hurt etc so had gradually built up a small collection of strange pets. He first took us to see the blue wilder beast which was in a large enclosure with a zebra. He strolled right up to the fence and let us stroke him through the wire, but apparently the zebra had got very bad tempered over the years so we were advised not to attempt to touch him as well. The wilder beast was really friendly though and stayed next to us the whole time we were there, enjoying the attention. Next the man took us through his back garden to his huge beautiful house and introduced us to a mini deer like thing called a Duiker which was sitting in his kitchen. I thought it was a baby but apparently it was at it’s full size, they just really are that small. Next we headed out into the garden and saw two alpacas. They were a little scary due to them being as tall as me, and it seemed they weren’t that fond of me either. They let the man stroke them and seemed fine with Glenn but were wary of me. With some encouragement I shuffled up to one of them and attempted to stroke it, but he seemed more interested in my foot. I was wondering whether the alpaca would bite me when the man confirmed my theory by warning me not to let him sniff my foot. He showed us all around the rest of his animals which included some more deer like things and an ostrich or two then we thanked him and said our goodbyes. It was amazing that he’d just given two complete strangers a tour of his house and garden, especially as he refused to accept any money from us.
After a further 3 more or so hours of driving and the total now racking up to about 14 hours, I was starting to get rather bored and uncomfortable. It was definitely the best way to see Namibia as we drove straight from the northern most tip to the centre, but it was by far the longest drive I’d ever done, and I wasn’t even the one driving. I was relieved when we reached Otjiwarongo where we stopped to see the crocodile ranch, my patience with being in the car was quickly running out. I’d found this place in my Lonely Planet guide and thought it would be a good place to check out as I had never seen a full size crocodile before. All the ones I’d seen on the boat trip with Mum and Dick had been babies, although I was quite glad of this at the time. The ranch breeds the crocodiles to be used for meat and their skin, but also to help with the population as crocodiles are quite often poached or killed for fun. It is the only place in Namibia that breeds them so I thought it would be worth stopping there. I was expecting it to creep me out at first as I’m usually a bit funny about the subject of things being bred for meat etc, but it didn’t actually bother me and they seemed quite happy. We had a private tour around the ranch and the lady showed us the adult crocs which were immense. The thing that surprised me was how still they are; I thought they might be thrashing around a bit but they don’t move unless they’re attacking something or being fed. We were told all about the eggs they lay and their lifespan etc, then showed into a building where all the baby crocs were. There were hundreds off them. After the tour we had a look at some of the bags and other products made out of their skins and were also given a whole skin to hold. It was basically like leather but with a scaly pattern on. Glenn had ordered a crocodile steak on our way in so that we could take it with us to try. As soon as we got back to the car we had a mouthful each and surprisingly it tasted a lot like chicken. Aside from the thought of it, it was actually quite nice.
Back on the road again for another couple of hours we eventually started seeing signs of Windhoek. It looks a lot like Florida, very clean looking and all American style buildings. After the 16-17 hour drive it was nice to finally be nearing our destination. When we reached Glenn’s parents house we were greeted by Jemma, Glenn’s parents, Glenn’s sister and her two kids. It was lovely to meet them but also a little exhausting after such a long drive. We all ate dinner together and then crashed out for the night. We spent the next few days enjoying the civilisation of Windhoek compared to the bush of Katima, making the most of the malls, cinemas and bars, knowing that in a few more days we had another mega journey to do.
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