It is a cold, bitterly cold morning. Wrapped in coats, mufflers and wearing thick socks and gloves, we try to warm ourselves by wrapping our hands around our steaming mugs of coffee. With our teeth chattering, none of us are able to get much breakfast in. Winter nights and early mornings in the desert can be very cold-hard to imagine that as the sun comes up, we will be pulling off our layers of clothes as the day becomes hotter. Soon, only a T-shirt is bearable. The extremes of weather as can be experienced only in the desert.
We stop at the town of Solitaire-the smallest town in Namibia. At the only café in this town, we have the most divine apple crumble. The generous portion is welcome to make up for going without breakfast that morning.
The Tropic of Capricorn passes through Namibia and we cross this imaginary line on our way to the Walvis Bay.
On our way to the town of Swakopmund, we pass what is known as the moon landscape. The landscape is made up of eroded hills and valleys and is called the moon landscape because of its resemblance to the surface of the moon.
We drive into Walvis Bay and we could be forgiven to think that we are not in Namibia. Beautiful houses line both sides of the street-the style and colour very appealing to the eyes. The idea is to catch sight of some flamingoes that frequent the Walvis Bay but the thick mist that shrouds the town has probably driven the flamingoes away. It is difficult to see much further than 10 metres across the Atlantic Ocean.
Our destination for the day is Swakopmund, a town in western Namibia. When our truck enters the town, I get a feeling of déjà vu as if I were in Munich, Germany. The town has a very German feel to it with brightly painted houses and bakeries with names like Konditorei- a relic of its German colonizers. The name Swakopmund is German for “mouth of the Swakop”. The Swakop is a major river in the western part of Namibia and it reaches the sea at the southern edge of the town of Swakopmund.
We stay at Villa Weise-not a very comfortable place. But we are focused on planning our itinerary so as to make the best use of the time that we have left on the trip. Tomorrow is our last day in Swakopmund and in Namibia. After depositing our luggage in our rooms, we head out to explore the town. The fog that we had encountered in Walvis Bay follows us here. We decide to grab a cup of coffee at the Swakopmund café as much to really have coffee as to get out of the cold. The spinach quiche at the café is very delicious and so are the scones.
That night, while going out for dinner, we walk in a group; Jojo tells us that it is advisable to not walk about alone at night. Our group is the only people that we see for most of the way to the restaurant. What a marked contrast to Mumbai in India or even Cairo in Egypt, where I am presently living-there are always so many people around.
My fellow diners sample the oryx and the springbok meat for dinner; Adi and I stick to a pasta and pizza fare. Being vegetarian in Namibia is proving to be quite a challenge!
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