THE MOST OF THRILLING RIDE OF MY LIFE
Imagine sitting on top of a dune 35 storeys high, nose facing 37 down. 4x4xing through in the Namib Desert is a heart-pumping adventure of scary slip faces, shipwrecks and ghost towns - and you'll love it!
parkedatthetop ofa35-storeydune,
it seems impossible we’ll ever get through the Namib. For a little comparison, the Carlton Centre in Jo’burg is 50 storeys high – but we’re in a 4x4 Toyota Fortuner and aim to drive through this giant sandpit with nothing but gears, four jerrycans and a sprinkling of grit to get us to the coast on the other side. Luckily, we’re not alone. Booked through Live the Journey, our first family dune tour through the Namib is guided by professionals like Danie ‘Jakkals’ van Ellewee, who trained under the original desert driver, Eben Delport. There are always two guide cars on each tour – one vehicle in front ‘breaks’ the route, finding a way through the imposing dunes, while the other car brings up the rear and helps with recovery. Eben reads the dunes like he owns the place, which he almost does. His company, Uri Adventures, created a way for selfdrive travellers to explore the Namib after former diamond-mining areas became concessions. ‘ Uri’ is the Nama-Damara word for the movement of a springbok as it jumps, otherwise known as pronking. Although our 4x4s are certainly not as graceful, I like the image of us pronking across the dunes of Namibia. Jakkals’ voice crackles over the radio. At the beginning of our trip, all 12 cars in our convoy were fitted with radios so that we could warn each other about obstacles, like slip faces and holes, and so that the guides could help us navigate each hurdle. ‘Okay, there’s a very big hole here. You really need to give it gas at the bottom of the dune, then keep accelerating until you get right to the top of the next one on the other side – but not too much.’ My heart is pounding. The last thing we need is for our car to fly over the dune peak when we have no idea what’s on the other side. ‘Try high range, second gear,’ Jakkals says. My dad slips the car into gear. I hold on tight and hope for the best. Mom holds even tighter. ‘Gooi mielies!’ Jakkals cheers over the radio. ‘Go! Go! Go!’ The revs are up and we’re churning the sand into butter at the bottom to get enough speed for the upcoming crest. ‘Daaaaaar’s hy! Lekker man,’ Jakkals congratulates us. We sit, perched on top of the second dune. The 35-storey-high one. Below us is a steep slide of sand and the car nose is pointing downwards at a scary gradient. Actually, we are standing in our car, perched on the peak, with our feet planted flat on the floor because of the angle of the car. Eben says no dune face is less than 37 degrees, or the dune would collapse and avalanche in on itself. It feels far steeper from inside the car. The trick here is to glide slowly down the dune, letting the compression of the car’s gears and the thick sand help you dribble to the bottom. Accelerate at the wrong time and you’ll have a carful of wide eyes and wild screams.
Our convoy is a lucky packet of vehicles, but most of them are Toyotas: Hiluxes, Prados, Land Cruisers, one Ford Ranger, ‘Suzy’ the 2,8-litre Isuzu bakkie and our automatic Fortuner. (Having an automatic in the sand was great – Jakkals told us that a clutch can sometimes break on the trip, in which case, a new one has to be dropped off by helicopter.) It doesn’t matter what car is used, all tyres are let down to a low pressure of 0.8 bar. So low that if you turn too sharply or hit a clump of vegetation, the tyre can peel away from the rim, letting out any remaining air. Then it has to be carefully put back together with a can of deodorant and a lighter. There’s a real thrill in skimming through sand and self-satisfaction while negotiating truly technical driving. Even though this is a 4x4 driving tour, I’m pleasantly surprised that the trip is not confined to the car. Thanks to the obstacles and recoveries, photo stops and lunch breaks, there’s plenty of time to step outside and feel the sand sieve between your toes. I’m also astonished at the variety of the Namib. It may be the world’s oldest desert, but it certainly isn’t a stark or dead place. We drive past oryx – shimmering in the distance because of the heat – while skittish toktokkies, sidewinders and lizards with dancing limbs all skate across the sand. The latter varies in colour, from sunset-red vegetated hills to longer strips of golden ridges to pure-white sand mountains – Eben’s favourite part of the Namib. The route also wends its way towards the eerie, abandoned mining settlements of Charlottenfelder, Holsatia and Grillenberger in the area between Conception Bay and Meob Bay. Only the triangular roofs of buildings peek out of the dunes, as the settlements have been taken over by sand and piles of glass bottles, scoured matte and opaque. Then, once we hit the foggy coast, wrecks of ships that tried to service these towns emerge. They lie between groups of stinky Cape fur seals – we estimate there are at least a thousand sitting on the beach – while several blackbacked jackals dart between them, furtively looking for scraps. This unforgettable adventure combines adrenalinefilled thrills with desert exploration, but also supports a respectful, environmentally sound mentality of treading lightly. Each car must drive in the same set of tracks as the lead car so there aren’t tyre marks everywhere, and so that desert wildlife gets a chance at survival too, as many species bury themselves in the dunes to keep cool. All the trash we generate has to be taken out of the desert, and we have packed all the water, food, camping gear and fuel we need for five days. Eben reckons about 90 percent of the clients on these dune tours are South African, and it makes a lot of sense. ‘People own 4x4s and they’ll first visit Botswana, check out the highlights in Namibia and do a few shorter trails, then they really want to test their car on an epic 4x4 adventure.’ This is exactly how my parents feel about this holiday, and I’m so glad I’m getting to tag along. Every evening around the fire is festive as we all gather for drinks and dinner, exchanging war stories from the day’s driving, and every evening I try to figure out why this trip is different. Why is everyone so happy? Of our group, five couples have done a dune tour before and will definitely return to do another. Back in the 90s, when Namibia gained independence, there were 17 applicants for the concession to trek across the Namib but only four spots were awarded.
‘...so much space stirs up a powerful feeling of enchantment’
Tours through this desert have a low footprint, offer exclusivity and manage to maintain the solitude that comes with all this sand. Could one be in love with sand? It’s unlikely. But the infinity of the Namib Desert is definitely overwhelming – in a good way. It’s an area so vast, they named a whole country after it; an area so vast that Namibia is the second least-populated country in the world (the first is Mongolia); an area so vast it takes six days to cross it. Something about being engulfed by so much space stirs up a powerful feeling of enchantment. On the last evening, Jakkals prepares a mean meal of kebabs and salad, and even treats us to a sneaky tub of ice cream that has journeyed through the dunes for the last supper, and he ‘fesses up: ‘We’ve been putting a little bit of Namib sand into your food every night. So when you go home and get a craving for the desert, it’s because it’s now in your blood.’ I may not be in love with sand after all – it’s the Namib in my veins.