I think I forgot to mention how beautiful the sunset was at A Little Sossus.  

 

We left early in the morning towards Solitaire. We settled in and rode on until we got to Moose McGregors’ road side café where we stopped to taste his famous apple pie. Unfortunately Moose passed away a while back. About 40km north of Solitaire on the C14 stands the Tropic Of Capricorn sign. My first time crossing the Tropic of Capricorn on any vehicle. All previous times I flew across it. Take care when driving on the gravel road for on-coming vehicles, and sharp stones on the road surface. There are sections of the road where the desert winds cause the surface to become corrugated. You can, literally, bounce yourself off the road.

After crossing the desert plains you drive onto the escarpment and then through the Kuiseb Pass. The drive across the highlands is rugged and picturesque. You then negotiate the Gaub Pass. Take care, there are no crash rails on the side of the road and the drop into the pass is a long way. At the bottom of the pass there is a scenic picnic area where we stopped. I had a chat with Marnus from Windhoek who was doing his first trip on a Honda CRF250. The brothers climbed up the mountain and through a kloof and disappeared for at least half an hour only to appear on the other side of the road. It was then that two sets of fellow travellers stopped and gave us a message that the caravan was standing next to the road about 5km back. 

We turned back and when we got to the rest of the party we found out the axle of the caravan bent and as a result the one tire bit through the floor of the caravan and started biting into the fridge that was standing atop of that area. The caravan was no longer road worthy. By the time we got there most of the stuff was already packed out of the caravan onto the trailer and into the Landy and bakkie. The decision was already made to leave the caravan in desert. We assisted to strip down he caravan and left not a lot behind. The carcass and curtains was probably all that was left. 

 

Once you are  on the desert plains the road is not very interesting. The surface is great and we could keep a constant speed on the bikes. All three GoPros were put to good use to capture good footage. I cannot at this stage speculate how much data we have captured but the end result will make a great video.

When we got onto the salt roads going towards Walvis Bay we sped up even more. The closer we got to the coast, the temperatures started dropping again. As we got close to Walvis bay Dune 7 lay to our right hand side. The famous Dune 7 and my fist glimpse of it. Silhoutted against the afternoon sun one could see the people walking on the crescent of the dune. We had a well deserved late lunch at the Spur in Walvis Bay before heading towards Henties Bay. The sun set as we got to Swakopmund and we headed north with the ocean close to the road on our left hand side. We are staying in the house of a cousin of Elsabe’s in Henties Bay and for the first time in over a week we are sleeping on beds and have a constant flow of hot water. After unpacking all the stuff Elsabe and Zelda started with all the washing. I think it took three days to do all the washing and get rid of the dust as every single thing that was in the caravan had to be washed.

The kids discovered 30 Seconds and we started playing by our own rules which caused a lot of laughter. Eventually the rest of the party went to bed and the three bikers retired to our room where we continued with the game. At some point we were so tired that none of the answers made any sense. We slept like babies that night and I woke up when Dawid snuck into the room to retrieve the 30 Seconds cards.

After some practical reorganisation of the “stuff” we headed off to Brandberg Wes where Elsabe spent the first couple of years of her life. Little did I know what road lay ahead.l but that will have to wait until I can blog again.

Bis Bald!