Onjuva – Day Two
So night time hits and the new tent is up, my new sleeping bag is rolled out, my belly is full of good food and sleep is right around the corner. I notice it’s a little chilly out, but the sleeping bag should cure that soon enough. Crawl into my bag and off to sleep time.
2 hours later. Ok…probably shouldn’t have had so much water to drink right before bed. Stumble out to relieve myself. Is there anything worse than getting out of a tent in the middle of the night? Everything has to go back on. It’s noticably colder as I make use of the nearby riverbed and take the moment to do a little star gazing. Back to bed, but I think I’ll keep my pants on…oh, and I think I’ll add that longsleeve shirt. Not really much warmer, but I’d rather worry about sleeping.
I spend the next amount of time waking up every 5 minutes and rolling over trying to keep myself warm. Nothing’s working. Hooded sweatshirt is now designated as my foot blanket. Feet feel better.
More in and out of sleep and notice my noggin is cold. I sleep inside my sleeping bag…full body.
More in and out of sleep. Ok…I’m going to die out here. What do I have? Nothing…good. Ah…my tent’s rainfly…bust that sucker out! I start by putting on my lower body.
More in and out of sleep. Rainfly over my whole body. Tolerable.
6 am I see some sun hit my tent. Sleeping a little better as things heat up.
7am I’m finally getting comfortable and it’s time to wake up. Awesome night. Lesson learned. It gets cold in Namibia during the winter.
The morning started with some delicious instant oatmeal, some peacocks hanging out outside my tent and a hike to the marble mine. Just out of the camp there is a white marble mine which is pretty spectacular up close; blinding. (see pictures) Visited the chinese camp and said ni hao (hello) a couple of times. These men are here as miners and no one really knows why. I’ve added this to my list of things to do.
The rest of the morning was spent inhaling diesel fumes from a generator, watching the chinese men watch us, snake spotting and bar planning for the campsite.
The drive home. Somehow this drive took 2 hours longer than the drive on the previous day. The sites were still as amazing, but the lack of sleep made things a little less enjoyable. The giraffes were a nice touch. No elephants again.
Highlight of the trip: kids throwing stones at our car. John told Penny to turn around as this is apparently a huge problem in the area. Kids want sweets and if white tourists don’t stop the kids will throw rocks. I spot them down a side road and we go after them. We drive up to their house. John gets out. The kids see that it’s not just white tourists, but a big black man and they run away very quickly. John explains to the old Himba man the predicament and a young girl comes over. Both John and the old man talk to the girl. Next thing we know, the old man is wipping the girl with a thin stick. I don’t think she’ll be throwing any more stones. The sunset was nice though.
We get back into Opuwo about an hour later and glad I went.