mirror on the wall to my feet, who is the fairest of them all
Take care!
Tag: desert
Monochrome Monday 9-08
Shortly after sunrise at the Fish river canyon in Namibia. While waiting for the sun to crawl higher so that the light was able to reach the remaining parts (poodles) of the water. At that time, the term canyon was right. But, where was the river? The river took a rest. Will be back in the next rain period.
Nevertheless, while waiting, that other car came along raising a huge body of dust from the dry road. Back in the summer of 2020, I was able to see similar situations in Iceland. When seeing such only every now and then, it’s quite impressive. But, I’m glad to not have such each day. On the other hand, when mankind is unwilling to change its style of living, we will definitely see such everywhere on our globe on a regular base.
Here, the low-standing sun makes an interesting scene. But, when the sun dries out the country, nothing remains than stones and dust.
Take care!
Throwback Thursday: ghost town
Today, I want to show you two versions of the same image. On the left, you can see the original color version, and to the right the derived monochrome version.
Throwback Thursday: ghost town
Take care!
Throwback Thursday: orxy antelope
Although they seem very intense colored with the strong and distinct bars on their face, body, and legs, when looking at them directly, they vanish easily in their surroundings in the Kalahari desert and where else you spot them in Namibia. Regardless if the landscape is gray or reddish, they merge with the background. It’s really fascinating.
The first image was taken at 8:45 a.m. The second at 6:30 a.m. and the third at 8:40 a.m.
The last one is taken at 11 a.m. Do you find the second oryx in the image?
As usual, click on an image to enlarge it.
Take care!
Throwback Thursday: I’m back …
… from Namibia!
While writing this, I’m sitting in Frankfurt waiting for my connection flight on my trip back home from Windhoek, the capital of Namibia in southern Africa.
During the last two weeks, I was exploring the south of Namibia. We were traveling the deserts, steppes, and savannas of Namibia between Windhoek in the North and Lüderitz in the South. Namibia changed my image of an African country. I was faced with a modern and clean country. Covid 19 incidence of 1.x (raising up to 2.3 by the end of our trip). I was very surprised, how serious the Namibian people are handling Covid: entering shops, restaurants, and other buildings only when wearing a nose-and-mouth-covering mask and in the entrance area of each shop a hand sanitizer was set up. In my opinion, this is a reason for the extremely low incidence rate in comparison with other countries
It was a very relaxed stay (roundtrip of about 3,000 km) to see the country and many animals besides the roads. Btw. roads: in the past, I experienced the Icelandic gravel roads and bad roads in Scotland. But in Namibia, the road quality is even worse. Most of the roads are not paved and even the paved ones are not as smooth as we know it from middle Europe. Instead, the gravel roads have a lot of bumps and potholes, and they are very dusty (dust devils can be spotted quite easily).
Despite these ‘problems’, it was a very nice trip, well organized, and equipped with a skilled local driver. This was his first job after nearly 2 years of sitting home unemployed because of the pandemic. So, I was experiencing again an empty country. But I’m feeling very sorry for the people depending on tourism. Without tourists, they can’t earn money to make their living.
My aim for this trip wasn’t to go on a safari. Instead, I wanted to see the deserts of Namibia: like Kalahari, Stone-Namib, Sand-Namib. End of November, the rain season is about to start. So, the country was already dried out. To stress this fact, we were even greeted by burning houses on the ground of the lodge of our first stay. In less than an hour, three 2-floor houses burned down completely. The trigger was a spark issued by a workman’s tool.
You might know, the land, now being Namibia, once was a German colony more than 100 years ago and then taken over by the British Empire followed by South Africa. In 1994 Namibia became independent from South Africa after the end of the South African apartheid regime. But there are still very strong connections to South Africa. Nevertheless, different than South Africa, they made a couple of good decisions: no condemnation of white farmers, picking English as the only official language instead of choosing one of the 11 local languages (plus Afrikaans and German). So, all people speak at least two languages: their mother tongue and English (sometimes in total 3 or 4).
I was meeting black people speaking German perfectly, what a surprise. I was happy to see, that the people connect Germany positively and they are proud of their country.
To name my favorites of the trip, I have to start with the animals we saw at the Lodges, in the National Parks, and besides the roads. I don’t want to bore you with a list. Next, I would name the dunes of Sossusvlei / Deathvlei where the dunes of very fine red sand can easily grow higher than 300 meters (about 1,000 feet), the Quiver tree forest (endemic plants relative to the Alow Vera), and the formerly forbidden zone near Lüderitz where the Diamonds were found with the ghost town Kolmanskop (Kolmanskuppe), a former German mining company town.
I’m very glad to have seen Oryx a couple of times, the signature animal of Namibia. They are well adapted to live and survive in these dry and scraggy landscapes. And they are beautiful. Here I have one for you, I met in Sossusvlei. I guess, this image itself is a symbol for Namibia: a lot of space to roam (only 2.3 million people living in a country of nearly 3 times the size of Germany, where we have more than 83 million people ), deserts are dominating the land, but there is still life (the green). We were in Deadvlei, a part of Sossusvlei in the early morning because the shuttle service stops at 3 p.m. because of the heat. Two weeks earlier, a Frenchman died here because of the heat. they found him the next morning terribly treated by the sun and looking like being a double of Freddy Krüger.
P.S. While you’re reading this, I’m already back at home for 3,5 days and I have to admit, I’m still freezing a lot. More than a 30°C difference in temperature between Namibia and Germany. I want the warmth back or alternatively back into the warmth. But, I guess, I have to dream about it ☹️. Instead, I’m in quarantine for 2 full weeks because I came back from a virus variant area. What the f**k. How can Namibia be a virus variant area, when there is nearly no-one infected. But I can’t change this, so I have to love and reschedule a few appointments.
Stay tuned and take care!
A hike along lake Korission
Next, we surrounded the lake Korission with our car. Again, we have had to pass unpaved roads with a lot of street holes. We ended in a place with deep, soft sand. Because of we did non have had an off-road-car, we left the car on the road side at the unpaved road. Luckily the remaining space was broad enough to let other cars passing by. Beside 3 or 4 other cars, we were alone. Despite the beautiful beach here, nearly no one was here. We followed the track along the lake. I wanted to see the tiny river connecting the lake to the sea. On the sea site of the track we passed a few abandoned surf clubs. Unfortunately the fauna along the track was so high, so we weren’t able to see neither the lake nor the sea for most of the time. About an hour after our start we arrived at the river. The fisherman’s hut here was also closed. A very lonesome area.
Take care!
From the desert to the ocean
The unpaved road led us a little bit further to another unpaved parking ground, much bigger than the one we used for our tiny trip inside the desert. Here, were some more cars parking and a broad sandy track let up the hill. We stopped here, too, and walked up that track. It was quite exhausting because of the heat and the lose sand on the track. When we finally made it up the hill we saw the ocean, the most beautiful beach on Corfu and were surprised by some remains.
Although, no hotel or similar building was visible. Thus, only few people were here enjoying sun, ocean beach and silence – a place lost somewhere in the nowhere. But, it seemed once an open air bath must have been here. We found the remains of a kiosk, an open air shower, toilets and a bleachers. Unfortunately, the last visitors must have been Vandales. All the facilities were hard damaged.
Take care!
A trip to the desert at lake Korision
Although, Corfu is a very green island, there is a sandy desert located near the west coast.
A lake, parted from the sea by a small land tongue, is surrounded by a sandy desert. This landscape is very different from the parts of the island, we have seen up to now. The ground is covered by a thick layer of sand, similar to a sandy beach. Bushes with thorny twigs and leaves are growing here, as well as some smaller crops, which love dry grounds. Thick, black insects are flying from one blossom to the next, by paying no attention to the visitors. Shady places are very rare here.
It seems, the locals use this area for driving with dune-buggies and quad bikes through the hills. At least we found many skid marks here, implying this.
The lake itself, unfortunately, is surrounded by reeds. These plants are about 2 m high. So, it’s quite hard to get a view to the lake. From some of the sandy hills we were able to see many herons and other big birds standing in the shallow water and on sand banks or swimming around. But, even 1200mm (400mm + 2x tele-converter attached to a camera with an APS-C sensor) were enough to fill the frame. Furthermore, the sand didn’t give a solid ground, to get sharp images. You also have to plan with heat haze, when trying to photograph over such long distances. What a pity.
When trying to come here, pay much attention to the road. The last mile is an unpaved trail with many thick stones and deep road-holes. Here, at our first short stop, is a small parking ground for about 6 or 7 cars.
Take care!
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