WELCOME TO NAMIBIA!
After collecting your rental car at the Hosea Kutako Airport (about 45 minutes outside Windhoek), you drive into the capital city to your hotel.
In the afternoon you can explore this interesting city that still has many traces of its German past, visiting famous buildings like the Old Fort, the Tintenpalast, the Independence Memorial Museum or the Church of Christ (Christuskirche). You could also undertake a guided tour to Kathatura township, which is a fascinating, humbling and eye opening experience or go shopping along Independence Avenue. Of course you can also just relax in the guest house’s pool, which is heated by a natural thermal spring.
For dinner (not included) we recommend Joe’s Beerhouse with its special atmosphere for some local culinary delights.
During the drive south, you will already get an impression of the vastness of the country. You travel via Rehoboth and Kalkrand to your lodge on the C20 between Stampriet and Mariental. Between Rehoboth and Kalkrand you will cross the Tropic of Capricorn. Your lodge is situated in a private 10 000ha nature reserve with three different ecosystems: savannah, dry river beds with riverine bush and red Kalahari sand dunes. Wildlife that can be seen in the nature reserve includes giraffe, zebra, big and small antelope, wildebeest and various small cats.
We suggest that you book an optional guided nature drive at Anib Lodge before you continue your journey. Today you continue in a southerly direction to the Fish River Canyon area. On the way you could visit the Quiver Tree Forest near Keetmanshoop. The Tree Aloes which grow here are called Quiver Trees because they were used by the Bushmen to make cases for their poisonous arrows.
After breakfast you first travel to the view sites above the Fish River Canyon before continuing to the edge of the Namib Desert. Here you can truly experience the breathtaking vastness of this canyon. Thereafter the journey continues past Seeheim to the Aus area.
After breakfast you continue to Lüderitz, the interesting desert harbour town. Soon after leaving Aus you will arrive at the entrance to the Restricted Area, where diamonds used to lie around like pebbles. Just past Aus you will also pass a desert waterhole where not only the elegant Oryx antelope but also Wild Horses survive. During the morning you will reach Lüderitz - an Oasis on the cold the Atlantic Ocean. In the afternoon you should visit the Diaz Cross, erected in 1488 by Portuguese explorers.
As you leave Lüderitz you should go on an optional guided tour of Kolmanskop (must be booked in Lüderitz), the desert ghost town which arose in the beginning of the previous century, after diamonds were discovered here. The tour is both fascinating and eye-opening!
After departing Kolmanskop, you continue on a long dusty road, towards Helmeringhausen. Here you can really experience the grandiose landscape of Namibia, especially along the Tiras Mountains, with their strange rock formations.
After a leisurely breakfast you continue towards Sossusvlei. En route you could make a short stop at Duwisib Castle, which Captain Wolf built in 1904 “in the middle of nowhere”.
The next morning (day 8) you depart before sunrise to the Namib Naukluft National Park, where you can also climb one of the huge dunes. From the Park entrance it is around 65km to the parking area among the dunes, from where you could optionally take a 4x4 transfer for the remaining 5km to Sossusvlei - the dried-up swamp area of the Tsauchab River. Afterwards you should still visit the Sesriem Canyon, where the river has washed a deep gorge into the countryside. The afternoon is spent at your leisure.
Today you drive over the Ghaub and Kuiseb Passes and through the Namib Desert to the coastal town of Walvis Bay, where the waves of the cold Atlantic Ocean crash onto the hot sand and where most mornings everything is shrouded in mist.
From Walvis Bay you continue along the coast to Swakopmund, where many buildings from the German colonial past remain. For dinner (not included), we recommend the Station Grill in the historic old station or the well-known “Cape To Cairo” restaurant in the Hotel Grüner Kranz, where you can experience an interesting cross-section of African cuisine.
The whole day is at your leisure. You could simply enjoy the sun on the beach – swimming in the sea is only for the very brave, as the Atlantic Ocean could even be a few degrees colder than the North Sea. You could also go shopping at the excellent shops in town and buy some Namibian ‘veldskoene’ or a safari suit, or you could take a walk around this interesting town. If you prefer, you could optionally go on a sight-seeing flight over the desert in a light aircraft, or you could go dune-boarding or even quad-biking in the desert.
Just beyond Henties Bay, north of Swakopmund, your route swings inland toward Uis and you once again drive through the barren Namib Desert. If the seal colony at Cape Cross interests you, you could first make a detour to Cape Cross (±53km each way), before continuing to Uis. On your way to Twyfelfontein you will pass the Brandberg, Namibia’s highest mountain.
Before leaving Twyfelfontein you should visit the ancient rock art of the San People near the lodge. What makes the Twyfelfontein site unique, is that these people did not paint their world as the Bushmen did, but that they chiseled it into stone. Near Twyfelfontein you can also view the basalt “organ pipes” of the Burnt Mountain (not to be confused with the Brandberg), as well as the Petrified Forest, where giant trees were washed down from Central Africa in a great flood and later turned to stone.
Thereafter you continue to the Etosha area via Outjo. We suggest that you make a small detour to the mysterious Vingerklip monolith, where you could have lunch (not included) at the nearby Vingerklip Lodge. As you approach the Vingerklip you will also have good views onto the Ugab Terraces with their strange flat-topped mountains. After lunch you then continue on a leisurely drive to the area just south of the Etosha National Park, where you will spend the next night.
It is suggested you leave very early for the Etosha National Park, so that you can be at the entrance gate when it is opened at sunrise. In this way you can then also be at the famous waterhole of the Okaukuejo Rest Camp very early. You spend the rest of the day in the park with its great variety of wild animals and its shimmering salt-pans. In the afternoon start heading East towards Namutoni Camp, which used to be an old German Fort, before exiting the park. Your accommodation is on the park boundaries, very close to the van Lindequest gate,
No plastic bags allowed in all Namibian National Parks!
Today you start heading south again as you travel towards Tsumeb. On the way you pass Lake Otjikoto which was formed when the “roof” of a dolomite cave collapsed. In the 1st World War German soldiers made use of this lake to dump some of their equipment, much of which was raised again and can now be seen in the Tsumeb Museum.
From Tsumeb you continue via Otavi in the direction of the Waterberg Plateau National Park, where a project to protect some of the endangered species of Namibia has been started. This national park is at the top of a mountain, and well-known for the rock formations found there.
After breakfast you travel back in the direction of Windhoek to a guesthouse situated between the city and airport. Here you have a final opportunity to relax with Namibian hospitality before your flight home.
Today you drive to the Hosea Kutako Airport to drop off your rental car and to check in for your flight.
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