Namibia

Ok, ok, I’m back now and even though this blog is way late, well here ya go. Namibia is incredible. I know I keep saying that about every place but it just keeps getting better and better. I don’t even know how the rest of the trip can top this but I have a feeling it will. My expectations for Namibia were so different than my experiences. The best surprise of my life, I might add. I had never even really heard anything about Namibia before except that is where Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt decided to have Shiloh. Other than that, Namibia held nothing for me. I honestly thought that there was nothing there. Alright, so we arrive into Namibia on Valentines Day and listen to our first Diplomatic briefing. In most of the ports, we have officials and diplomats come (usually from the Embassy) onto our ship and talk to us about some of the logistics of the country. This was the first time they had done it though and it pretty much scared us to death. They told us how we need to always watch our things and need to be wary of everyone you meet etc. This is important information that we all need to hear during pre-port but sometimes they over-do it to the point where we are so fearful of everything that it closes us off from experiences. So it was a mixture of that and almost non-interest that I had coming into Namibia; not the greatest way to start off a trip. After that was over, we were greeted by a girl’s choir from Windhoek (capital of Namibia) singing and dancing for us down on the dock. Their voices were amazing. What a way to get welcomed to Namibia! I wish I had a way to record it and let you all hear because it was so beautiful. It brought tears to my eyes because it felt so beautiful and untouched. I can’t describe it but it felt like Africa; this welcoming, open, inclusive, fragile but strong. I felt like I was home. I hadn’t even felt “homey”in Europe but here it was completely different. It really makes you think; our voyage is themed migrations and in all my classes there is a focus on evolution and how our species came from Africa, and there I did feel like I belonged. Interesting ya? Well these girls were amazing. They were wearing hand-made dresses and had moves like you wouldn’t believe. We got to meet them and hang out with them afterwards and they were so sweet and friendly. They had no reservations about making you their new best friend. It was heart-warming. We are incredibly lucky to have met them and had this experience. After that I walked around Walvis Bay with Jordan and Faith a little and leaving the port we discovered that a bunch of vendors had set up camp right outside the port gates. They had mostly come from the Northern parts of Namibia with their hand-made art and traditional crafts to sell to us because apparently word travels that a huge ship with lots of students was coming to buy things. What they had for sale was beautiful! Hand-carved chests with the Big Five, traditional masks, bowls, carvings, statues, jewelry, and so much more. I wanted to buy it all and had I been able to fit more into my hands I would have. We wanted to eat first and had to get cash out so while Jordan and I were in the ATM, Faith met this woman outside of the bank and got to talking and asked where we should go to eat. She pointed us in the right direction and we started walking, and she started following us. Apparently she had invited herself to lunch with us. That was fine, we like meeting locals. Her name is Agnes and she has all our addresses so ma, watch out if you get a visitor from Namibia at your door! She was really nice and we found out she was a preschool teacher and has a son. It was fun but at the end when we got the check she looked at Faith and was like, “You pay for me, ok?”Faith didn’t really know what to do so she was like ok. Interesting but ok whatev. We went back to the vendors and bought lots of stuff and then they had an FDP so they had to go. I went back to the ship to rest a bit and as soon as I get in the door Vanessa comes and finds me and we went to explore some more. We met these guys who showed us around the city and it was an amazing tour that I’m pretty sure SAS couldn’t have beat. We even got to see the townships where all the poor people live. It’s kind of like seeing the projects or ghettos. All the people were waving at us and saying hello and the kids were running around us playing. Some people looked at us like they had never seen white people before. Incredibly fascinating. Pumla and Savaci, our new African brothers, were awesome and so nice. They were just interested in learning about our culture and sharing theirs with us. We were kind of sketched at first but it turned out to be amazing. We went back to the ship after a long day to get all dressed up and meet our friends for a Valentine’s Dinner. We had heard about this great restaurant called the Raft so we hailed a cab and went. About twenty minutes later we pull up to this circular hut in the middle of the water with lights all around it and the sun going down behind it. It was beautiful and the food inside was good too! We sat around for hours eating fondue, Kudu, Springbuck and drinking incredible South African wine. It was an incredibly romantical night haha. The girls kept missing our boyfriends though so we caved and gave them a call on the cell. Neither Vanessa or I can talk to ours though (they happen to be in the Dominican Republic and the Bering Sea respectively) so a voicemail had to suffice. At the end of the night, happy and full and in love with Africa, we pile 6 people into one of their small taxis (another taxi driver tried to steal me too!) and head back to the ship for a sleepover on the deck. We thought this would be the best place to do it because it’s hot and there’s no wind. We were stoked. We started off the night with 5 of us sleeping outside and only 3 woke up together. We also discovered that it gets very cold in the middle of the night and that it often rains. Not so fun after all but a good start to Namibia.
The next morning, Vanessa and I had a Sea and Sand dune trip. I don’t think we really knew what we were doing but we were excited to go anyway! Jordan managed to snag a last-minute spot on the trip too. The first half of the day was spent on a boat in Sandwich Harbor where seals played in the water around us and dolphins swam next to us and pelicans flew above us trying to match our speed. Seals would climb onto the boat too and we got to pet them and watch our guide feed them. We drove next to this seal island too where all the seals were laying out and playing and the little ones were swimming in and around the waves. It was so much fun and beautiful views too. We didn’t want to leave the boat but we finally came to the other side of the harbor where there were 6 Land Rovers waiting for all of us. We got in Harmon’s (pronounced Ar-mOn) rover and drove all around the beach and next to the Dunes. A few days before our arrival there a whale had washed up on the shore. Everyone tried to save it but it died after a couple days because it’s lung had collapsed on him. So we came across part of its ripped off jaw bone and 50 meters further down, the whole whale itself. I haven’t ever seen a whale that close and it was weird. He was huge and it was so sad, you couldn’t even see it’s original face because its tongue had swelled up to such an enormous size. We got to touch it too. So that was kind of depressing, some jerk climbed on top of it too and I was about to punch him in the face. But we kept driving down the surf and eventually we were driving through the dunes up and down, it was like a Disneyland ride! Harmon busted out Red Hot Chile Peppers and the new Coldplay so Vanessa and I were singing it at the top of our lungs in between fits of laughing, driving through the dunes and holding on for dear life. We stopped for a picnic lunch on the beach of oysters and champagne and got to watch the dolphins swimming along the waves. Jordan of course jumped in after them and tried to swim with them but no luck. While they were setting up for lunch, Vanessa and I hiked up a dune to get the full view. Incredible. And totally worth hiking in the desert sun on sand. We kept driving up and down the dunes and even drove down backwards on some of them and came to the top of this dune where you could run and jump off and you went so far because the dune was super steep. I’ll post pics I promise! I thought I had it figured out but most are still too big to post. By this time, Harmon had become our good friend and so we made dinner plans with him because his girlfriend owns a restaurant called Harry Peppers that we had heard good things about. So driving back to the office, we got to see the salt flats by the harbor. They turned the water on top of the salt bright pink and we tasted the salt –intense! It was a huge day and we were all wiped out from the sun and activity but we went to gather the crew and head to Harry Peppers. We ended up being late and Harmon wasn’t there when we arrived but the waiter called him and he came back to meet us. We had an awesome dinner (again). We had a big day ahead of us, but still wanted to see Namibia at night so Harmon had the waiter escort us out to a little local bar. It was awesome! And really funny because they pay American music in all the clubs where we’ve been so far. We met some fun people out and then headed back to the ship for what could possibly be out last night of life. We were skydiving the next morning. Woke up to clouds and were bummed cause we thought they might cancel it. We were already late and I’m pretty sure we got the only taxi driver in the country who lost on the way to the airport and drove at least 30 km slower than everyone else. We made it though, and they got all signed in and suited up and proceeded to freak out for the rest of the time. They had to drive you out into the middle of the desert where there was a tin roof we could sit under and then a room where they kept all their gear. They could only take up two people at a time and we were a group of like 25 kids so it took a long time and we were just hanging out in the desert with the skydiving guys who are so cool. Mias was my partner and were now Facebook friends, watch out! I don’t think I said two words the entire day. My friends were all worried cause they had never heard me not talk for more than a few minutes, go figure. But soon it was my turn and there wasn’t anything I could do. I got strapped up and we got into the plane. Mias had to hold my hand the whole time and tried to get me not to think about it but the plane just kept going higher and higher! Well my videographer got out to the edge first and just hung onto the wing outside the plane like no big deal, all of a sudden I was on the edge of the plane looking out over the desert and dunes and the ocean. And then I was gone. Flying. Floating. I don’t even know. It was incredible though. He let me fly the chute a little and we had a perfect landing. I was so excited afterwards! It was so incredible. Ah I can’t even describe it! I was so happy the rest of the day. It was already after 5 by the time the taxi came to get us at the place and we were at least 45 minutes from Walvis Bay and the ship and if were 0-15 minutes late to get onto the ship we get 3 hours of dock time in the next port. We were all so happy though and our driver was awesome and sped and we got the to the gate with 7 minutes to spare but the guard wouldn’t let us in cause the taxi didn’t have a port pass so we had to bride the official to let us in the gate to the ship. We handed him all the cash we had and the driver got us as far as he could go and we got out and booked it, I mean ran hard-core with all our bags to the ship and up the gangway and we made it in time! it was a miracle and the best day ever. Ah, I love Namibia. I want more time to explore Swakopmund (where the airport is). Ok now I need a writing break and then its blog South Africa!!! Be excited, safari stories to come.
Miss you all and love you so much!