Hello from the Atlantic coast, but quite much further down than usual. I am still experiencing a reverse culture shock: where is the Africa I know? Was it all ordered up by the German colonialists? Everything simply works. The only confusion so far has been withdrawing money from the ATM: instead of Namibian dollars I got South African rands. Turns out it does not really matter here. How odd.
We landed in Walvis Bay in the middle of the desert, on a hot, windy, sand storm day. But behind the dunes was the ocean, and miles and miles of beach and birds. Regardless of expectations, not a bad place to spend the summer.
(Walvis Bay, Namibia; June 2017)
In confusion, in Windhoek. Why is everything spotless, scrap-less, in straight angles, and surrounded by watered lawns? Where are the scooters, the rusty cars, the peddlers, the fruit stalls, the people living their lives on the streets; and the smells and the noise?
From above, the Kalahari desert looks positively negatively habitable. This is not a place to run out of fuel or water on one of those spindly, straight roads. Unless one is an oryx and can live for weeks on desert shrubs and the abstract idea of water and shade.
(Above Namibia; June 2017)
Lovely ones, apologies for the long silence. You see, I have spent the two past months in Africa. I thought I would have so much time to write, but first there were long (lovely) days with dolphins, then some crazy driving around the desert, and finally more lovely days by and in water a most astonishingly shade of turquoise.
This blue marble 