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The remoteness of Namibia - November 23, 2014

After crossing the border into Namibia on Friday afternoon, to be greeted with an outside temperature of 48 degrees, we made our way to an amazing resort on the banks of the Oranje River. The river forms the border between South Africa and Namibia and is the main source of water for a vast and dry region.

The resort, Nortosh, was part of a huge grape growing enterprise. The grapes in the area are grown for table grapes and they are exported all over the world. Not surprisingly the grapes are all handpicked, mainly due to the ready supply of cheap and available labour. There is a regular work force of 3,000 but at harvest time the work force swells to 30,000 which is just too difficult to even get your head around.

After a later than normal start we headed off up north. There was no bitumen in sight and today I have had another dose of "African Massage" which is what you get when you bump and jolt around in a bus for 5 hours.
All day today the landscape has been lunar in nature, extremely dry, windy and so desolate. I thought we had some remote regions in Australia, but what I have witnessed today has been exceptional.

Since we had a long drive ahead of us today our first stop was to be a competition of sorts. We were divided into three teams and at a predetermined spot we all had to get out of the bus (in the said lunar landscape). We then had 10 minutes to plan for then get our guide to take a photo.
It had to be creative and represent our travels or the environment we found our selves in and we could use props if we wanted. The winners will be announced tomorrow, however I feel that one of the groups should get a handicap as they had two professional photographers in the group. I am not expecting to win.

Our next stop was the Fish River Canyon which is one of the largest canyons in the world.
Some of the earliest German pioneers who settled in South West Africa ( which was a province of South Africa until it declared independence in 1994) as it was then known settled in the area around the Fish River Canyon as it was a permanent source of water.
There is a very small river right down at the base of the canyon, which today did not even look like it was flowing. It appeared to be just a stagnant series of small ponds.

Surprisingly on our way to lunch which was at a road house in the middle of nowhere it started tosplash with rain. Our guide who has done this trip many many times has never seen rain in this area. Even now there are some dark storm clouds that have formed in the sky. I wonder if we have more rain to come?

Despite the desolate nature of the environment there is wildlife. The Orix (an antelope with long almost vertical antlers) is plentiful, there is the occasional zebra and springbok (also an antelope species) and birds are plentiful.

Now how to describe the Bates Hotel where we are staying tonight! Our guide mentioned on more than one occasion that it was "character filled" and located in the town of Seeheim - sorry correction the Seeheim Hotel is the town. There are 28 people who live here and they all work at the hotel.
Seeheim is on the main rail line from, actually I am not quite sure where. The train has not stopped at the station for the last 25 years and there is only one train a week going from somewhere to somewhere (my geography is a little scratchy at this point).

Back to the hotel......
As we were driving into Seeheim our guide put on a song - which happened to be "Hotel California" by the Eagles. Those of you who are familiar with the lyrics will see where I am going with this.
Remember the classic American movie of the 60's "Psycho" and the Bates Hotel.
Picture a hotel in a ravine in the middle of the Namibian desert. The hotel is of solid stone construction, three stories high with turrets, bay windows and chimneys.
But wait it gets even creepier - the lady owner is also a professional taxidermist. Sure enough in the bar there were baboons, zebras, orix and other animals that have had the full treatment by the manager and have clearly seen better days :)

Some trivia :

The national animal of Namibia is the Orix.

Orix tastes just like beef.

The national animal of South Africa is the springbok.

Along with Australia; South Africa and Namibia are the only countries that eat their national animal.

To ensure we stay hydrated, we buy our water in 5 litre containers

The South African rand is accepted everywhere in Namibia and you do not even need to change your money into Namibian dollars