What a treat to see Namibia again! Outside the airport, the landscape was shining green and bright due to all the rain that had arrived the last month. Quite a different view to what I have seen before. We picked up our rental car and headed for the city of Windhoek.

Windhoek

Windhoek is a beautiful, quiet city, with shops, parks, business centres and restaurants. In the middle of the city is a pedestrian street, where you can see several of the rocks from the Gibeon meteorite shower.

The Zoo park

Is a quiet green lung in the city centre, where people gather to talk, play and rest below the large trees. It has a cafe and a very nice playground that children and their parents can enjoy. Some of the toys have been there for more than 25 years but are still in good shape and brings much joy. For our son, the highlight of a trip to Windhoek used to be riding at the horse in the Zoo park. I wish they could build similar ones in Norway.

Meeting friends

In Windhoek we eventually got to meet my dear friend K. and her family. She was our neighbour in Lűderitz and her son Peinge Nakale used to be playing with our oldest son. He is now working as a photographer, videographer and artist and is soon finished with studies at College of arts in Windhoek.

K. took us to a wonderful Angolan/Portuguese restaurant in the eastern part of the city, where we got to enjoy their company and lovely seafood.

On the way to Okaukuejo

The B1 road from Windhoek to Etosha is tarred and straight. On the way you pass the city of Okaukuejo, with its nice outdoor craft market, and the cities of Otjiwarongo and Outjo. In Okaukuejo we almost got into a fight with some parking attendants, which we had given some money to look after our car while shopping at the market. We only had a 50 NAD note, which apparently was too much. Thus more of the people around wanted a piece of the note, that the man we had given it to had received. An advice is thus to make sure to have some smaller notes or coins to give parking attendants before you park.

Etosha

As the Anderson gate was refurbished, we stopped inside the gate to get our car checked and papers signed. No loose plastic bags are allowed in the park. We got a paper showing what we should pay in park fee, which we then did at the first rest camp, Okaukuejo when checking in.

As it has been raining a lot lately, it was not much animals on our drive to the camp (we did a small detour) and the roads were very slippery. However, we saw a large rhino, some springbucks ans an Oryx antelope along the way. At Okaukuejo, we saw the sunset over the waterhole and a few impalas. as it is so much water all around the park, the animals are more scattered and does not migrate as much to the waterholes, as they normally would do. It is however greener than we have ever seen it here and the ground is covered with green plants and flowers.