Tuesday 28th Sept 2010 - Desert Crossing - Part 1

.We awoke to a brilliantly clear day and got ourselves busy with packing up for the day ahead.  Today was to be the desert crossing and as Andre had explained, we'd have to first get out of the riverbed before exploring further and this sounded like an adventure in itself.

Breakfast was an interesting array of muffins, sausages, pap and sauce, cheeses and breads.  Once we had finished up, washed our dishes, made the final adjustments to our packing, we parked in convoy and waited for Andre to take the lead and guide us out of our little safehaven.

We joined up with section of riverbed we had driven through the day before and here we were instructed to pump up our tyres as we were about to ascend some very rocky terrain ... 

This terrain being WORS PASS, is made up of rock that looks like slabs of shale.  And that is all - just rock and pieces of it strewn everywhere.  Any plant life is virtually non existent and what there is is very scrubby and dry.

Here is Andre taking the lead and testing the track before the rest of us can follow.

Once at the top he radioed for the rest of  us to come up one vehicle at a time and here you can see just how high we are going - notice in the clearing just left of centre how tiny the 4x4s look! (click on the picture to enlarge).

And here is a close up of the type of rock we drove over...

Once at the top the view was again quite breathtaking with the contrasts of rock, dune and greenery. 

We assembled next to Andre, waiting as each vehicle slowly made it to the top.

Where the river flows the abundance of life is absolutely amazing and to see all this with one's own eyes is truly a privilege.

And so we continued our journey and not too far off we came to an area that is littered with Welwitschia mirabilis...

Monday 27 Sept. 2010 - Let the Dunes Begin...

All the drivers drove their vehicles up to the main entrance to have radios fitted for the trip while the rest of us couldn't wait for that first cup of coffee and discussed the sudden change in weather and wondered what we were in for.



We settled down to a hearty breakfast - the perfect start to the long day ahead and Andre gave us the lowdown of what the plan for the day would entail. 



First stop was at the garage so that everyone could see to their last chances on petrol and water, wood and other odds and ends as we were not going to see another civilised spot until Friday afternoon.

We hit the road at 09:00 and made our way to the Namib Naukluft National Park Gate about 30kms away, where we all took a sho't left.



Once we had all turned and were through the gate, the convoy was brought to a halt and we were instructed to deflate our tyres to takkies as we had now entered soft sand territory and the flatter the tyre the better as you "float" across the dunes.