Come see me in africa!: Day 4, Sept 12 – Kunene River Lodge to Epupa Falls

The day started well but guess what? We just made it outside the Lodge gate and another flat tire occurred.

Roelof and Bertie change tire with lots of supervision.

After changing the flat, we drove just over an hour for lunch at Swartbooisdrift, which is on the Kunene River. Here we enjoyed a nice brunch. We also came across a beer bottle house…reminded me of the beer can house in Houston…and also found a retired Land Rover. I thought the tires looked pretty good and considered asking Tom if he was interested in a couple extra tires.

Lunch at Swartbooisdrift along the Kunene River

Beer Bottle House

Retired Land Rover...shame to waste such good tires!!!

A few minutes drive from the river we came across a monument commemorating Afrikaaners who crossed the Kunene near here returning to Southwest Africa from Angola in the late 1920’s. They were desendents the Dorsland trekkers (Thirst land trekkers), who settled in Angola in around 1870. The Dorsland trekkers suffered horrible casualties to fever and starvation.

Dawn, Tom, Salome and Bertie checking out the monument

Afrikaaner graves from the late 1920's

Many of these earlier settlers died as conditions were a bit difficult. Can you imagine traveling over this terrain in a covered wagon with all your belongings? It is difficult enough in a landcruiser with 2 weeks worth of food and supplies!

Tough terrain for early settlers

Himba boy who appeared from nowhere when we stopped at a road junction

We left Swaartbooisdrift and headed towards Epembe on the D3701. After Epembe we headed back north on the D3700 towards Okongwati. Okongwati would be our last chance to get fuel and we weren’t even certain we could get it here. Fortunately we found some at the mechanic shop, fuel station, and building supply store shown below.

Salome and Martie organizing fuel at the "we'll help you with whatever we can" shop.

Salome, Leon, and Martie watching the refueling process.
Note the marks on the plastic container used for tracking volume dispensed.

While refueling, which was done in a clever way considering they didn’t actually have any fuel pumps, we were fortunate enough to see the Namibian census team call on a local household and a local boy stock up on grain at the milling station next to the fuel station. Never a dull moment!

Local boy with freshly milled grain headed home

Young Himba boy following donkey with grain

Namibian census in action!!! Apologize for the chain link fence
but the security at the petrol station was a bit tight!

Back on the road again to Epupa Falls on what was a relatively good road. In spite of road conditions, we had another flat tire along the road before reaching Epupa. We finally arrived at about 4:30 and set up camp at Epupa Falls campground. A beautiful spot just next to Epupa waterfall…where we ended up staying 3 nights it was so nice.