Day 8 – Namibia/ Botswana Safari 2015. R&R Epupa Falls

The Epupa Falls is at least 800 metres in width

After breakfast which was just cereal, toast and coffee as we will have an early brunch we set off to a Himba village to see how they live and to hand out some food to thank them for allowing us to take photos and the tour of the village. 

The Main course of the Kenene River over the Epupa Falls

We have a guide, Richard, who gives us a talk on the Himba cultures and customs, for instance they are polygamous and can have as many wives as they like, the village has a headman/chief and whatever he says goes, a young girl is matched with a man at birth, but that is only for his first wife, he can then go and hunt, as Richard put it, for more wives, the first wife is married after her first period.

The Himba are very primitive living simple lives and are nomadic, moving mostly to where there is sufficient grazing for cattle, goats and sheep. The Epupa area has not had any rain of note for 3 years so this village has sent its livestock to graze with the young men as far away as 40kms.

The village and huts are very clean and they have designated a holy tree that lies between the chiefs’ hut and the kraal and one should not walk between the tree and the kraal. The tree is where all the ceremonies like marriages take place.

It is said that they are in some way related to the Massai of Tanzania and Kenya when a faction moved north east, but when I questioned Richard he said that the Himba broke away from their roots in the East and came south, either way they could be an offshoot of the Massai as they do have similar traditions.

The women do not wash they just apply ochre and they have a plant that gives off a sort of lavender perfume so they do not smell at all. It is said that the tribe is battling to come to terms with modern civilisation and they are also said to be marginalised by the majority Ovambo government that supported Swapo’s fight for Independence whereas

Himba family

The Himba supported the South African armed forces as trackers and soldiers, one of the elders was quite open about being deserted by the South Africans when they granted independence to Namibia, all in all an interesting morning.

Forgot our pre-photo prep "Chests out and Stomachs in

Back at the camp site we have brunch and are told that there is +/- 100 people staying at the camp site, but it is big and the facilities are good. After brunch we set off to view the falls as the camp site is upstream of them and they are very big in the sense of not very high but cover a huge area, photos do not do it justice.

At sunset we travel up to the top of a hill overlooking the falls and get some nice shots. There are a number of birds that are endemic to the area including the Cinderella wax bill and there are rosy faced love birds, swifts and parrots. There are also some very nice chalets and a pub and after our walk to the falls we have an ice cold beer that goes down like water, temperatures are in the late 30’s

We are starting to get a handle on the names of the 30 people in our party who come from Johannesburg, Pretoria, Cape Town, Windhoek and Bonnievale occupations vary from wine farmers, lawyers, tax specialists, irrigation engineers, electricians and retirees to name a few.

Another great meal and with an early start tomorrow we have an early night, in fact we have never been to bed as early as we have on this trip. Tomorrow we travel to the foot of Van Zyls pass and some say it is more difficult than the actual pass, we shall see.