African Wings: Part 6 - Conception Bay to Sossusvlei

AFRICAN WINGS: PART 6: THE DUNE FIELDS & SOSSUSVLEI

Join us on a 6500km flying adventure through Namibia starting at Rundu on the Angolan border and ending at Oranjemund;  the quirky mining town of the Sperrgebiet

We woke late and had a lazy morning walking on the beach and having a fabulous bacon and eggs brunch before packing up and heading to the hangar.

Our next destination was Sesriem, gateway to the famous Sossusvlei and Deadvlei in the Namib Naukluft National Park. We had decided to leave later in the day so that we would catch the dune fields in the late afternoon sun when the shadows are long and the light warm.

Dunes just east of Conception Bay

We flew along the coast to Conception Bay, took a deep breath, said a little prayer and headed east across the endless dune fields. A daunting prospect lay in every direction, a vastness that leaves you breathless and quite frankly terrified at your own insignificance. The dune fields marched like sentinels endlessly into the distance – us just a speck in the sky.

The endless dunefields mark like sentinels into the distance

In the Nama language “Namib” means Vast, and is the only name that can faintly describe the landscapes of this desert country. Its inconceivable size and sheer emptiness instil in you a deep respect for one of the world’s oldest deserts. 

As we flew I found myself wishing for a book called something like “The Idiots Guide to Dune Spotting” or that I had a Professor of Duneology sitting next to me. I looked out the window with the hot air blowing in my face knowing I was looking at a marvel of time and geological process with not even a hint of understanding. The Namib truly is a world of boundless richness, beauty and complexity.

The shadows lengthened and every shape and curve became more accentuated, colours deepened and the sea shone like an enormous spotlight behind us and then finally blinked out, disappearing behind the horizon.

The dunes turned from molten gold to deep ochre red, growing in height and stature until the giants of nature; the dunes of Sossusvlei came into view. These dunes are over 400m high, solemn, ancient and some of the tallest in the world. One can see why Sossusvlei is a muse for artists, photographers and soul seekers as you cannot help but fall deeply in love with her at first glimpse.

The famous dunes of Deadvlei and Sossusvlei

  

The clay floor of Sossusvlei has been carved into tree shaped patterns by seasonal water flow

We flew in silence, in awe of what we were seeing, hoping in some small way to capture the magic on camera.

Landscapes of Sesriem

Sesriem canyon

Coming into land at Sesriem Jan made the announcement “Echo Zulu Papa (the call sign for our aircraft), two nautical miles south of the Desert Lodge airstrip……” to which we got a curt reply to please change our frequency to 123.45 (the pilots chat line) In a moment of serendipity it turns out that Roland, the guy we had bought the plane from a year prior had just got his first charter job with Desert Air and was based at Desert Lodge! After tying down EZP we headed off to Desert Camp (http://www.desertcamp.com) where we had booked accommodation and spent the evening catching up with Roland and having a braai under desert skies……..



Desert Camp