The title of this blog post may seem a little strange, as it comes from a book in the Hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy series, but is not out of place. First: it relates to my last days in Namibia, for this time. Secondly: it was fish that first brought me to Namibia. Third: Namibia really has good seafood! 

Along the Namibian coastline runs the Benguela current with cold oxygen-rich waters from the antarctic ocean. This, along with the earths circular movements, causes deeper water to rise up along the coast and where the water masses meets, it gives life to an abundance of sea-living species, as plankton, shrimp, lots of fish species, seals, dolphins, whales, birds and even penguins.

You might not think that penguins live in warm Africa, but where I used to live, we had a small fenced-in area next door, where my colleagues kept a few injured penguins that they wanted to rescue. I the sea, 30 meters from my terrace, were seals floating around, waving their loafers in the sun. Down by the jetty were large white cormorant birds, beautiful to look at, and I got to visit fish farms with abalone and oysters, participate in lobster fishing, tuna monitoring and later on go fishing for hake, monkfish and horse mackerel.
When I was at the boat, I could sometimes see whales far away or herds of dolphins playing right in front of the boat. 

You can read more about some of my experiences along the southern coast of Namibia if you read my blog about Lüderitz and Kolmanskop.

Once I sat at the edge of a beach in Stomvogelbucht. My father had left and my husband had still not arrived. It was only me and our 2 year old boy, which were sleeping in the car, so I felt quite sad and lost. Out of the ocean came two dolphins, swimming around as if to cheer me up. It was as if the had felt my loneliness and wanted to comfort me. It was really nice. 

When you go to Namibia, you might not experience going out fishing, even though there is a lot of fishing spots in Swakopmund and Henties bay, where you can go angling from the beach. However, you will probably get served wonderful fish and seafood at the restaurants. Especially in coastal towns like Lüderitz, Walvis Bay, Swakopmund and Henties Bay.

You can read more about food in my blogpost from Swakopmund and Walvis Bay

Travelling along the B1, northways from Ketmanshoop

We did not expect much from our last days in Namibia, as we should be spending most of the time in our car, driving almost 700 km along the straight but tarred B4 and B1 from Fish river Canyon passing Keetmanshoop and further on almost to Windhoek, where our plane would leave back home the next day. I must say that we were pleasantly surprised.

Even though we dropped visiting Quiver tree forest and Giants playground, right east of Keetmanshoop (which I would advise first-time travellers to see), we used most of the day in the car. It was a beautiful drive.

I had one goal on the way: to see if we could get hold of a circular Springbok carpet, as we had got 26 years back, in the Kalkrand area, but chances of somebody handcrafting and selling these along the roads nowadays seemed scarce. However, I was lucky. Around 40 km north of Kalkrand, we found a lady selling beautiful handcrafted springbok products. We were really happy to get the carpet and she was happy that we bought it, as we were the only customers that day. 

Last night at Auas Safari Lodge

We had booked an overnight stay at Auas safari lodge, just an hour south of Windhoek, to be on the safe side of arriving to the airport, even if something happened to the car. We knew it had a pool, food and relatively good reviews, but not really much more. To get there we turned off the B1 road at Aris and drove for some time on a sandy and some places quite rugged road, where several rivers had crossed, picking up a local hitchhiker along the way. We were happy that the rain had still not started pouring. We were welcomed by really nice people, and it showed up that they had a small waterhole, with beautiful birds, including a Grey Heron, that I could watch from the pool area. Before dinner we saw rainclouds forming in the sunset and lightening in the dark skies. Really stunning to watch.

When time came for dinner they had set two tables, with white clothes on, facing the waterhole. We were only two couples there that night. While eating, we suddenly saw animals coming. First a Springbok, then a herd of Sable Antelopes (which is one of my favorites) and even a Waterbuck. What a treat on our last night in Namibia!

The last day, i spent with the pool, while my husband did sound recordings. I also tried to catch a photo of one of the really beautiful birds of Namibia, the Lilac-Breasted Roller. It is a small bird, and I’ve mostly seen it sitting still, on top of a tree, or similar. I have thus seen its lilac breast, but I have never seen it flying, which was amazing. The blue color of its wings was just so amazing. I’m not a trained bird photographer and to autofocus on a bird flying so quick is not easy, if you don’t know the direction it will fly in. Some of the photos are thus not clear, but I still add them here, so that you can see this birds amazing colors.

The last part of the road, from Auas Safari lodge to the WDH airport was much easier than what we had foreseen, as it was only a small stretch (16 km) on gravel road. When reaching the C23, it was a smooth tarred road and we arrived safely to the airport, without a single blasted tyre on the way.

We will come back, if we find a way. So long, and thanks for all….