Nowhere else in the world is one’s being enveloped by a Spirit of Place quite like when one is in the Namib Desert ………… it wraps its hand around your soul and holds onto you forever.
I was fortunate to spend 6 months there in the army in 1965, followed by a few other trips to Namibia subsequently, but unfortunately none of them stretched into the Namib that I had experienced in the army, and on this remarkable trip.
On Pat’s birthday in 2009 we arrived at Sendelingsdrift and celebrated with some beautiful King Prawns on the braai joined by a good bottle of Sauvignon Blanc. The next morning we crossed on the pont into Namibia and moved on up to Kolmanskop where we spent most of the day wandering through this amazing “ghost town” just 10km inland from Luderitz.
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KOLMANSKOP
One evening in 1908, a Namibian railway worker was shovelling railroad tracks clear of creeping sand dunes when he saw some stones shining in the low light. His German employer identified them for what they were: diamonds……but unfortunately the worker was not rewarded for his find. Very soon hordes of prospectors descended on the area and by 1912 a town had sprung up, producing a million carats a year, or 11.7 percent of the world’s total diamond production.
Kolmanskop became a little well of luxury in the barren desert. There was a butcher, a baker, a post office, a gymnasium, a bowling alley - and an ice factory; fresh water was brought by rail. European opera and other groups came to perform. A sort of mad eccentricity reigned. One family kept a pet ostrich that terrorized the townspeople and was made to pull a sleigh at Christmas.
Bowling Alley
Kolmanskop’s prospectors became rich overnight simply picking diamonds off the desert floor, and during its brief heyday, about a thousand people—German colonizers and their families as well as local tribespeople who worked the mines—lived in the town…………but German authorities wanted greater control over the incredible riches. They cracked down, declaring a vast area of Namibia a Sperrgebiet, or restricted zone, forbidding entry to ordinary people and reserving prospecting rights for a single, Berlin-based company.
But it wasn’t to last. Intensive mining depleted the area by the 1930s, and in 1928, the town’s fate was sealed when the richest diamond fields ever known were found on the beach terraces to the south. The townspeople left in droves, abandoning homes and possessions.
By 1956, Kolmanskop was completely abandoned. The dunes that once rolled over the railway tracks now burst through the ghost town’s doors and porches, filling its rooms with banks of sand.
Viewed from the road to Luderitz, Kolmanskop holds no attraction whatsoever for anyone passing by, and I am sure that many thousands of people have missed out on the remarkable experience that a visit to the town offers for no other reason than its utterley bland and boring appearance from a distance.
On the way up through the Namib Naukluft Reserve we stayed overnight at a little campsite on a privately owned farm which was really “just so” - what a pleasure.
At Sesriem we decided to camp at the Sesriem camp site which is one of only two camps inside of the Namib Naukluft Reserve. Here we had the advantage of being able to drive to the dunes before the sunrise…..a distance of 60 km to Sossusvlei and Deadvlei.
Characterised by the large red dunes that surround it, Sossusvlei is a large, white, salt and clay pan. The dunes in this area are some of the highest in the world, reaching almost 400 meters, and provide one with wonderful images in the beautiful morning and evening light. Sossusvlei literally translates to “dead-end marsh”, as it is the place where the dunes come together preventing the Tsauchab River from flowing any further………….some 60km east of the Atlantic Ocean. The River seldom flows this far however and the pan remains bone-dry most years. During an exceptional rainy season the Tsauchab fills the pan, and can hold water for as long as a year. A sight I would dearly love to see.
Close to Sossusvlei, Deadvlei is a clay pan characterized by dark, dead camel thorn trees contrasted against the white pan floor.
The pan was formed when the Tsauchab River flooded and the abundance of water allowed camel thorn trees to grow. However, the climate changed and the sand dunes encroached on the pan, blocking the river from reaching the area. The trees are estimated to be somewhere between 900 and 4000 years old (depending on the information source), however they have not decomposed due to the dry climate, and offer one a unique environmental and spiritual experience found in very few other places on the planet. The 1 to 2 kilometer walk to Deadvlei across the dunes in the heat of the day is a trial all its own, but the rewards are quite beyond description, and I would urge anyone who has not been there to “GO NOW”.
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