Wouter and Elmari's Y2K Land-Rover tour, leg 6

2000-07-10 to 2000-07-16

Monday, 2000-07-10, Epupa Falls: As we're getting ready to leave, I notice that the right rear tyre is flat-ish. Must be a slow leak. I quickly swap it for the one on the bonnet. Rene, who got here late yesterday, is planning to go via van Zyl's pass, so they leave early again, not really seeing much of the falls. We leave at 09:30.

	On our way back from Epupa Falls we stopped at another Himba village. I had loaded my camera with Ilford Pan F 50 ASA black-and-white film, which is, of course, why these pictures are in monochrome.

We were driving along and I caught a flash in the rear view mirror. Stopped at the top of the next rise and binoculared the road, yup, Pim was stopped, also at the top of a rise, with his lights on bright. Trouble.

We doubled back, to see what was wrong.

On the road from Kazangula to Shesheke in Zambia, Pim's top right hand shock mount tore loose. He fixed it at the time, but only on the one side where he could reach. So by now everything had worked loose again, and we needed to fix it, properly this time. A combination of high lift jack, bottle jack, and a handful of M8 hardware, and Pim was on the road again.

	This is the bottle store in, as far as I can remember, Opuwo. Those bottles are mostly 750ml Black Label bottles. These are exported to Namibia with no way of recycling them -- so they end up in huge piles all over Kaokoland. Since that day, I have not bought SAB beer again -- I rather buy Windhoek Lager and Export, which is quite a bit more expensive. I don't think SAB will notice, but at least I feel better about not supporting these people with their short-sighted ideas. Plastic and metal eventually decay, even if it takes a hundred years. Glass is forever.
	[WPT 095 -18.238217 13.769082 10-JUL-00 15:27 GMT 17:27 SAST Turnoff] So, we drove on and reached Kaoko Otavi at 17:00. We learn that the road via Robbie's Pass doesn't exist, so we went back to the D3704 and head south to Sesfontein. When we stopped to fix Pim's shock mount, Elmari had left the keys in the rear door lock, so we lost those somewhere along the way. That means that I can't lock the driver's door, or at least, I can lock it once but not unlock it.
	[WPT 096 -18.417292 13.785514 10-JUL-00 16:00 GMT 18:00 SAST Camp] We drove a short way off the side of the road, and made camp.

Tuesday, 2000-07-11, 10:00 SAST, Bush Camp: We get off to a slow start, I check the oil and the tyres, Daniel fiddles with his door lock.

There's one humoungous downhill between Kaoko Otavi and Sesfontein. We saw people getting out of a bus, the bus reversing up the hill, and the people walking up. I was coming down this hill when the gearbox suddenly would not go into third or fourth any more. Of course this is when Pim decides to stop in front of me, not a bright thing to do at the best of times. I can't remember whether I managed to stop, or hurtled straight past him, but that was somewhat scary.

"Welcome to FO...all?"

Sesfontein, 12:47 [WPT 097 -19.119537 13.618997 11-JUL-00 10:47 GMT 12:47 SAST Sesfontein] We were fortunate to reach Sesfontein fairly early, since I had to figure out what was wrong with the gearbox. I opened the top cover to inspect the works, and saw that one of the three clips on the synchro had popped out of position. I managed to pop it back into position with a small screwdriver, started putting things back together, and managed to drop the one interlock into the gearbox. Damn. So I took Elmari's dishwashing skottel, drained the oil, recovered the interlock, and assembled the gearbox. Got a look that was dirtier than the skottel for that one :-)

Daniel and Julia were very worried about Nate -- he was not feeling well. They decided to go back to Opuwo to have his blood tested for malaria. Pim & Thandie, Elmari & I went to the hotel, had beer while sitting by the pool. Windhoek draft at N$10 for 500ml.

Later on Elmari made a really nice supper with soya and dried green beans, bacon, potato and garlic. Some kids came around to sing, but we decline the offer. When Pim and Thandie went back to their Land Rover they found themselves robbed, coffee and food missing. Which of course did not leave Thandie in a good mood.

Rene & Joke arrive, they went to the start of Van Zyl's pass and then turned around, the going was just too slow.

Much later, Daniel & co get back. Confirmed, Nate tested positive for malaria. Elmari feeds them the rest of the food and half a bottle of Thandie's red wine (Tassenberg). Daniel promises to wash the dishes in return... yea, right :-)

Had a really nice shower, and off to bed.

Wednesday, 2000-07-12 : I was just about to wash the dishes when Daniel rocks up, and actually takes the dishes and starts washing them! It's the biggest event of the century, and everyone takes photographs. (Sorry, Daniel, the word is out now! :-)

We certainly had a lot of mozzies during the night, and there are a lot of flies about this morning. And the showers are cold, they ran out of gas. Ah well, at least I had a good shower last night.

Camping cost N$55 per person per night, but Daniel decides that this is too much, with their being five of them. He comes back, says "I explained our desperate situation to them" -- they let them stay for free.

We set off towards Palmwag, slow and leasurely. Daniel & co and Pim & Thandie went off ahead, Rene & Joke are still behind us somewhere.

[WPT 101 -19.633792 13.873769 12-JUL-00 10:05 GMT 12:05 SAST Coffee break]

	[WPT 102 -19.884068 13.949010 12-JUL-00 10:53 GMT 12:53 SAST Palmwag] We were at Palmwag, declaring that we had nothing to declare, when Pim's Land Rover appeared in the distance, with Thandie driving. Turns out Pim passed out cold, of course upsetting Thandie somewhat, and they were quite relieved to see us. We decided to get Pim to a hospital as soon as possible. He was on Larium, and we figured this was the most likely cause for his quick nap.
	[WPT 105 -19.843047 14.128182 12-JUL-00 12:07 GMT 14:07 SAST Grootberg Pass] Grootberg pass, at 1540m (on the sign) or 1552m (on the GPS).

My father had an ID19 and a DS20 or three. I grew up working on some of them, so I have a soft spot for these quite incredible, very french cars. There was something in the shape under the tree that told me I just had to stop and investigate. Yup, a DS20, much the worse for wear. [WPT 106 -19.781479 14.289442 12-JUL-00 12:28 GMT 14:28 SAST Citroen wreck]

[WPT 107 -19.688509 14.314547 12-JUL-00 12:53 GMT 14:53 SAST Beer stop] We stopped for some beer and cool drinks, and very shortly after that stopped because Pim had a flat tyre. His sand-type tyres just could not cope with the sharp stones in Namibia.

[WPT 108 -19.621604 14.842218 12-JUL-00 15:42 GMT 17:42 SAST Kamanjab]

15:42 local time, Kamanjab : Pim buys a new 245 tyre and gets a gator and tube in his old tyre. R1400, not too bad a price that far from civilisation.

[WPT 109 -20.105174 16.156399 12-JUL-00 17:45 GMT 19:45 SAST Outjo hospital]

17:45 local time, Outjo hospital : OK, booked Pim into the hospital, I tried to convince the doctor that Pim had ingrown testicles and that he should tell Pim that castration is the only way out, but the doctors in that part of the world seem to be a serious bunch... Pim ends up on generic anti-malaria drugs (Daramol / Paludrine), and all is well.

[WPT 110 -20.119352 16.157488 12-JUL-00 19:25 GMT 21:25 SAST Ombinda Lodge]

The bed & breakfast places in town were closed, and the hotel wanted N$ 190 per person per night, nottefok! We get a cabin at Ombinda lodge for slightly more than a campsite would have cost, less than the normal price, and everyone wins. We have supper at the lodge, N$ 252 for the four of us including two bottles of red wine. The special price does not include breakfast, which suits us fine.

Thursday, 2000-07-13, Outjo : We hit the internet cafe in town. Hear that Elmari's grandmother died while we were in Zambia. Not a happy day.

We fill up, and move on, destination Etosha.

[WPT 111 -19.178985 15.919055 13-JUL-00 11:58 GMT 13:58 SAST Okakuejo]

[WPT 112 -19.035364 16.471033 13-JUL-00 14:09 GMT 16:09 SAST Halali]

We meet up with the rest of the crowd in Halali, as per schedule. We're all in one camp, life's good.

Somewhat before sunset, we wandered down to the water hole.

	The rhino came down when it was almost completely dark. I rested the camera on a rock and hit the shutter. "Click....click", if you know what an SLR sounds like in slow motion. But hey, I got the picture..

Friday, 2000-07-14, Halali : There's a 101 parked at the office as we're leaving. I chat to the guy, he's got a 300TDI engine and a Range Rover transfer box, claims 12l/100km. Of course seeing this 101 is not a good thing, it only strengthens my resolve to get one of my own. Pim also thinks it's a neat idea, we figure we need to buy a pair of these and outfit them as serious campers.

We take a slow drive to Namutoni. Saw a steenbok, and a really big elephant. Also giraffe, lotsa smaller buck. [WPT 114 -18.809291 16.940553 14-JUL-00 09:03 GMT 11:03 SAST Namutoni]

We were driving around, when we rounded a corner and there was a fairly large rhino in the middle of the road. I braked, he took off, and I managed to stall the engine.

Now, the starter motor had been giving trouble, and I could not get the engine restarted at all. We eventually got out and pushed, then noticed that the rhino has sneaked back to look at the strange yellow beast that had frightened him so. They move extremely quietly for their size.

We of course ducked back into the Land Rover. When Elmari turned around to look at the rhino, her chair went "squick&quit; and the rhino bolted. I guess it sounded like a safety catch or something.

We eventually push-started the Land-Rover and made it back to camp with a few minutes of gate-open-time remaining.

Saturday, 2000-07-15, Halali: We leave Halali, destination Okakuejo.

Sometimes, it pays to sit and watch the small things, instead of driving around looking for lions and tigers and bears.

	We were parked at "Salvadora", watching the ground squirrel things with the big nuts. After a while (think more than half an hour) a little cat-like animal appeared, later on there were two of them lying in the shade. Cute little things.
	Then, we noticed a fox that had been lying under a bush all along. Later the fox was joined by another. During this time, quite a few cars arrived, the people had a superficial look, and left. Their loss.

	The giraffes in the distance reminded me of the scene in Star Wars where the Imperial walkers are coming up over the horizon on Hoth. Pim got out to take a video, fortunately there were no lions around.
	Note the elephant in the background, leaving the waterhole. Okakuejo is a magical camp. The waterhole is just there, you can park off all night and watch the animals. We were trying to get supper together, every now and then someone came running: "lions at waterhole!", "5 rhino at waterhole!", etc.

	So, as you can see, the water hole is quite close to the camp. Which can be scary if you're not looking around to see what the guy with the camera is doing... We saw many more animals at this waterhole, but it was too dark for photographs. You can go to Okakuejo, sleep all day (if you can handle the heat) and spend all night at the waterhole, and you'll probably see more than anyone else.