13 Day Skeleton Coast, Sossusvlei, Canyons & Naankuse Volunt

We will be collected from the Hosea Kutako International Airport on arrival and transferred to Chameleon Backpackers in Windhoek. Depending on our arrival time, we may have the opportunity to join an afternoon City & Township Tour at your own cost, choose to relax by the pool or take a short walk into the city centre to collect supplies. Tonight’s meal is at own expense in one of the many restaurants in Windhoek or order in and enjoy the evening at the Chameleon Backpackers’ bar before having an early night in preparation for the next 7 days exploring Southern Namibia.

You will be collected from your accommodation within the Windhoek city limits at 07:15 and transferred to Chameleon Safaris Head Office for a short pre-departure meeting. We first drive north via the small town of Okahandja, but soon we are heading west, past the tiny centres of Karabib and Usakos, to the port town of Walvis Bay. The edge of Africa and the Skeleton Coast. Walvis Bay lagoon is an internationally recognised Ramsar site, (Convention on Wetlands of International Importance Especially as Waterfowl Habitat) and is justly renowned for its birdlife. Flamingo, pelican, African oyster catcher and turnstone to name but a few of the more than 50 bird species occurring here. This with other aqua fauna including bottlenose and Heaviside dolphins, humpbacked and southern right whales, ocean sunfish and Cape fur seals all add up to make Walvis Bay lagoon a wetland wonderland.In particular, we are here to see the flamingos which are usually abundant and found within easy photo distance from the shore. There are two types of flamingo to see, lessor and greater and they accumulate here because Namibia’s Atlantic coast is abundant with both phytoplankton and zoo plankton. Flamingos do not enjoy a solid diet, they live on micro-organisms such as plankton and they are filter feeders, almost like an oyster. They rinse the seawater through their beaks and tiny filaments filter out the nutrients as it swishes by. Flamingos are unable to eat unless their heads are fully inverted and, while feeding, they walk around in a circle stirring the sand and mud with their feet to release the nutrients. Certain types of these micro-organisms turn reddish pink when they die and this accounts for the pink colour of the birds. Flamingos do not breed in Walvis Bay. The tides here are not usually very steep, but occasional spring tides can bring deeper waters and this in not suitable for the specalised nest constructed by the birds. Flamingos build a nest, called a cone, out of sand and mud which has a hollow top into which they lay a single egg. This cone is designed to keep the egg out of the water and so a tidal environment does not work. Instead, for breeding, huge flocks of birds head typically for the Etosha Pan or to the Makgadikgadi Pan in Botswana. Both these mineral pans are seasonal and are usually dry but can flood when there is sufficient rain. It is still not properly understood how the flamingos know when there has been suitable rain fall in these relatively far away catchment areas, but somehow they do know and they leave the coast in great flocks that streek the horizon pink as head inland. We complete the final leg of our journey into Swakopmund and we check into our accommodation at the centrally located Hotel A La Mer. Swakopmund is an interesting place to say the least, founded by Captain Kurt von François of the imperial colonial army of the German empire in 1892. (He also founded Windhoek in 1890). It is bounded to the north, the east and the south by the mighty sand dunes of the Namib Desert and to the west by the Atlantic Ocean. There are still many examples of colonial German architecture to be seen and the German language is still widely used. Swakopmund offers many opportunities to keep us busy during our time here. The town centre is small and easily explored on foot but there are also many extra, optional activities available. Our guide will discuss all the options with you in advance and will be able to facilitate any bookings that we would like to make. Dinner tonight is for your own account, Swakopmund boasts some truly excellent restaurants and again our guide will be able to help you with recommendations and bookings.

Making the most of our time at the coast we only leave Swakopmund this morning at 11:30, giving us plenty of time to wander around town. Alternatively, there are many more optional activities available this morning if you wish. For those with a love of adrenaline sand boarding is also a very popular if you fancy careering down the slip face of a sand dune at 60 km per hour. This activity is generally only available in the morning. Departing Swakopmund no later than 11:30 we head east into the desert. We first cross the Namib gravel plains, large areas of flat and seemingly barren terrain broken up by huge mountain inselbergs. We have two mountain passes to traverse this afternoon, first is the mighty Kuiseb Pass and we follow the road from the top of the mountains, dropping steeply down into the canyon carved over eons by the Kuiseb River on its way to debouch into the ocean at the port town of Walvis Bay. We climb up from the banks of the river and over the pass, travelling through the mountain peaks and on to the second, smaller canyon of the Gaub River, a tributary of the Kuiseb. We emerge from the mountains onto a flat road and almost immediately we cross the Tropic of Capricorn at 23.5 south degrees. There is a signpost at this auspicious spot and we stop along the road for photos. Onwards again to our destination for today, the gateway to the dunes and Sossusvlei at Sesriem. We make our campsite in anticipation of our day tomorrow, in the shadow of the towering red dunes of the world’s oldest desert.