Days 177 to 183 - Week 27 (30th April 2007 to 6th May 2007)
Well we left the adventure capital of Swakopmund behind us and headed to Sossusvlei. This is a 32,000 sq km sand sea that covers much of the west of Namibia . The scenery here was wonderful with the dunes reaching a height of 325m, and in the evening light the colours were amazing. Most of use did a guided hike with a local bushman who pointed out things that you would just walk by with out even noticing. We then rushed to Dune 45 (the most photographed dune in Namibia) to watch the sun set and get that postcard photo we all wanted.
Our next natural feature visited was the Fish River Canyon, where our lookout over the 160km long canyon made for an unforgettable sun downer party. We pretty much devoured probably a canyon full of food between us - some of the best for sometime . Even a sneaky bottle of wine or two made an appearance - which made for one of the best meals on the whole trip. Not being able to sleep in the official camping ground meant that we had to resort to our old ways and found a bush camp not far down the road.
It was on May 2nd that we finally crossed into South Africa. We did the biggest truck clean so far before getting to Cape Town, where we had 3 new people joining us for the journey north. If only they knew what they were letting themselves in for !!! Nah - it was nice to have some fresh conversation and personalities on board. All in all though - it is an achievement to us all that we are still on speaking terms and actually still want to hang out with each other.
Finally reaching Cape Town - our ultimate destination for the last 6 months - what a great feeling that we had made it overland all the way !! We may have been 3 weeks late and had 6 people less then we started with, but we are here in Africa and still lovin it !! Its hard to believe what we've all been through to get here. Whatever is left in store for the remainder of our journey up to Nairobi and then Cairo - only the overlanding god knows.
The first night in Cape Town, we all went out to an all you can eat Mexican. I think a few of use took this as a personal challenge - especially after the portions consumed in Swako. Over the next few days we had the choice to take it easy, shop till we dropped, eat till we popped, sight seeing or getting the cable car to the top of Table Mountain - or for the more adventurous, the choice to abseil 112m down one of the rock faces. If this sounds a bit tame you could get face to face with a great white shark by doing a cage dive - a record 11 sharks were seen over a 4 hr period - unreal. This week also welcomed in our 6 month mark on the trip. Yes it's really been half a year living in a big yellow truck.
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