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| Okavango River at Rundu |
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| Hakusembe Lodge Grounds |
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| Denise negotiating |
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| Pretty bushveld |
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| Kalahari Sands |
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| Our room at Canyon Roadhouse |
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| Bathroom at Canyon Roadhouse |
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| Old vehicles 0n display at the Roadhouse |
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| Station masters house |
Day 17
After a very pleasant stay at
Hakusembe and believe it or not in the same room as we occupied in 2015 we head
for Fiume Lodge and Game Farm just outside Grootfontein.
We wondered what we were in for
when we left the road and went through two sliding gates along a very rocky
road to Fiume Lodge, which was like an oasis, in the midst of dry bushveld it
had 8 rooms and they were well appointed. Outside the Lodge there was a water
hole and a salt lick, which later that afternoon attracted Zebra, Oryx,
Springbok, Wart Hog and there was a host of birdlife and a couple of resident
bush babies. It was the ideal stop over for travellers to Etosha, Caprivi and
North East Botswana and all the national parks in that area.
Day 18
We headed for Gobabis today
getting away fairly early although they had a power outage that affected the
whole North East Namibia so we are not the only ones that have power cuts and
they had no idea when it would be back on and no one in Namib Power could tell
them what the problem was, we were very empathetic!
We wanted to see the Central
parts of Namibia and today we got our wish, but we could not rely on the Garmin
to take us there through the C and D roads and I had to revert to the one map
book I had, which does not have the road number changes in so half the time we
relied on the cars compass.
Today it must have been Wart Hog
open day, we saw literally hundreds, most managing to get through the fences along
side the road, because we all know the grass is greener on the other side.
This part of Namibia consist
of huge cattle farms alternatively game farms, when I say huge, I mean huge, we
were told that they are up to 15,000 hectares in size. The vastness and open
spaces in Namibia
never fail to astound us.
We arrive in Gobabis in the late
afternoon and we are staying at Gobabis Guest House, which is located just
outside the town, but interestingly it is truly mixed housing with large houses
mixed with township houses and everything in between with some roads tarred and
some gravel, but you can see that trust has not been built between neighbours
with the “haves” living behind high walls, all windows fitted with burglar
bars. Walking down to town at night is not recommended.
However, the accommodation was
good and the dinner was home cooked roast chicken, with some delightful pumpkin
fritters, crispy roast potatoes. Prior to this we had chicken for two nights in
a row and Denise was hoping it would not be chicken again, well I could have
bet on chicken; luckily the home cooking saved the day.
Day 19
We had breakfast with three guys
from South Africa
who were on a hunting trip, but had another important duty to do, which was to
scatter one of the party’s brother’s ashes in the game farm that they had been
visiting and hunting on for 20 years some people have some peculiar places to
pick for their final resting place. I am sure the relatives of the game they
have shot over the years will be delighted; I leave the rest to your imagination!!!
We once again defy the Garmin
and choose to visit Dordabis where I understood they had a weaving industry
using Karakul wool, but alas, if it was there it was nowhere to be seen. We
took a wrong turning and ended up far further East than we intended, but we did
see a lot more of Central Namibia all on excellent gravel roads, some even
better than their tar roads. We continued to make good use of the compass with
very little help from the Garmin and Tracks for Africa, which seems to be the
story of my life as we had the same problems when we travelled to East Africa in 2012.
The Garmin told us that we would
arrive at Canyon Roadhouse near the Fish
River Canyon
at 21h00 at one stage, I told Denise that it was impossible and estimated our
arrival time as 18h00 and we eventually arrived at 18h30 just as twilight time
approached.
We have a lovely room and we
enjoyed a non-chicken dinner and almost a bottle of wine to celebrate our last
night in Namibia
with a vow to return again. Canyon Roadhouse is quite quirky with an old cars
theme and a popular destination with lots of overseas visitors to the Fish River
Canyon itself.
Day 20
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| On the road to the RSA Border |
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| Scenery that photo's do not do justice to |
Our destination today is across
the border and an overnight stay in Springbok at Annie’s Cottage a place we
have stayed before. We had the most efficient border crossing ever and crossed
over in no more than thirty minutes. The road to the border is another straight
one, but the scenery alleviated the boredom.
We could well be disappointed
with the flowers this year as although there were some flowers on the side of
the road as we approached Springbok they were not the profusion that they are
known for. The guest house Manager said they had 4mm of rain in both June and
July and unless there is rain in the next week or two it would be deemed a
failure in this area. We hope the situation improves as we travel south, but
there is nothing we can do about it, it is nature’s way and the B----y weather
and we can come again next year.
Our next stop is in Clanwilliam
and this time next week we will be back in Knysna, if we do not decide to
continue the journey.
Happy Birthday Mathew hope you had a very good day and all the best for
the year ahead, we love you.
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