Lueritz, Namibia

 

Leaving Capetown

We’re sailing on Oceania's Sirena, a 660 passenger ship out of Cape Town, South Africa. That meant a 3-hour flight to Newark. A 3-hour layover, and a 14 hour flight to Cape Town. We both managed to sleep about four hours on the plane, arriving at 4:30 PM. After some beers at the hotel, we slept most of the night. Next morning, we took a cab to the ship, arriving about noon. Unfortunately, we spent about 2 hours waiting in line to get onto the ship. Never did find out what caused the delay boarding the ship.

We spent the following day at sea, listening to lectures and playing trivia with Andy and Jim, our traveling companions for this trip.

Today we docked at Luderitz, Namibia. The desert comes right down to the ocean. Bartolome Diaz dropped anchor in this bay in 1487. Adolf Luderitz bought the land from the local Nama chief in 1883. Germany became the colonial power in South West Africa. There was a dispute about exactly how much land was purchased pushing the native tribes into the desert. In 1905, a concentration camp was established here. Several thousand natives from the Herero and Nama tribes died from forced labor on the town and railroad. Eventually 80% of the Herero tribe and 20% of the Nama tribe were killed by the Germans.  They also conducted medical experiments on the natives. The Nazis would appropriate these practices in the 1930s. Diamonds were discovered just outside of here in 1908. The ghost town of Kolmanskop is the remnants of this industry.

During the Great War, the South Africans in an effort to reduce the British Army occupying their country agreed to strike at the Germans in South West Africa. They brought an army of 30,000 soldiers and 6000 horses. Some of those horses were the first of the Wild Horses of Namib. We saw the descendants of those horses today. We saw several small groups to drink at a watering hole. Along the road we saw a large group of horses with the desert mountain background. There are 87 horses today. This area has been in drought for 14 years, so the horses have been fed grass, since there is not enough natural vegetation.

While we were in the desert, Jim did some sea kayaking. He declared it one of the best days ever, encountering numerous seals.