Day 9, Sept 16 – Otjihaa to Otjinhungwe at the Kunene River

We started the day by changing out one of Bertie's tires before leaving the campsite.  Roelof, master tire changer, tied Bertie's flat onto the top of Salome's land cruiser.

Roelof and Bertie loading the tire

Meanwhile, Nico had his compass out and we all tried to find North.  Soon arms were pointing in all directions.

Where is north?

Soon we were on the road but unfortunately we didn't get very far before Salome had a flat.  Again Roelof changed the tire so I took the opportunity to take pictures.  Namibia has some very interesting trees, some of which are found only in Namibia.  Here's a picture of a Bottle tree.  We also saw a small herd of Springbok.

Bottle tree (Pachypodium lealii)

Well camouflaged Springbok

While waiting for the tire to be changed, we also picked up mopani wood for firewood and threw it on top of our vehicles.  We knew that in a couple of days firewood would be more difficult to find.

The travelling was much easier all the way to the intersection of the road to Orepembe and Rooi Drom (Red Drum).  Two kilometers before the intersection we came across another road going to the right and there was much discussion about whether or not it was the “right” road.  From the garmin’s “tracks of Africa” maps, it clearly wasn’t the main track but I thought perhaps it was a shortcut as not all the roads in Kaokoland are shown on “tracks”.  We had discovered that the previous day.  So we took the road.  Later, it also took a sharp turn away from the direction of the main track to Rooi drom.  Here we stopped and reassessed the situation.  After much discussion and speculation on where the road went, we all turned around and headed back to the main track, which in the end took us to Rooi drom. 

Now along the way there were several sections of very rough road especially after the marble mine all the way to the Rooi Drom.  We did meet a few vehicles along this road, one of them at the top of a pass at about the only point we could have met them without one of the vehicles having to back up on a very tricky section of road.  Unfortunately the lazy photographer did not get a picture of the narrow pass but she did get some scenery pictures taken out the window without stopping!

Himba hut with a view

Red dirt tracks through beautiful yellow grass

Ostrich grazing on the plains

We arrive at Rooi drom and take a short break.

The red drum...nearest toilet 23 kilometers

We arrive in the Marienfluss valley, a beautiful spot with lots of yellow grass due to the good rainfall earlier in the year. There are mountains all around in the distance. We stop for a very short, late lunch and Salome gives the thumbs up.  Then on the the Kunene River where we stayed at the Syncro Campsite.  We knew the Kunene was near when we saw the Makalani plams.

All OK and ready to roll!

Makalani palms across a sea of yellow