Waking up in Tommys Lodge. It is a very gated guesthouse in this stripcity town of maybe 5000 citzen. Two thirds or more are probably living on one side of the road with paths, without names. In houses of metal or cardboard, plastic or whatever they have found. This is a goldmine town and the other side of the road with the lodge is more brick and cement houses, a couple of supermarkets and other lodges and nicer homes.
I have a very looong great breakfast spaning over three hours while writing the blog and downloading as much as I can of the book Invandrarna and pod casts like Framgångspodden and This American Life.
I role out and as a second breakfast I buy a chocolate ice cream, it is so good in the hot morning.
This may be one of the most beautiful and happy days of my life. I have had a shower, slept well, have less then a hundred to cycle today and no stress. I also have people to meet tonight. A week ago I posted on a Facebook page of my arrival in Namibia and that I would love to meet some people. A Swedish girl visiting her boyfriend responded and so now we all go camping together. So nice to meet friends!
I cycle in a medium pace listening to podcasts all day.
The scenary around is the most beautiful since that djungle, Bwindi forrest in Uganda. The clear blue sky and the sand brown mountains.
I take many pictures. I pass through a town and stop for lunch.
I get some local braied (BBQ) meat to put on my sandwiches. The children next to me giggle and laugh. Soon we discover that we all speak english and we talk a litle bit.
Houses are African and simple or colonial.
Most are very colorful, which I love.
The uphill after lunch is not steep but at least 20 km long with a slight head wind.
Hot and very tough. But now I can see the goal for today, Spitzkoppe. Great chocolate ice cream like mountains shooting up through the flat dessert landscape.
I finally reach the branch off road towards the attraction and it is a dirt road and half of theese last 30 km I have a strong side wind. That is probably good, because it is afternoon and hot. No clouds around.
It is fun to cycle on this road for most parts but I am so thankful most of my trip has been on taar. It is a lot of concentration needed to maneuver the bike in the more firm parts of the road. After about 50 m in one track it gets deep of loose sand and if you are not on your watch you go sliding down to deep and speed is lost, then you lose balance and you have to put your feet down not to fall. In this case it is great having a ladies bicycle. The other thing you have to watch out for is the bumps of dried water. The rain water gathers and creates small ditches. Ten or more in line of the other and this is very bumpy and putting the bicycle and the bags and gear to a very uncomfortable endurance test. The last and most difficult is sharp rocks that may puncture the tyres.
But I finally reach.
And it is a marvelous mountain and place. Wow! So happy I see this.
Cant believe I dont take my time and do more detours of famous landscape and sights. Upon arrival I meet the manager of the place who shows me to a camping spot which has great showers and bathrooms that are not on the map.
He surely thinks I am in the need of a good shower or two with my salt stained shirt. I have a walk around and it is a beautiful place.
Really cool rock formations and I also meet some people in my age, so I join them for a beer while waiting for my new facebook friends.
Once they arrive they discover they know each other and see each other every other week in the small capital of Namibia. We have a great night talking and grilling. Next day I walk around with the Swedish-Namibian couple.
We talk a lot.
See the others at times and just
have a beautiful day and calm greatly peaceful evening with brai (Bbq) under the stars.
The other group is also having fun and have more of a party from noon to midnight and we hear theire cheerie lafter and music in a distance. So much fun in the middle of nowhere. I really like Namibia.
I wake up and it is pretty much allready light but from where I sleep in the shadow I climb up to see the sun going up. This landscape is like big pepparkaka dows, formations are very different. The rock is something like a poroes granite, falling apart and eroding from water and wind in to a rough sand.
I take my bicycles before the others wake up
and go to take some pictures in the village. I also get this bright idea of buying 10 local mobiles, village art to have an auction on Facebook.
PÃ¥sk is soon coming up. I really like these myself.
I give one to the couple I see as my hosts here and closest company. The others I take pictures of and later post on Facebook. These should be able to bring in the last money to the fund for the trip and at the same time it has allready given theese locals a lot of food on there table. They were not cheap about 20 USD each. And I did not bargain.
We have a nice breakfast all of us together maybe 10 people. Then I set of in to the dessert.
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