On a trip to the Sossusvlei dunes, Kit Peel found a spot of luxury in the harsh desert
Guidebooks are misleading. There’s nothing new in that. You go to England but don’t really expect, as part of your itinerary, to have tea with the queen or hang out with Damien Hirst in his latest eatery. And, when you get to Austria you’ll find that the hills aren’t “… alive with the sound of music”.
But Namibia? Well, they almost had me. A barren, sand-swept land. A vast desert with gemsbok-laden dunes in the west, gemsbok- laden reserves in the south, salt pans and more desert in the north. And the east? More of the same I suppose.
With its old towns buried in sand drifts and shipwrecks on the Skeleton Coast, Namibia appeared bleak, but impossibly romantic. Brochures spoke of “exclusive service in Africa’s jewel” and the usual “paradise for the discerning traveller” – almost too good to be true.
And then I remembered a friend’s experience there a few years ago. He had been a delegate at an International Monetary Fund trade conference in Namibia in the early 1990s. The delegates of – yes, you read right – the IMF were put up in a falling to pieces hotel, where the taps produced a trickle of cold water, or just sand. The food was bad, the service was bad, and the IMF’s reaction, not surprisingly, was bad. “Namibia,” my friend muttered, “was a dump, we didn’t give them a penny, so I expect it’s still a dump!”
So, setting off on a three-day visit to the country in April, one night in Windhoek and two near the sand dunes of Sossusvlei, I wasn’t sure what to expect.
Not what I found in Windhoek. A half-hour drive from the international airport brought me to the Hotel Heinitzburg, which overlooks the city. Windhoek, at an even higher altitude than Johannesburg, is a place of clean streets, fresh air and blue skies that buzz with little charter flights taking tourists across Namibia.
Dropping off my bags, I walked down to the city centre. It was relaxed, sophisticated and it was a nice place to hang out. I found a really good restaurant on Empire Street, overlooking the law courts and sat outside on its first floor balcony, waiting for it all to go wrong.
But it was faultless, from the food, to the service, to the plumbing.
The Hotel Heinitzburg, originally built as a castle by Count Raith for his family in the 1920s, also reeked of spanking good German hospitality. Smaller rooms than you would expect in a castle, but with wrought iron four-poster beds.
Dinner was served on a terrace overlooking the city. Candles, white linen and silver bits and pieces, with the nice touch of a glass of champagne on the house.
After Kalahari truffles and ostrich fillet, I would have been happy to have, Roman-style, put a feather down my throat, and start again.
The only blemish on an otherwise perfect evening was the arrival of a couple of Brits who accosted me as I was going up to my room. They had just come back from, as it happened, the very camp near Sossusvlei where I was flying to the next day.
The camp, they said, was beautiful. But, lowering their voices, they told me that the staff there were “ghastly, ill- mannered, frightful” and “really awfully rude to us”.
Next morning, in a Sefofane Air six- seater, I was heading south-west out of Windhoek on the one-hour flight to Namibia’s most famous landmark, the Sossusvlei dunes.
The dunes are contained in the western region of the vast Namib Naukluft desert. At nearly 50E000km2 it is the third-largest reserve in Africa, just after the Selous Game Reserve (55E000km2) and the Central Kalahari (52E000km2).
Sossusvlei Wilderness Camp is situated in a 7E000ha private concession in the Naukluft region, in the shadow of the Tsaris mountains that mark the eastern boundary of the desert.
Originally farm land, the camp was opened by Namibia’s environment and tourism minister in October 1998.
Not long after experiencing the stomach- churning thermals coming over the Tsaris mountains, I got a bird’s eye-view of the camp. Nine thatch and timber chalets and a main lodge, perched on rocky outcrop, in a stunning landscape of plains and mountains.
There had been unusually heavy rainfall in the area and the desert plains were awash with light green grass and purple and yellow flowers. We circled low over the camp, startling a couple of the resident gemsbok herd.
This is not a game-rich area. There’s an abundance of snakes and birds and, if you are lucky, an aardvark, a jackal or a porcupine. Leopard and desert cheetah are so rare as to be mythical. The camp is a place to relax, to learn about the desert environment and is an easy access point to the main attraction, the Sossusvlei dunes.
The chalets face out across the desert plain, and between gaps in the nearby mountains you can see the deep orange dunes, 25km away. The quality of accommodation is excellent, with an emphasis on being close to nature. Folding doors push back to reveal the balcony and plunge pool and the en suite bathroom has an enclosed shower with a folding window on one side.
It’s hard to fault the whole set-up. It is a classy and unique experience. Still, there are a couple of things missing, which I found puzzling. There is no fire, real or otherwise, in the chalet, which. considering the bitterly cold winter mornings, is peculiar. Also, with all the staff you could possibly hope for in a safari camp, no-one comes to bring you tea or coffee in the morning.
These things aside, according to a number of travel agents I spoke to, the word is that Sossusvlei Wilderness Camp is the pick of the luxury accommodation in the area. The level of service and the friendliness of the staff in particular set this camp apart, with not a hint of the gloomy forecasts of the British couple I had met the previous day.
The first evening’s property drive was a fascinating insight into the desert environment. From the strangely named smelly shepherd’s tree, the paper bark tree and the camel thorn, to the even stranger round patches of exposed earth called “fairy circles”.
Apparently scientists don’t know what they are, although some people believe they are upside-down termite holes.
Jumping off the vehicle to look at a weaver bird nest disturbed a horned adder and sent us running. Our deadliest encounter with wildlife passed uneventfully as the snake was happy to pose for photographs.
Sundowners followed quickly afterwards as the desert began to cool and the mountains glowed pink.
Meals are served on a long table in the main lodge. With supplies trucked in once a week, it is a miracle that the chefs can produce good food. A choice of main courses like sweet and sour chicken or roast beef, followed by pudding of melktert or poached pears and, incongruously, a good cheese board.
The highlight of the trip was the drive to Sossusvlei, the sea of red dunes that are on the cover of every Namibia guide book. The camp is further from the dunes than some other camps in the area, and to get there for sunrise, the wake-up call is 4.30am!
The drive to the dunes, via the entrance gate at Sesriem, takes about 65 minutes on dusty roads.
At up to 40-million-years old, the dunes of Sossusvlei are the oldest in the world. They are also the highest, some reaching as much as 300m. They were formed from vast quantities of sand that were carried from the Orange river into the Atlantic Ocean and from there, northwards via the cool Benguela current. The sand was deposited on the Namibian coast and over millions of years was shifted more and more inland by the wind.
Deposits of oxidated iron give them their distinctive red colour.
As we drove into the park the desert pan widened and the dunes on either side of us were up to 6km apart.
The scale of this vast dusty expanse is nearly biblical. You half expect to see Moses appear in the distance at the head of a great column. About 45km from the Sesriem gate we came to dune 45, towering 135m above the road. Already other vehicles have parked under a nearby camelthorn tree and tiny figures could be seen heading up the dune’s ridge.
From the top, the view of the pan and dunes is unforgettable. Vast, desolate, stretching into a shimmering horizon. This is the highlight of the whole Namibia trip and it takes your breath away.
I sat and took it in until the sand, heated by the climbing sun, became too hot. Then, instead of going back down the ridge, Isaiah led us, half running, half walking, down the 45 face. At the bottom, we walked back to the vehicle and set up chairs and tables for a breakfast of muffins, baby quiches and fruit.
We returned to the camp at about 1pm for a repeat of the previous day. A siesta and at 4pm a property drive.
The most memorable remainder of the holiday was waking up early the next morning and sitting in bed watching the sun rise over the plains, turning them purple, red and yellow. Later, having crawled out of bed, I sat smoking cigarettes in the plunge pool and saw the colours settle into browns and greens. Between the mountains the dunes glowed red.
I was hooked. I was sold. Believe every good thing you hear about Namibia. From where I was sitting, it doesn’t get better than this.
For information on Hotel Heinitzburg call Tel: (09264) 612E49597. For information on Sossusvlei Wilderness Camp Tel: (09264) 612E2E5178