So Shashi motors on further north! We camped at the epic Fish River canyon, which is just HUGE! It's the first canyon either of us have ever seen, and we can both see what all the fuss is about
From there we drove on to the Namib desert for a full (gruelling) day through the changing landscape. It's so barren out here, in some places there is just nothing but dust forever! Eventually we made it to the center, and the monster dunes of Sossusvlei...
We camped again in the middle of nowhere and were up at 'the crack of the crack' of dawn to climb dune 45. Ouch! At first sight it didn't look so tough - I think I even heard someone say as much as the went sprinting past me to try and be the first person up to the top - hahahaha... we were all totally f***ed in about 10 minutes! It's 1000 feet of loose sand, and at 5.30 in the morning that's a whole lot'a sand! Anyway, eventually we made it to the top just in time for sunrise, and it was pretty spectacular Later in the same day we went out into the dunes with a local bushman who showed us how they find their way about the place (which all just looks the same to you and me) and even managed to track down a few sleeping creepy-crawlies for us to see. The highlight of the walk was the alien landscape of Dead Vlei... For anyone who's ever seen that movie 'The Cell', it's the weird desert location in it. It's a 900 year old dried up desert lake, and it somehow still has loads of eerie looking dead trees all over the place. I loved it
Anyway, we continued on - passed the Tropic of Capricorn...
...and we're actually in Swakopmund at the moment, resisting the urge to blow our budget and go skydiving! Tomorrow we head off for Etosha, and get to see our first glimpses of the Namibian wildlife
Alex & Jinnie