Fri. 24th May ‘24
Any concerns we’d had about sleeping on the roof of our cabaña proved to be groundless – the mattress was comfy, the duvet & blankets were warm enough, there wasn’t too much wind, and eye masks dealt with the brightness of the moon. Janet says that she heard howling (likely jackals) in the night – I had earplugs in so heard nothing. A shame though that the moon was so bright that we didn’t get to see more of the stars or Milky Way. As we are heading into winter here, sunrise was about 7:20 and that proved to be a perfect time to wake up and enjoy the colours in the sky for a new morning. Needless to say, one of us was better at sleeping in than the other!
Over breakfast, there are decisions to be made as to what to do today. We are nearly 2 weeks in to our trip and haven’t yet been on a Sundowner drive (to be fair, though, it is the drive bit that we haven’t had). Anyway, Hans offers to take us on a Sundowner trip to Hidden Canyon this evening, so that’s an easy decision. We do fancy a walk this morning – before it gets too hot – and Kristin suggests we head for Panoramic Mountain, about an hour’s walk from the lodge. She promises that the views from the top are, well, panoramic and worth seeing. So we load up with water and a couple of cameras and head off whilst the day is still cool(ish).
The directions aren’t quite Peter Pan simple – go along the airstrip, turn left at the circular bush and follow the track under the tree to the left hand side of the ‘mountain’ (hill), follow the stone-pile markers up the ridge to the top. To come down, carry on along the other ridge until you get to the sandy dune, then slide down it and head home. Simples! And more or less as described, although we did need to do a bit of improvising going up the ridge. Definitely not a mountain and the climb never got worse than just needing to pick a path amongst the stones.
At the top, there was a cross (not sure why) and a tin box with a guest book in. You couldn’t even use the old “well, I would but I don’t have a pen with me” excuse as there were plenty in the tin! Looking back at other peoples’ comments around 90% were in German – reinforcing our view that we have come across 2 or 3 times more German speakers than combined Brits and Americans. Guest book filled in, it was time to look around and take in the view. Whilst I would quibble about the ‘mountain’ tag, there is no disputing the panoramic-ness of the views. Stunning whichever way you looked. They only served to reinforce the ‘middle of nowhere’ feeling that we had as we drove in.
The way back down was simpler and easier than the way up, but before we got to the sandy part of the slope, we passed what we assumed to be a couple of cactus plants. Hans told us later that there are no cactuses in Africa. What we saw were actually a type of Euphorbia – different from those we saw in Fish River Canyon, but still just as toxic.
By the time we got back, the day is getting hot so there is nothing else for it but to find a shady place, relax and catch up with the ever-demanding blog and photo sorting. Our meals have been a bit all over the place on this trip – and they certainly haven’t been at the prescribed Hornsey meal times! Lunch today is a cold beer but we had a cooked breakfast and we know we’ll eat well tonight, so we feel that we can cope. We pass the afternoon chatting with Theresa (a Brit, who moved to Germany 40+ years ago) and her husband (Hardy?). There’s also the odd visitor to the watering hole to distract us.
At around 5, the four of us – plus Hans’ two dogs – all pile in to his battered Land Rover and he takes us off on our sunset tour. He explains that his ‘farm’ is 170 sq. km. – bigger than Lichtenstein, he says with glee. As we stop at an old Acacia (Camelthorn) tree with amazing gnarls and whorls on its trunk, Hans says that it is probably over 300 yrs old, but nobody really knows.
Supposedly, we’re heading for ‘Hidden Canyon’, but the truth is that the whole landscape is fascinating and changes surprisingly rapidly, so we enjoy the experience of being out in this strange world as the light gradually becomes more golden. Every now and then we stop at a lookout point and the cameras go click, click but its difficult to capture the scale, let alone how we feel about this place. So I’ll settle for this final photo of the day. We’ve stopped on a dune to have our sundowners, the sun is just touching the horizon behind us, and the colours are all gold and red. We feel that all is well with the world.