First of all I want to apologize to you again for not hearing from me until now… Unfortunately we only had very sporadic internet again yesterday evening and so the upload of the blog entry was unfortunately not possible. I hope you can understand that 😉 This is Africa!
Today we moved again from Swakopmund to Kaliombo. The departure was planned for 09.00 am, in order to be able to master the 380 km as fast as possible. But since the F 850 GS of our photographer Sascha had problems with the radiator for some days (there was a lot of coolant leaking out), we brought the bike to a workshop yesterday evening. The manager of the Yamaha shop was a Namibia German and therefore he spoke good German. He was very friendly and very eager to help us. He told us that we could pick up the bike this morning. Accordingly Sascha and Gavin set off for the workshop at 09.00 a.m., which was 2 minutes walk away. When they weren’t back until 10.00 am, I also went over to see where the problem was. There we learned that the radiator had started to vibrate at the brackets and then the cooling lamellas had rubbed themselves against each other in one place and a leak had occurred. Because of this, the mechanics had tried to carefully weld the leak at the radiator.
That said, unfortunately this solution didn’t work as desired… After it was clear that it didn’t have the desired effect, a solution was added to the coolant to seal the leak from the inside. Unfortunately, that didn’t help either. When it became clear that the motorcycle could not continue to ride, the nice young Namibian German offered us another solution. In the workshop stood a Yamaha 1200 Super Tenere, which had obviously already experienced some adventures. With this motorcycle, a friend of his had made a complete world trip and according to his statements the motorcycle was in a perfect condition. So he offered us to transport the F 850 GS to Windhoek and we could take the 1200 Yamaha with us and deliver it to Windhoek. So we did it finally also, in order to lose no further time. When we had clarified everything, we could finally leave around 12.00 o’clock. On the way to Kaliombo lies the “Spitzkoppe”, a beautiful rock formation, which you can see from a distance (Spitz runs upwards, therefore Spitzkoppe). On the way there, we had some nice photo spots with the mountain in the background. Sascha, as a photographer, was absolutely enthusiastic about this opportunity. In the meantime he had already familiarized himself with his new vehicle 😉
After we took countless photos in front of this fantastic panorama, we drove on to the camping site of the “Spitzkoppe”. Arrived there, we strengthened ourselves with cold drinks. But we couldn’t recover for long, because Sascha wanted to take more pictures. So he jumped on the roof of the car of the three AfrikaScout girls and “whipped” us 😀 At this point: “Thank you for your effort, my friend!”. So we drove on all paths on the campsite looking for the best photo spots and finally we found many! But see for yourselves.
As already mentioned, everything had been very delayed this morning, we left Spitzkoppe at about 17:15 (we have to say that we still had about 150 km ahead of us and it gets dark at about 18:30 ). Since we didn’t want to drive too long in the darkness, we tried to make time on the asphalted roads to Kaliombo. We succeeded relatively well. Around 19:00, we arrived at the “Kaliombo Safari Camp”, which was a completely new experience for us. We turned right off the asphalted road, through a gate and drove through the bush for 10 minutes before arriving at the house. At that moment we realized that it was a huge farm. When we arrived there, a man introduced himself to us as Hans-Dieter. As it turned out, he is also a German from Namibia, but he has already lived in Germany for four years. His language was accordingly good. There we also saw our companions Reiner and Zimpi again, who arrived three hours before us. Hans-Dieter took us into his garden where he introduced us to his wife Gertraud (a very cordial woman). Next to the house there was a kind of carport with a big table, a bar and a grill place. Everything was extremely beautiful and designed with love – a place where you could feel very comfortable!
Hans Dieter told us countless stories about the life of a Namibia German, his life as a farmer and his past. Particularly shocking were the stories about poaching, which also exists on private land. Hans-Dieter often finds traces of poaching on his land. One really notices how close he is to these types of things. Around 23:30 o’clock he brought us to our accommodations for this night. In the middle of his lands he has built a bigger Tented Camps, which he rents out. But anyone who now thinks that these are normal tents is completely wrong. The tents are lovingly furnished from the inside, have a king-size bed and a bathroom behind the tent. All around the tent is only closed by fly nets, which gives the impression that you are lying directly in nature. And I will try to enjoy this experience now 😉 See you tomorrow! Sven
Product tip
Wunderlich Flow-Jet
The Wunderlich Flow-Jet is ideal for the Gravelroads in Namibia. One has a clear and unrestricted view to the front and gets enough air at any time in the heat. For me an absolute must-have on a tour like this.