Godzilla Pass

Posted on May 2, 2015 by admin in Africa + Blog + Namibia

Blog 25 by Mick: Godzilla Pass

Tanya and I have been keeping a travel diary on this trip so we can keep track of what we have been doing and have some notes from which we can write the blog, which is becoming more and more important as we slip further and further behind. Often our daily entry is about a paragraph or two, sometimes as little as a few words if all we did was “chill on the beach”, sometimes half a page or maybe more if something interesting happened. For the day we did Van Zyl’s Pass, it was over 2 pages. And the first 3 sentences of that entry summarise the pass rather well.

“Well, Van Zyl’s pass hey. Fuck me what a monster. That pass is badass.”

Van Zyl’s Pass is one of the great adventure riding Trophy Routes in Southern Africa. If Kaokoland is the golden crown of Namibian adventure riding, then Van Zyl’s is its crown jewel. It is well known and well respected because it is technical, remote, and in some places downright scary. Back in South Africa when discussing riding routes for northern Namibia, Van Zyl’s came up every single time as a must do for serious off-road adventure riders, and was described to me as being “like Bezuidenhouts (the off-road pass we did back in KwaZulu Natal in blog 4) but bigger”. Which I suppose is true enough, but akin to describing Godzilla as being “like a lizard, but bigger”. Anyway, what I’m trying to put forward here is this stretch of road isn’t for the faint hearted, the under-experienced or the ill-prepared.

Getting to the top of the trail – hope you like rocks.

We got some intel on the route our usual way – talking to people who had done it. In this instance though we went so far as to also track down some photos and read a few ride reports as it was obvious Van Zyl’s was a little above and beyond normal off-road riding. One fellow we spoke to online suggested that it might be too much for Tan and that attempting it loaded was “insane” and requires “balls of tungsten, not steel”. And this is coming from a motorcycle tour guide who has done it many times and on many different bikes. He was also the only guy to call ‘bullshit’ on the Bezuidenouts comparison, describing it as a whole ‘nother level of hectic.

Matter of fact, I don’t mind rocks so much. A good steering damper does wonders here. Note you can see the backyard repair job I did to Tanya’s fender on the RH stantion cover. It got a crack in it all the way back in Australia from an altercation with a tree, but it took the nasty corrugations from Purros to Opuwo to break it in two. I did the advriders 1st pass repair job – duct tape. That lasted about 2 hours. So the night in the camp ground I fixed with an Aluminium Composite, which is engineering bullshit for a beer can I found in a bin sandwiched between a disposable cake tin from our breakfast with 2-pack epoxy resin. 10000kms later its still there.

If I’m honest, this news put a little doubt in my mind. I went back to the photos and reviews we had found and pondered whether this was really such a great idea or not. If something went wrong, the nearest hospital of any consequence was 1000kms away in Windhoek. But I was confident in the bikes and our setup, and pretty confident in our ability to deal with whatever challenges came up one way or another. And I knew I would be kicking myself for a long time if we never even attempted it, especially after being forced to give up on the Doodsakker dream after failing to secure an Angola visa over the Christmas period. So that’s how we found ourselves at the campground at the top of the pass that morning.

The first 2.5km or so from the campsite wasn’t challenging, just rocky, narrow and pretty slow. We rode past a couple Himba huts were the men were herding their cattle and goats from kraal to pasture. They waved happily enough but looked at us a little surprised and intrigued, maybe even a touch confused. I’m guessing they must question why people would ride this track by choice. It must be strange for people whose life is so naturally tough they spend most of their energy trying to make things easier, to watch tourist vehicle after tourist vehicle drive all this way to tackle some fucked up piece of rocky mountain path which would make their billy goats trip over. Maybe we are strange.

Shit just got real.

We arrived at our first obstacle after only about 10 minutes of riding, got off the bikes and walked up for a look-see. It was plainly obvious we weren’t on the wrong trail, and that the stories of the trail’s evilness were true. It was a rocky, washed out and a steep stretch of trail around 40m long. I walked the obstacle a couple times, picked a line to ride, filled a few holes with rocks and went for it. And binned it within about 20m. On a very steep off camber section washed down to bedrock the front wheel locked while feathering the front brake and the bike went down to the right at slow speed. It was a bad start.

Really real. Picking lines through hectic rocks.

Line picked. Its go time. And 30 seconds later it was bin time. I think this photo shows quite well how steep this prick of a thing was. Almost like a set of nasty rocky stairs in some spots.

Tanya wasn’t keen on attempting the obstacle – to be honest it was pretty damn hairy – so after walking my bike down the last of the rocky patch I walked back for Tan’s bike to ride that, hoping to conquer the obstacle after my failed effort. I missed out on redemption, but at least bettered my first attempt by getting about 30m down this time before dropping it. Bugger. Tan’s bike is actually 12mm lower than standard and 25mm lower than mine, and its suspension a bit softer than mine so with me on it the bike sits even lower again. I cased the bike out on a tall sharp rock, took a reasonable chunk out of the bash plate and dropped it. It was a doubly bad start.

The chunk of aluminium gouged out of the bashplate on the sharp rock in the foreground of the photo.

The yella-terra is successfully at the bottom.

Looking back up the track – yes this is the track. That the parts washed down to bedrock was off-camber made it that little bit extra tricky on the bikes.

We rode on. There were various steep but negotiable sections, in amongst the odd nasty semi-obstacle (as in it was a bad bit of trail, but not bad enough that we had to stop and pick a line) and the occasional nice fun bit of rocky trail. At one point we came around a corner, with Tan leading as she likes to do in tough technical terrain, and the trail dropped straight into a nasty steep and rocky section. While it was nowhere near as bad as the first obstacle, it was steep, washed out and reasonably hairy. And because Tan quickly found herself in the middle of it all, she didn’t have time to over think it and did what she had to do. She rode through it to the bottom, straight into a gully and up a quite steep and loose rocky climb. As is generally always the case, the hairy moments that come out of nowhere are never caught on camera.

Tan on a decent bit of trail. The photos as always don’t do the gradient justice.

My bike way down at the bottom of an obstacle, and me back at the top to help with Tan’s bike. Walk walk walk.

Continuing on, we encountered a few more proper obstacles. At all of these we would stop, walk it, pick a line and move rocks around as necessary. I’d then ride my bike down and then Tan would decide whether to attempt it or not. Generally she would have a crack at it first, and either make it, or stop and have to paddle her bike though the nastiest bits. A couple times I would have to chip in and help walk it down the real steep sections.

Link to Vimeo of me on one of the obstacles. You can see you had to pick a line and ride it – get off line and you’ll be off the bike.

Riding Tan’s bike. The suspension feels too squishy for my beer inflated mass.

The blue beast on a decent bit of trail. These actually were the good bits.

In this manner we covered another 3.1kms in a bit over an hour. We came to a dry creek crossing and pulled up for a breather under a tree, the shade was welcome as it was now mid-morning and starting to heat up into a proper Kaokoland summer’s day. When looking for rocks for our cairn ceremony, I found water dripping from Tanya’s bashplate tank. The heavy whack I gave it on the sharp rock in the first obstacle had cracked a weld, so we recovered the water to a water bag. It was not the place or the season to be wasting 3 litres of drinking water.

My chosen rock for our Cairn Ceremony. The deal is you get a rock at the top of the trail, put your name on it and place on the cairn at the bottom.

Tan and her precious.

Tan on a steep descent into a small gully.

Near bottoming out the rear suspension and using good technique on yet another tricky climb. Clamping the tank with the knees and leaning forward over the bars to keep the front wheel where it belongs, on the ground…

Winning…. another successful steep and rocky climb.

The next section wasn’t particularly challenging, just rocky and slow with ride-able climbs and descents, and one proper obstacle before reaching a cairn with named and dated rocks celebrating people’s completion of the pass. We had done 8kms by now including passing the Tracks4Africa waypoint for “Van Zyl’s Pass”. Arriving at a cairn we figured we must have completed the pass proper, and celebrated with a rest and placed our rocks on the cairn. On the GPS I could see that there was still more trail to do before we hit the valley bottom but figured the gnarly stuff must all be over.

Arriving at Van Zyl’s Pass. This is it apparently, or at least according to Tracks 4 Africa anyway.

Yet another obstacle. This one about 20m before the top cairn.

Riding it. This one wasn’t too serious, just needed a bit of a look before barreling it.

Tan paddling her way through.

Placing our rock. We didn’t carry this one from the top! We cheated. Forgive us.

But this itty-bitty one I carried.

Tan hamming it up at the top cairn.

And so it seemed. The next 2.4km took only 10min. We reached a lookout point and had an early lunch (salami and jellybeans), enjoying the views of the Marienfluss Valley which wasn’t far below. After 30mins of photos and snacks we hit the road again, assuming that the trail must gently follow a spur to the valley bottom. Well we were mostly right, in fact, just replace the descriptive verb “gently” with “viciously” and we were 100% bang on.

More decent trail on the way from the top cairn to the look out. Steep and rocky, but ride-able no problem.

The Marienfluss Valley not far below. We were so close but so far.

Truly amazing scenery, and no-one for miles. I should actually say kilometres being metric and all, but miles are further.

The two conquering steeds.

Tan happy(ier) after eating all her jelly beans.

Within 500m we had arrived at an incredibly steep washed out monster motherfucker of an obstacle. It was a serious bloody thing. Tan wasn’t convinced we would get down at all, and after walking down and up again I knew it wasn’t that bad but still wasn’t convinced it was actually ride-able. Walking the bike down looked doable but physically dificult to hold the bike up on such a gradient, so I had a crack of riding it anyway. I picked a line which basically followed the fall line, sat on the bike, started it and let out the clutch before I second guessed my bravado. I stood up, leant back, and feathered the brakes as much as I dared and made it, but not by much.

Me on the intercom to Tan. “You’re not going to like this”

Tan looking down and me looking up. This thing is gnarly.

And looking up. This thing is really proper gnarly.

“but but but? We’re finished?! I put my rock on the cairn and everything!”

But I couldn’t do it twice. The bike was right on the limit of traction coming down and seemed like it would slip at any time on the loose gravel and steep gradient. It wasn’t a good feeling and I wasn’t keen at all on pushing my luck twice, so Tan and I walked her bike down.

Riding my bike down. If you look close you can see my heart in my mouth.

Coming down the fall line – I was worried if I went off camber the rear wheel would slip out.

Actually had a reasonable head of steam by this point, relatively speaking anyway. I could only feather the brakes so much with out locking up.

You can get a sense of the speed here…. the rear wheel locked on the last super loose stuff but it was all over now. My heart is still in my mouth though.

Looking down before walking Tanya’s bike down. That was hard work in itself, even with two people. Riding is tricky, risky, and a bit scary, but walking the bike is physically taxing. You’ve got to pick one option; be tired or shit yourself.

From then on the trail was continuously steep and rocky. Even with the real nasty obstacle behind us, Tanya’s confidence was shot. She had thought the tricky descent was all over after the stop at the lookout and couldn’t come back from that mental closure, she couldn’t refocus. She had a few moments on the steep and loose descent, once dropping the bike into the trail-cutting cracking the fairing and doing some electrical damage, and another time actually bouncing off the track, around a tree, over a massive rock (about the size of a bar fridge) before maneuvering back on to the track now at much too high a speed and dropped it. It was a massive moment that thankfully didn’t end as bad as it could have. But mentally and physically she was spent.

The trail continues. More rocks. More loose gravel. Nastiness and at a serious gradient.

Steep. The last bit of trail

There was only one really tricky bit left before the bottom, so I rode both bikes down that. The last 2.2km from the lookout to the bottom took nearly an hour and ten minutes, mainly due to the amount of walking up and down reconnoitering obstacles and riding 2 bikes. By I was now pretty shagged after all this walking on a steep gradient in my bike gear, and maneuvering, man-handling and picking up dropped bikes all in the heat. Now at the bottom we rested under a tree before placing a new stone on the bottom cairn. There was physically no more “down”, we are unmistakably at the bottom. We had actually finished it this time. Including walking all the major obstacles, a 20min stop in the creek crossing to transfer water, a 20min stop at the top cairn to prematurely celebrate, and a 30min stop for lunch, the pass had taken us over 4hrs. That’s about 3hrs of ‘riding’ for 12.6kms.

The last obstacle. We could see the bottom cairn from here so knew this was it and it was all over.

Me riding Tan’s bike. She wasnt up for this last challenge.

Steep and rocky and…

…straight into a tight left hander other wise you go straight off the edge of the mountain. Just what you need after a rocky descent.

Looking up at Tan coming down the last bit to the cairn.

A few extra notes on Van Zyl’s (pronounced like “sails” but with a Z):

This is a serious and remote bit of trail. Proper serious and proper remote. If you are considering doing this trail in a supported group, as a minimum I’d recommend that you’d need to be an intermediate rider, reasonably experienced and pretty confident in your ability. If you’re considering going solo or loaded, then I’d suggest its really only advisable for more advanced riders. For my risk acceptance level at least, I’d think twice about going solo in summer. If you break yourself or your bike you’ll be lucky if your only waiting a couple days before someone comes past, if your unlucky it might be a couple weeks.

Obviously for this sort of terrain the smaller the bike the better. It will be more achievable and more fun. Loaded up I wouldn’t have wanted to have been on anything bigger than a 650cc machine. People have done it on 1200GS’s as part of supported groups (ie no luggage and minimal fuel), but I’d suggest this isn’t the terrain for a 1200cc machine. A South African friend of ours told us the story of a friend of his who attempted it solo and loaded on his 1200GS. He ran out of talent mid pass and got stranded – couldn’t go up and couldn’t go down – and paid thousands of dollars to have his bike recovered.

From our GPS log I’ve put together these notes which might help people get a handle on travel times for the pass. Note that at all major obstacles we would stop, walk it and pick a line, then bring the bikes down one at a time. Obstacles where I rode both bikes down obviously slowed us further. I’d guess that a small group of intermediate level riders would do it in a similar amount of ride time. A solo or pair of advanced riders could probably do it half these times.

• 10min for 2.5km from Van Zyl’s camp to 1st obstacle
• 1hr10 for 3.1km from 1st obstacle to creek crossing (1hr 20min for 5.6km cumulative)
• 20min stop at creek crossing.
• 20min for 1.4 km from creek crossing to top cairn (2hrs for 8km cumulative)
• 20 min stop at top cairn
• 10min for 2.4km from top cairn to lookout (2hr30min for 10.4 kms cumulative)
• 30min stop at lookout
• 1hr10min for 2.2km from lookout to finish (4hrs10min for 12.6km cumulative)

Buggered. Bloody buggered. And still isolated as hell with hours upon hours of off-road riding to do to get anywhere.

So tired our spelling failed us.

All done. “Fuck you Van Zyl you prick! What sort of sadist bastard builds a pass like this?”

We thought it might be interesting for Tanya to voice her thoughts on Van Zyl’s, so here it is.

Van Zyl’s according to Tan:

Mick had been advised by a friendly and helpful guy we’d been talking with online that Van Zyl’s might simply be too difficult for me and that either one of us doing it fully loaded was pretty mental. This guy had done Van Zyl’s a number of times on a bike so while it wasn’t what I wanted to hear at all, we appreciated and respected his input and thought about it a lot. Mick has actually seen what I can do on the DR and he was confident I could do it even if I was a little nervous. It’s been a long time coming but I am at the stage where I can more than hold my own off-road. We decided to go for it.

These famous, trophy routes don’t always live up to the hype. Van Zyl’s for me did and sort of didn’t. In terms of the main obstacles it was much harder than I envisioned. But I was pleasantly surprised that the riding in between the obstacles, though proper technical and challenging with steep rocky up and downhills, was really good fun and represented a chance to mentally prepare yourself for the next really hard obstacle. This made a huge difference for me as I expected an unrelenting 10km of high-level technical riding with no respite whatsoever. Having the chance to recover energy and confidence in between the insanely difficult obstacles was awesome.

The two hardest obstacles I didn’t consider doing. On an unloaded dirt bike I would have given it a shot. But on the fully loaded DR I wasn’t going to attempt it. I like to at least have a go at just about anything but in this case the obstacles were so far outside my ability on that bike that I was humble enough to admit it. So in those cases I just watched and learned from Mick doing it and treated the monster obstacles as an aspirational goal for the future.

One of the main challenges of the pass is its very remoteness. And being so remote it wasn’t a simple case of completing the pass. We had to do it without hurting or overly exerting ourselves, and without doing any significant damage to the bikes. Plus we couldn’t afford to lose any fuel. Once the pass was finished we still had a heck of a lot of off-road to cover after that, in seriously hot conditions in the middle of nowhere.

Damaged fairing – few cracks from a brief meeting with a rock. Seems rock beats fiberglass as well as scissors.

What made Van Zyl’s Pass really hard for me was the last 2km of the trail. At the 8km mark (which took hours to get to I might add) there is a cairn where people place a rock inscribed with their details. Tradition dictates that you take a stone from the start of the pass and place it at the end of the pass. Seeing the pile of rocks we made the mistake of thinking that was the end of the challenge and just after the look out and around the corner we would come to the valley floor. This was not the case at all.

But by the time we found out there was a little more of the trail to do, I have made a huge mental shift that I could not come back from. In my mind I had slayed the dragon and had eaten my celebratory packet of jelly beans. It was all done and my energy levels lasted as long as they needed to. When we came upon the hardest obstacle of the whole route I was DONE. By God, did I struggle that last 1km. It was utter torment and I found it so steep and lose that my hands were shaking at times. I’m not proud to say (but am not ashamed either) that there was a minor amount of weeping that occurred which is how Mick and I have come to grade the seriousness of the off-road riding we do. Van Zyl’s is only the third off-road ride to have reached weeping level of difficulty. I tend to get teary when stressed, frustrated, scared or when I crash a bunch of times – all of which happens on the hardest of the hard routes. There would be another before we left Kaokoland. But eventually we got to the end of it all and onto the mercifully flat ground at the bottom. There we found the cairn that really marked the end of Van Zyl’s.

I had worn my Garmin watch and heart rate monitor that day and found that over the 12km morning ride I had burned 2100 calories. It felt like more.

I was glad it was over and have come to be pretty proud of my efforts that day. I was really satisfied with how I handled the uphill sections. I had that down pat and absolutely monstered them, throwing the DR piggy around like it was a 250cc dirt bike. On these I was bloody impressive! The steep, loose downhill (especially at the end) I felt I could have done better. I was fatigued, had been having issues with my rear brake (later found out it had a hole in the brake line leading to air bubbles and less than reliable performance) but if I’m honest I just wasn’t comfortable and didn’t try too hard. Look it was bloody hard, loose scary shit but when it came down to it I knew there were a couple of occasions I attempted the obstacles in a less than confident committed way then took that as ‘enough’ of an attempt then just got Mick to help.

Link to Vimeo of Tanya on one of easier climbs. There was one decent line over a big lip, but it led straight into a tree.

But I was glad we did it in the end. Van Zyl’s type riding represents my riding Achilles Heal. Fully loaded with 30-odd litres of fuel on steep rocky, washed out descents is not comfortable for me. That is when I feel the weight of the bike. I sort of hate it. On this terrain my usual defense of good technique is not always enough as it requires a level of strength to manage the weight and momentum of the loaded up bike that I sometimes just don’t have. But perhaps that is just a cop out and increased confidence and more aggressive riding would make the difference. Either way, it was good pushing myself and identifying areas to work on both skill and confidence wise. Having said that, I would like nothing so difficult for a good long while. A GOOD long while.

STOP! Himba Time!

Posted on April 23, 2015 by admin in Africa + Blog + Namibia

Blog 24 by Tan: STOP! Himba Time!

We had a somewhat restless sleep despite our fatigue as I was far from comforted by the campsite custodian’s response to my question of whether we were safe from lions at the campsite. We had already found ourselves inadvertently camping in a place where there were lions in the past, like our unplanned camp in the Ugab River, and I didn’t want to do the same again. He thought for a moment and responded that while the lions were usually around here they had moved on to the next river valley so we would most likely be fine. It didn’t exactly inspire confidence in a deserted campsite.

Kaokoland in all its glory

The DR ate the corrugations up for dinner

Happily we survived the night, and celebrated that milestone in our now traditional way; by sharing a hot tin of baked beans and a black coffee. Our next destination was the relative ‘big smoke’ of Opuwo. After the hot and tiring riding from Sesfontein to Purros we were expecting much of the same riding and mentally prepared ourselves for another tough day. We were pleasantly surprised by the conspicuous absence of sand along the route and we spent the first part of the morning taking in the desolate beauty of the place along nice gravel road. There was a heat haze in the distance, the air smelt hot and the aridity of the place was such that it tickled the skin as the moisture was slowly drawn from our faces into the thirsty desert air. While the corrugations were a bit hectic at times our DRs, with their motocross forks, sliced though them like a hot knife through butter.

The ever-present heat haze in the distance that followed us everywhere we went

The Giraffe Mountains in the distance

We had the music blaring in our helmet and grins like a Cheshire cat the whole way. It was like there was no-one else on the planet but us, which has been a common feeling for us in this part of Namibia. It is the greatest of treats a biker could ask for. I imagine it is the equivalent experience for an art fan to get a private showing in the vaults of the Louvre. We were in an adventure motorbiking paradise and it seemed to be there for no-one but us. I couldn’t help but think I was excelling at life at that point. I was doing what makes me happiest, in one of the most amazing place in the world with a fellow that I am rather fond of. If there are ever doubts of the wisdom of shelving a conventional life and all the perks and comforts that come with it, it is days like these that dispel those thoughts altogether.

Corrugations! Everybody’s favourites. Luckily these ones all but disappeared at 100km/h

The scenery was fantastic in Kaokoland’s near monotone, copious yet beautiful near-nothingness kind of way. Unlike our last week of riding, the kilometres came easily and we relished the chance to take it all in with minimal exertion. As we progressed the familiar yellow sand dunes of the Skeleton Coast Park appeared on the horizon. We had been informed that the desert elephants that usually line our route were now chasing the water and foliage within the Skeleton Coast park. We would have obviously loved to have seen the robust desert elephants of Damaraland and Kaokoland but we were more than a little relieved that they had moved on from our planned route for greener pastures, so to speak. They are a huge hazard for motorbike riders in this part of the world as they can be extremely aggressive and the winding and sandy nature of the trails makes the deck ever more stacked in the favour of a four tonne elephant in any biker-elephant altercations.

The little gang of Himba kiddies we met in Orupembe. Note the little fella on the right in longsleeve jersey and no pants.

The CBD of Orupembe

Enjoying an icy cold coke and sharing our biscuits with the kids

We came upon a village marked on the map as Orupembe. Once again it was a place that seemed barely worth printing on a map but it was the closest thing to a landmark we’d seen all morning so we stopped there for lunch and a cold drink. However, our little stop for coke looked over before it began when we arrived at the closed shop. While considering our limited snack options (salami and biscuits) we came across a bunch of little Himba kids who were shy but very keen to gawk at us.

The kids inspecting our kit

Chilling in the shade

We grabbed a couple blissfully cold cokes and enjoyed the limited shade on offer. Slowly the kids became more comfortable with us and were soon happy to share our biscuits. They took great interest in all our gear and after they had inspected everything in fine detail they were keen to have their photos taken. Many times. They loved it and it made for a nice rest from the road.

This is a young Himba girl as evidenced the two plaits of braided hair called ozondato, the form of which is determined by the paternal clan she belongs to

The little boys tend to have shaved heads

Another girl with a killer smile

These types of necklaces are very common (and heavy) and are made from iron electric fence wire

The braids on the girls’ heads are actually a sewn in weave made of goats hair.

Look how striking the girl at the back is

After we parted ways with our new mates the riding improved even more as we rode though the Giraffe Mountains. It was unreal riding through the undulating, winding rocky trails. The riding was fun and at times a little technical and we were loving every minute of it. Before coming into Kaokaland we had heard many a story of people tearing the sidewalls of tyres on the sharp rocks. We can believe it but managed to avoid the same fate ourselves. We were running high pressures and riding with caution to minimise wheel spin.

The Giraffe Mountains offered up some of the nicest rocky trails of the day…but no giraffes sadly

Holy shit! Trees! Real live living things!

Excited for a non-dead straight road

As the day wore on the long distance and heat was starting to get to us. The technical riding we had been enjoying earlier in the day was now starting to annoy us if I’m honest which shows just how spoilt for great riding we had been lately. By now we were getting exhausted and overly keen for a cold drink and the wholesome food that the town of Opuwo could provide us with. Just as we were getting so close and ominous dark clouds were appearing in the distance, our pace slowed down even more as we rode up washed out roads exposing bedrock, which made for slow and bouncy riding. Fortunately, by the time we were really getting really tired, a nice graded road opened up before us and for the last 40km to Opuwo we managed 100km an hour.

Great fun

Having a breather

We had an awesome time screaming up these trails

And down roads like these

Edging closer to Opuwo it was sand and tiny river crossings

We stayed at the Opuwo Country Lodge, which was perched on the top of the hill overlooking the town. It is an impressive looking lodge with an infinity pool and amazing views. We blatantly ignored the lodge’s rule of smart casual after 6pm and had dinner in all our dusty and stinking riding gear. Dinner was an awesome rump steak with the best vegies I have had is so long. We arranged to stay the next two nights in their campground as our bodies and minds were crying out for a rest day. We spent most of our time by the pool chilling and trying to replenish energy stores as well as stuffing as much protein and minerals into us as physically possible.

The Opowu Country Lodge thankfully had a campground

LUXURY is …dining on non-canned food in a place like this

GOOD SERVICE is….politely waking up sleeping customers when the meals have arrived

During our last evening at the lodge we were sitting down to dinner when some guy came up and said ‘Mick, is that you?’ We couldn’t believe it. It was Mick’s geo friend Chris who lives in Arusha, Tanzania. Turns out he is in the area for a few weeks of mapping while his company explores for copper nearby. He had no idea we were in the area nor did we expect to run in to him there. This world of ours is a tiny one. It was great meeting him so unexpectedly and we are looking forward to catching up again with him in Tanzania.

I don’t think anyone really knows what smart casual is….but it is probably not this

THIS.IS.THE.LIFE

Before we knew it we were on the road again and heading towards our most significant challenge to date; a fully loaded descent of Van Zyl’s Pass. Once again fuel range was to be an issue so we filled up both the safari tanks and the secondary fuel tanks in anticipation of long routes in near total isolation – our favourite!

The morning started off rather poorly for me. While stocking up on supplies at the supermarket I realised it was a perfect chance to get some milk to drink. I had been craving non-powdered milk for weeks. I grabbed a half litre bottle of icy cold milk from the fridge, orange juice and a cake to share and joined Michael in the carpark for breakfast. I got a rude shock when a guzzled a mouth full of curdled milk. It was icy cold but very very off. An altogether unpleasant experience but on the bright side I no longer craved milk and I was well awake now. I tell you what, a triple espresso wouldn’t wake you up half as fast as a mouthful of off milk.

Opowu is the largest town in Kaokoland and it possesses a similar lack of charm as all sizable towns seem to – traffic, loitering people, litter and a disproportionate amount of bar and bottle shops. However what made the place interesting was the shear number of Himba men, women and children in town to do their shopping and other chores. It was like a fusion of the two worlds – you’d see extremely elaborately dressed Himba ladies with children strapped to their backs waiting in line at the checkouts or in line for vegetables. It looked like any old supermarket in any developing country except for the large number of topless women smeared in ochre and butter.

On the road again and more rocky trails

‘You have a bike too? We are now friends.’

We only had 150-ish km to cover today but in this part of Namibia and in this heat was always going to take a fair few hours. Compared to the riding we had done prior to Opuwo it was pretty tame but nice and challenging nonetheless. After several hours, we came across a remote Himba community. We saw a hire car and a foreigner with a bunch of locals gathered around him. We were in need of a snack and a rest and thought it would be worth seeing what this fellow was up to. He turned out to be a cool German guy called Thomas who was from Berlin and owned a KTM640. He had visited this place a couple of years previous and had taken photos of some of the Himba people. He had retuned with the photos keen to give them to the Himba who had posed for him. We thought this was pretty cool indeed. We grabbed a cold soft drink and sat in the shade talking and he was kind enough to give us bread and cold tomatoes to eat which was glorious. A shared love of bikes and a tomato exchange and viola! We are instant friends. So now we have another person to go riding when we got to Germany.

A young Himba girl – we never figured out the significance of her headdress

After a year of marriage or following the birth of their first child, Himba women add an elaborate animal skin headdress to their hairstyle like the one this young woman has on

The girls excitedly posed with anything they could get their hands on

The Himba are a rather fascinating group of semi-nomadic people concentrated in Kaokoland, the remote north-west corner of Namibia. They number around 30,000 and are sometimes referred to as the ‘red-people’ due to the cultures beauty norm that has the women lathering themselves in red ochre mixed with butter and animal fat. The Himba women in particular hold very tightly to their traditions and invest a great deal of time and effort in maintaining their appearance. The hairstyles have a varying degree of complexity which denotes their status and stage in life. The women sleep on raised wooden pillows in order to not damage their dreadlocks which are a mixture of ochre, butter, straw, goat hair and increasingly Indian hair extensions purchased in town.

How different could two women look? This girl was the most gregarious of the group and very keen to get a photo with me

The Himba women are fiercely proud of their traditional hairstyles and clothes and are more eager than the men to hang on to the old customs. This picture illustrates this well. We didn’t come across any male Himba in full traditional attire. These days the guys have regular haircuts and commonly wear contemporary clothing

An interesting thing about Himba culture is that its considered highly egalitarian with decisions split between men and women with women mainly managing finances. Although marriage is extremely important in Himba culture, extramarital affairs are encouraged for both men and women. The tragic affect of this is that despite the utter remoteness in which the majority of Himba live they have not been spared the scourge of HIV/AIDS. And it is some of their cultural practices that increase their vulnerability to HIV/AIDS infection. Polygamy is commonly practiced, people become sexually active very young and with child bearing so important in their society the notion of using condoms to address the spread of HIV/AIDS is one that is not likely to catch on at the speed it needs to.

Showing the Himba ladies my tattoos

A young Himba woman with her braids tied back indicating she is ready to marry

More elaborate jewelry and hairstyles

While we were sitting there one of the village guys came over with some of the local apple cider brew to give us to try. It was very outgoing of him to do so and his efforts were met with extreme laughter from the rest of the village. They thought it was hilarious that he was going over to these strange whities and they seemed to get a real kick out of our reactions to their local firewater. It was like a cloudy apple cider, which packed a fair bit of punch but fell short of sending us blind. Actually it wasn’t too bad at all. With the ice broken the group of young Himba girls gained the courage to approach us and interact.

The red colour that is used on the skin is considered a sign of beauty and they smear the mixture all over their skin, hair clothes and jewelry.

At the beginning there was the one girl shyly requesting a photo and before we knew it they were fighting for a turn in front of the lens. Every time we showed them the photos they would squeal with delight and try to come up with another pose or prop to pose with. They were loving it and were especially keen for photos with me. They demonstrated their jewelry to me and as I didn’t have any jewelry myself I thought they might be interested in my tattoos. To say they were excited was an understatement and the older ladies in particular were interested to see them and kicked the younger girls out of the way so they could inspect.

Hanging around the bikes

Himba girl looking badass in my sunglasses

An ever more enthusiastic round of posing for photos took place and excitement reached fever pitch when I taught the girls how to use the camera themselves. We went out to the bike and where we did a bit of a show and tell with all our riding gear. What amused me the most was the older ladies were just as curious as the young girls and refused to miss out on any of the action, insisting I take photos of them wearing my sunglasses. One of the girls was brave enough to get on the motorbike but seemed to balk at the prospect of going for a ride. It made for a fun break from riding and a lovely experience with the Himba people who we couldn’t help but be impressed by.

Everyone wanted a turn with the sunnies

Including the old ducks

They would not be left out of the fun

Our experience with the Himba people had been extremely positive and very much at odds with some of the travellers tales we had heard before coming to the region. We found them to be laid back, kind and extremely curious. Far from having them aggressively insist on payment for photos we never paid to take photograph and typically were asked to take their photos when they saw we had a camera. The difference for us really came down to the motorbikes making them more curious about us than the other way around. Additionally, we would always strive to strike up a rapport before even thinking of getting our cameras out. This was generally easy to do as the first thing on our minds when we stopped the bikes is taking off our gear, grabbing an cold drink and sitting under a tree for a good long while. By the time we are in the mindset of taking in the surroundings they are thoroughly curious. With me being a female I think they find this less intimidating and all the more curious.

The Himba aesthetic is extremely interesting and exotic and I certainly understand the desire to seek out these people and photograph them. However I think the mistake people make is by getting out of their cars where they are making a 5 minute stop and get straight in their faces with the camera. It is not normal and not how human interactions work. Think about it. It someone off the street appeared out of nowhere took your photo and walked off you would find that weird if not upsetting. Were that person to make eye contact with your stand around for a bit maybe tell you their name and after a bit of interaction motion to take a photo… obviously that wouldn’t be quite so strange.

This girl was the only one brave enough to get on the bike

And she seemed to enjoy herself

We also take the time and get a sense for how they feel and it is feels right we might ask for a photo and it not we don’t. An example of this was a couple days previous on the way to Opuwo when I came upon a Himba woman along a really long remote stretch of road. I recalled I still had a packet of matches in my tank bag which are incredibly handy to the people living out here. I pulled up to the woman sitting under the tree and as I approached I saw that she was young and lovely and the most splendidly adored Himba lady I had come across. Her jewelry was incredibly elaborate. I came in and held out the matches and motioned as to say ‘do you have any use for these’. She looked absolutely thrilled. Utterly delighted even and held my hand in a way that expressed her gratitude but there was something else there too. If I had given her money I don’t think I would have got the same reaction at all. To me the little gift of matches was less a sign of charity than an acknowledgment of the remoteness and challenge of the region. The rapport was certainly there but I couldn’t dilute the moment by whipping out the camera.

The girls were keen to hear some fat beats on my headphones

After saying our goodbyes to our Himba mates and Thomas we continued on some more technical trails which were very rocky, then sandy, then both. Just getting to Van Zyl’s pass was proving a mission in itself. It took hours and hours of riding through thick sand and rocky trails to reach. The last several km to the campsite was wonderfully technical. There were short yet steep climbs over large sharp and rolling rocks that served as a fantastic place for practicing balance and low speed throttle control. With the bikes so heavily laden with fuel and our gear it felt like trails riding and it was bloody brilliant. We were negotiating undulating, rocky, rocky trails at walking pace and I loved every second of it. I couldn’t believe how the humble DRs were handling and how much my riding had improved in recent months. Before now I would not have thought the bikes capable of such highly technical slow speed manoeuvring and I found myself going half the pace necessary and as slow as physically possible just for the challenge of it. Quite simply we had the weight distribution of the bikes tuned to perfection.

The distribution of weight on a motorbike is SO crucial. 5 kg of luggage poorly positioned on a bike can be more disrupting to handling that 15kg of well positioned weight. We have the system so sorted that it is only on steep downhill that we can feel the weight of the luggage on the bikes. We keep our weight low down and forward and it makes the world of difference. With this concept in mind there are few places we can’t go.

This kid was too cool

On arrival at the Van Zyl’s community campground we were not surprised to be the only people there yet again. After some time a couple of Himba girls came along to show us to our campsite. The eldest girl we guessed was in her late teens or early 20s and her tied back dreadlocks indicated she was ready to wed. The other girl we guessed to be around 10 years old. The only word of English they spoke was the word ‘seventy’ to indicate the cost per person for the campsite. After paying the girls settled in to watch us sent up camp and just generally hang out.

She loved the SIDIs as much as we do

Stlyin’

They were pretty mad about all the motorbike gear, especially our hot and sweaty SIDI crossfires which they happily wore for a couple of hours. The young girl in particular was a total extrovert and was nothing short of fascinated by every bit of kit that we pulled out. They helped us set up camp and we all shared some food and chilled out until the sun went down. The little Himba girl was keen to share some food with us as well so bullied some fruits out of the smaller kids. The bush fruits were bitter as a lemon but we managed to fain appreciation and the girl seemed thrilled to have shared them with us. They even went to the trouble of peeling them for us when we were struggling with the skin. There is no more human an experience I think, than sharing your food with another person and we enjoyed the language free connection.

NO COMMENT

I introduced a Himba girl to the selfie – am officially the worst person around

Learning and failing to use a camera

She got a huge kick out of wearing for my sunglasses for a couple of hours and made no request to keep them. She just had her fun with them

While at the camp we watched the local kids going about their business. We saw a tiny little kid of maybe 6 years old walking along on his own carrying a machete that was almost half his height. It was yet another lovely interaction we were fortunate to have with the Himba who we found to be proud, kind, inquisitive and keen for a laugh. We couldn’t help but admire how they have been able to eek out a living in such harsh conditions while maintaining such a strong sense of their tradition and culture. Eeking out a living may not be the right way to describe them as while they certainly work hard and lack a lot of comforts they are often quite wealthy in terms of cattle. Some Himba familys have us to 200 head of cattle but are not likely to ever say how many they have due to fear of stock theft.

Amongst travellers to the area there is a lot of talk about how commercialized/money hungry the Himba are and how they will not pose for a photo without payment. I challenge anyone to travel to a remote Himba outpost and give someone five dollars then give them a packet of matches and see which gesture gets the bigger reaction. I guarantee you they will be far more pleased with the packet of matches than any amount of money you could give them. Oftentimes I think the request for payment is used just to get strangers out of their faces.

If you look closely you can see where the young girls weave is sewn in

This girl was fascinated with how things worked

And was undeniably intelligent

But it is undeniable, especially the closer you get to Opuwo, that the Himba communities are now choosing to earn small sums of money by opening their communities for tourism. The obvious consequence of this is the slight and continual change in the dynamics of the culture on display for the interested tourist who will get their holiday snaps then move on. Leaving what behind I don’t know. It is fair to say however that the foreigners have a great affect on the Himba than the Himba have on them. Who knows, the Himba have tenaciously held on to their traditions through colonialism, wars, droughts now all they have to overcome is globalisation, a HIV/AIDS epidemic and their govenments plans for a dam along the Cunene river that will inundate a huge part of the lands they call home. Fingers crossed for these guys. They might need all the luck they can get.

They went crazy for the photos of my friends wedding on my Ipad. What they must have thought of our clothing and adornments I wonder

Our new friend getting some bush berries for us to eat from some boys who’d been picking

A couple of young Himba boys paid a visit to the camp as well

That evening Mick worked on further reinforcing the repair job on my broken front fender in preparation for the beating the bike is likely to take the next day. We carb loaded on pasta and ate by the fire before heading to bed in eager/nervous anticipation of the next day’s Van Zyl’s Pass attempt. Could it really be as hard as they say?

Up the Ganamub Without a Paddle

Posted on April 18, 2015 by admin in Africa + Blog + Namibia

Blog 23 by Mick: Up the Ganamub Without a Paddle

At least we got some semi-working internet with our horrifically expensive camping at Palmwag Lodge. But with that I got a hell of a shock – an email from Delorme about a cancelled emergency SOS activation. I had been carrying the InReach in my tankbag where it was convenient, along with other things which I wanted quick access to like our camera, some basic tools and a hat. But in there it had somehow been turned on, the SOS button had been unlocked, then the SOS button activated, cancelled again, then re-activated. Oops. In fact that understates the situation slightly, more like “very big oops”.

Thankfully, Delorme had thought that it was pretty strange that the SOS had been activated and cancelled and activated again, and they could see that we were moving during this time. They got in contact with my folks in Australia and agreed that it seemed accidental, that if we were on the road we were probably ok and decided to ignore the SOS, which I was very thankful for. It would have been exceptionally embarrassing to have emergency services come all the way out to Palmwag only to find us safe and sound, and the InReach bouncing around in my tank bag. Oh well lesson learned, the InReach now securely lives in a soft wool lined Goretex bag and then in a side pocket of my backpack all on its own, rest assured I think its very unlikely to be accidently activated again!

Needing a decent rest we paid an absolute fortune for a room at the Sesfontein Fort Hotel. It included breakfast at least and we used the pool a bunch

From Palmwag to Sesfontein it is only a bit over an hours riding and we arrived at about lunch time. Even though it was such a short day, Sesfontein would be our last bit of civilisation for a little while so we decided to enjoy it and got a room at the Fort, which was the old German Police Station from colonial times. The relaxing afternoon gave us a bit of time check over the bikes, do some other small little jobs and have a swim before heading into Kaokoland.

Being late January we were in the middle of the “wet” season, a very ‘relative’ term considering Namibia is one of the driest countries on the planet, and this area is one of the driest in Namibia. We had planned to ride up the Hoanib River to Amspoort, before heading north to Purros. However, after being forced to cross the flowing Aba Huab River a couple times I figured we better check with the locals whether the route was open before committing to 150kms of riverbed riding.

Downtown Sesfontein – not much around at all despite it being a major town in the area. This is the main/only shop. Seriously.

It was a wise move. Apparently the track to Amspoort was blocked by water and saturated soft sand at the Sesfontein end of the trail, however we could bypass it by riding up the main road about 30km towards Purros, then heading south down a remote and unmarked trail following the Ganamub River for about 30kms. This would bring us out on the Hoanib River. He wasn’t sure about the track from Amspoort north to Purros, but we could find out and make a plan when we got there. Sounded good to me; our adventure just got a little bit more adventurous!

The following morning we fueled up the bikes and went to the “Fontein Shop” to stock up for a couple days of bush camping. Grocery stores in remote Namibia are pretty sad affairs. They all consist of the same things, being bully beef, canned pilchards, chukalaka, canned vegetables, soya mince, powdered soup, long life milk, millet meal, beer and cigarettes. Some stores have a greater choice than others, ie there are 3 different brands of bully beef, or different flavours of canned pilchards or chukalaka, and the real fancy joints might have 2-minute noodles, but it is all basically the same shit. So it limits your camping food options pretty significantly.

The petrol station where we filled both tanks to the max. The humble Datsun 1200 ute/bakky is a stalwart of African transport.

The road north. Here is a nice spot but the majority of the road is full of nasty rocky sections just begging for tyres to rip open

We rolled out of Sesfontein with enough fuel to get us all the way to Opuwo and supplies for a couple days camping. It was a route of nearly 500km but about 150km of it was deep soft river sand and the rest of it was reputably slow and variably sandy, rocky, and/or heavily corrugated, so it was outside the range of our front safari tanks alone. To add a fair bit of contingency we hit the road with both front and rear fuel tanks full, which is 44 litres of petrol plus about 9 or 10 litres of drinking water not including the 3 litre of emergency water in our bashplate tanks.

The 30kms from Sesfontein to Ganamub River turn off took us about 45 minutes. It wasn’t technical at all, but relentlessly rocky and slow. We were told there was a “village”, also called Ganamub, where the main road crosses the river and that is where we would find the riverbed trail south. When we reached what I’d guessed must be about the right spot on the GPS, the village turned out to be only 4 or 5 tiny huts and a stockyard spread over half a kilometer or more of sand and rocks. The definition of village is obviously pretty relative in this part of the world also.

The village of Gunamub is the few huts you can see in the distance

I found a couple Himba guys near the stockyard sitting in the shade of a tree, which seemed like a pretty good place to be considering it was probably about 40 degrees. It was late January in Kaokoland – its pretty toasty. I pointed at the river bed and asked “Ganamub?” to which they nodded, then pointed south down the river bed and asked “Amspoort?” to which they nodded some more. Good, we were on the right track.

We headed south and it was obvious this trail sees very very little traffic. Where there were some trees, the vehicle tracks were covered in plenty of old leaf litter. The trail was soft round river sand with plenty of hidden rocks, so I wasn’t keen to lower our tyre pressures more then they were (front ~20psi, rear ~25 psi) for fear of pinch flatting. However, a couple kilometers down the trail we were forced to stop. The sand was so soft and hot that our front wheels were tracking poorly and making riding very hard work. I took 5 psi out and the bikes performed much better, we would just have to avoid the rocks.

The start of the thick sand – rutty much? I dropped it not far from here trying to get started in the nasty soft sand.

Letting the tyres down a wee bit. Made a massive amount of difference.

After over an hour of tough sand riding we had travelled the 30kms to the confluence of the Hoanib and Ganamub Rivers, and arrived at an eroded water course which had very recently had fast flowing water in it. I could see the track on the other side but there was no entry or exit point anymore, just a near vertical 1.5m drop into a wet silty bottom.

Convenient time for a rest stop on one of the very very rare sections of hard trail. Good photo op too.

Tanya had spotted an alternative track off to the right and after a bit of investigation on the GPS, I could see it ended up on the same trail. It seemed a little foolish to commit to a muddy and difficult crossing without at the very least investigating the alternatives, so we turned around and followed the trail around to the south-west.

After a couple minutes or so we came to the Hoanib. The trail had disappeared and we were riding on an expanse of freshly exposed round river rocks, and it didn’t take long to see why. The Hoanib was flowing with muddy water, and it was obvious from the debris and erosion it recently had water from bank to bank that had washed the track away. Knowing that tracks like this always have plenty of alternative lines, I looked on the opposite bank for any sign of a track we could follow out of the flowing river. Nope, there was nothing.

There was no safe way downstream, the way we want to go, on our side of the river as it was blocked by the flowing water and a steep rocky valley wall, so I went upstream to see if there was a safe way across onto the other bank and maybe we could travel down from there. About 200m or so upstream I came across this…

This is Wolfgang, his wife Nicole, and their Hilux. They are in what is sometimes referred to as “a pickle”.

My immediate thought? Bloody hell, this bloke is in some strife right here. The car was bogged to the axles with flowing water at the sills. Not only that, judging by the vehicle, a white Toyota Hilux with roof tents, I figured it was probably a hire car. And based on our experience in the Ugab only a couple days previous, where the river had gone from empty to 40cm deep in about 20 minutes, it was feasible the car was in serious jeopardy. This bloke is not in strife – he is deep shit. Proper deep shit.

I got off the bike as the guy walked across the river to meet me. “Looks like you might need a hand there hey?” I said dryly. I could see he was pretty stressed out just by the look of him, and my Aussie accent was obviously a little too broad as he asked if I “spoke English?”. “yeah not too bad”. “Sprechen du deutsch?”. “Nah mate no German”.

Another flashflood thwarting our plans. I went to walk the river in riding gear thinking I might ride across, then realised it was a pretty silly idea. I’ll just walk from here and save myself the bogging.

Tan and I took our boots off and made our way over to help. Thankfully the water wasn’t deep, generally only about 10-20cm, with the occasional 30cm deep spot. I could see the car was sitting on its chassis, so I grabbed Wolfgang’s shovel and started digging. Without some weight on the wheels, this thing wasn’t going anywhere. I spent a good 10 or 15 minutes digging out the front left wheel and down the side of the car, before conceding defeat. The flowing water was filling in the hole with fresh sand as I dug, and back at the front wheel it was only marginally better then when I’d started digging.

Jacking the car up and digging out the wheels. Wolfgang was hot and changed into something more comfotable (forgive us for the pic Wolfgang). This photo has 3 of the 4 wheels jacked up and rocks stuffed under.

While all this was happening, Tan was on the telephone. Wolfgang mentioned he had a satellite phone, so we offered to ring our friends in Windhoek who could call around and hopefully organise vehicle recovery. I was ‘reasonably’ confident we could get the vehicle out ourselves, but it was Wolfgang’s hire car and his bill to pay if it all got washed down the river so I let him make that decision. Tony in Windhoek then proceeded to get in contact with people in Sesfontein, which was about an hour and half away. However no help was coming. Tony spoke to someone at the Fort but because a few tourists had called for help but had gotten their car out while the recovery car was still coming, or given wrong directions so they were never found, or had been recovered and then just driven off, no-one does recoveries from Sesfontein anymore because tourists weren’t paying their bills. Now that is some shit behavior that puts innocent people at real risk. Basically… no one was coming to help.

Anyway, back to the Hoanib. Wolfgang then mentioned he had a high lift jack, so he got that out while I went looking for something to place it on and found a nice thick flat piece of flat rock (schist to be specific). It was then a case of jacking every corner of the vehicle as high as it would go and stuffing the hole with rocks. The reasonably close supply of schist meant we could even make a short little runway of hard rock for the car to reverse down and build up a bit of momentum. Nicole and Tanya brought the stones, while Wolfgang and I jacked, dug and placed the stones. We then unloaded everything we could pick up from the tray to lighten the load and let down the tyres. Wolfgang said he had already let them down to 1.4bar, about 20psi, but I told him we should let them down “until they look basically flat” which he did. This whole exercise took about an hour and a half. Thankfully during that time the water level had been pretty constant. It had look like it was coming up for a little while but it then thankfully stabilised.

With all that done, it was time to try and get this thing to move. Wolfgang hopped in the drivers seat while Nicole, Tan and myself all got ready to push. Sitting on the rocks the car had instant traction, but I was expecting it to sink as soon as it hit the wet sand. But it didn’t, now with a heap of a momentum and rolling on a set of balloons it powered straight out of the river with Wolfgang hooting from the drivers seat and Nicole looking like a mountain had just been lifted off her shoulders.

Winners!

We sat down triumphantly on the sand with a cold beer from their camping fridge and Wolfgang then went on to explain what had happened. They had been driving up the dry riverbed trail, when the Hilux sunk in a patch of soft water logged sand. Now that’s not a great situation to be bogged in a remote riverbed, but its not a massive problem either. While getting his recovery gear out however, a wall of water came down the river; flash flood. Suddenly there was water at the bottom of the doors. Now that is a massive problem. Wolfgang put down some bog mats which soon sunk deep into the sand, and tried to pull the car out with the winch by burying a log but all he managed was to pull the log out of the ground. They had been working for 2 hours when we arrived and were very stressed, poor buggers.

Some happy people

Tan and I evaluated our options. With water in the river and considering that the trail for the next 30 or 40 kilometers to Amspoort is the riverbed, continuing on didn’t seem so clever. I’m ambitious, but not stupid, and getting riding down a flowing river is pretty stupid, especially considering the trail north of Amspoort to Purros is also a riverbed and we had no intel whatsoever on that. The deal was sealed however when Wolfgang mentioned they had seen a Hyena on the trail not long before getting bogged.

We had been planning to bushcamp around Amspoort somewhere, but Tan mandated that bushcamping was firmly off the agenda now that there was first hand accounts of Hyena only a few kilometres away. The area was also known to contain the odd lion, later confirmed by Tracks 4 Africa on our GPS showing a nearby village which was “abandoned due to lions”. Flashfloods, hyena and lions were too much for us, so turn around we did. We later found out we were in the river valley that had elephant attack in 1999 which, if it wasn’t fatal, was surely at least highly unpleasant.

The ride back was pretty tough. It was late afternoon now and really hot, the sand was hot and soft, and we were tired from digging in the river for a couple hours. But Tan was on fire on the bike and achieved, for the first time ever, to drop the bike less then me in a day. On the way down the trail I had dropped my bike trying to get started in some soft sand after taking a photo, and on the way back I dropped it once more doing exactly the same thing. Tan dropped hers only once mid-corner in a really nasty rutted section where she was just too tired from hauling rocks to fight the fall. Not bad considering we were fully loaded up for a few days of camping, leaving with 44l of fuel and 10l of water or so. 2 stacks vs 1; she was stoked. However, Tan’s excitement at ‘being the best rider’ was diminished somewhat by Wolfgang and Nicole coming upon her and her fallen bike on the ride out. We hadn’t seen a single car all day yet her only drop was witnessed by onlookers. She wasn’t happy.

The Ganamub Riverbed 4×4 trail. Its like this for about 95% of the way. Nasty.

The trail complete and back in Ganamub village we decided to head back to Sesfontein rather than carry on north west to Purros. By the time we had pumped up our tyres up again we were starting to run out of sunlight, and Wolfgang and Nicole had invited us to their campsite for a braai of Gemsbok steak, fresh vegetables and cold beer. That was an offer too good to refuse, so we didn’t, and had a great night with them around the fire. And here’s a kicker, Wolfgang is an avid biker himself and works as a marshal for the Ertzberg Rodeo extreme endure in Austria, and offered to arrange us some tickets if we can get to Europe by early June. How’s that for luck! We’ll try our best to make it in time.

Speaking of luck, considering the odds that anyone, absolutely anyone, would find those guys bogged in that riverbed is a bloody mind bender. Kaokoland is proper remote Namibia with few tourists, even in the high season in winter its hardly a busy place. We were there in the middle of summer and had seen no-one in cars outside of the towns. Literally no-one. Think Simpson Desert or Canning Stock Route in Australia, in winter you might see a couple cars a day, or maybe none. In summer though there is no-one but the very very odd foolhardy soul. Not only that, we were way off the main Kaokoland roads, the only reason we went down that Ganamub trail was that we knew the normal trail from Sesfontein to Amspoort was blocked. And even then we only found them after riding upstream a couple hundred metres and that was only after investigating the alternative route to the Hoanib that Tanya found. Rest assured, the odds of anyone finding them are very very slim indeed. We were glad to lend a hand to people that would have done the same for us and to have made some new friends that we’ll do our best to meet again in Europe.

We stopped at the Fort for a refreshing Rock Shandy on way to camping

The following morning we bid our farewells to Wolfgang and Nicole, replenished our water and fuel, and headed for Purros. The road conditions were quite variable but constantly slow, sandy and rocky and corrugated in various combinations, and getting more and more isolated with every kilometre. Purros is renowned as a place were you’ll see desert elephants, and Tracks 4 Africa warn of ‘aggressive elephants’ and sites of elephant attacks, in addition to lions and flash floods. In Sesfontein we were told the elephants had moved down the riverbeds to the Skeleton Coast, which was a little sad as it meant we missed the spectacle of seeing elephants in the desert, but good as it meant we missed seeing elephants while exposed on our motorcycles in sand. Back in South Africa we were told a story from a couple years back of a European guy who was killed by an angry elephant right in front of his poor wife while on in Purros. We were obviously pretty keen to avoid the same fate.

The road to Purros. There is sand…

And sand.

Oh here is some more sand

Here is some sand with corrugations for something different

While we missed out on the elephant we did manage to see desert giraffe, including a mother with what could/must have been twins. As we approached Purros we were greeted with more and more sand and even some sizable sand dunes in the distance. Beign late January, the sun was beating down with considerable force complete with a heat haze in the distance, and as ever we were keen to set up camp on arrival and then down a couple of cold cokes.

Here are some rocks

Rocks with Giraffes.

We wondered it we had come across the rare case of twin giraffes as they were both the same size and following a lone giraffe. Who knows?

The trail was like this most of the way, with many lines to choose from

We were rather underwhelmed by the town of Purros which is little more than a collection of huts spread out in the middle of the sandy river plain. We had been told of a 5 star resort by our friends Danie and Sara who suggested we visit for a sundowner. It was a navigational mission to find the right tracks here through the sandy riverbed and eventually we came across the entrance, unfortunately with signage saying that the resort was closed. It was a little disappointing as we were looking forward to gatecrashing the swanky resort for the rich and famous and having a rock shady, but it wasn’t to be.

Sand with rocks

Rocks in a riverbed just to spice things up

I think you get the idea now, here is some corrugations.

Heaps of Sand

Heaps of it. Its harsh and isolated country out here.

Conceding defeat we set about finding a campground. Again we struggled with finding the trail into town as there was a mass of lines through the massive sandy riverbed. We eventually found the deserted campsite and just went ahead and set up camp figuring rightly that if someone wanted money they would find us. We then headed back into ‘town’ in search of a cold drink and information of the nearby ‘Himba Cultural Village’.

This is us in Purros CBD. Seriously. This is the middle of Purros. This is it.

We had heard of the Himba cultural village from a couple of friends who hadn’t gone too deep into Kaokoland but still wanted to see the Himba people. Both groups of friends had told us they didn’t really enjoy the experience, as it seemed a little too much like a ‘human zoo’. We had time to kill and rather foolishly (in retrospect) we thought we might not get to see any other Himba besides these people in the cultural village. So there we were, faced with the dilemma of wanting to see and learn more about the interesting foreign culture and not wanting to be insensitive arseholes reducing the people of a proud culture to inhabitants of a profitable human zoo. Curiosity prevailed however and we decided to go for it and if we didn’t like it we could just leave and add that to the list of lessons learned.

Our bikes at the village.

First of all, we didn’t know where the village was so at the only shop in town we asked around, and were eventually put onto a guy claiming to be a tour guide, who turned out to be reasonably drunk (it was about 3pm) and a bit of a shiester scumbag. He kindly offered to take us the village for a completely stupid amount of money and when we told the guy we would rather find out own way he got a little aggressive, threatening that if we went without a guide the Himba would call police or even that we could be physically attacked if we took photos. Even though we had been told that the Himba do sometimes get angry with people taking photos, and it is common knowledge that they do ask for money, we laughed him off.

Saying hello to all the kiddies.

Turns out the location of the Himba village was in our GPS so we made our way there all by ourselves after dumping most of our luggage at the campsite. By now the campsite custodian had arrived and delivered us our 10L bucket of water and said he’d mind our gear. Cool. We had a great little ride out to the Himba village and could really get stuck in on the deserted sand road with the luxury of only minor luggage on the bike. We showed up at the camp and they seemed happy enough for us to come in and have a look around. There was no-one who spoke any English beside “photos ok” and “thirty”, the cost in Namibian dollars to get in. We paid our US$3 equivalent entrance fee and set about looking at what they were doing.

The kids liked having their photos taken.

And they were pretty stunning

The kiddies loved my camelback, they all wanted a drink from it.

We definitely got the sense the Himba women were sick of having their photos taken over and over and over again. But Tan managed to strike up rapport with one of the women and they seemed to have a good time together chopping off the end of some palm fronds. Tan reciprocated the interest by showing the Himba her colourful back tattoos. Meanwhile the kids had taken a keen interest in my Camelbak after seeing me drink from it. We went from hut to hut checking things out and feeling a lot like intruders. In the end we bought a little bracelet for Tanya and then invited the ladies to come out and check out our bikes and kit. This really made them come out of their shell, probably because they weren’t the ones being gawked at for a change. Even the stroppy ladies seemed to be enjoying themselves checking out all the riding gear.

This lady was cutting palm fronds for use a shelter

Like this

Tan had a go

Tan showing off her tats

Note the animal skins on this lady’s skirt. This is very common.

We are not sure what the belt around her guts is for. Too many pies maybe?

This old lady was resting in a hut

And this lady was very keen to show off her new born baby. We are not too sure what the dress is about as this is very uncommon, it might be because she just came from hospital and had her ochre washed off.

Tanya put on her body armour and demonstrated its use of by miming crashing a bike. It was pretty funny watching one particular lady understand what it was all about and then explaining to the others. Despite the language barrier it was obvious to us that one of the ladies thought we were completely nuts to be travelling this way. Not having a tour guide meant we didn’t learn a whole lot about the culture but it was a far nicer experience on the whole I think. And once again the bikes were a fantastic icebreaker. To them we weren’t just the usual foreign tourists rocking up nice and fresh in their 4WD with cameras ready to snap away. We were a bit different and they were curious about us as we were about them. Even after paying our entrance fee and buy a bracelet, none of that made them as happy as when we gave them a couple packs of matches on the way out. We had been told that this was a very well received gift and it was certainly the case for us, they loved these more than money.

This old lady made a lot of the nick-naks for sale…

…and looked after many of the kiddies.

The kids loved Tanya’s sunglasses

Some cute portraits.

and again

The hair is actually a goats hair weave filled with ochre and butter

The kids loved seeing themselves in the photos

We went to sleep really fulfilled and happy with our first Himba encounter, our experience wasn’t at all the “human zoo” we had been warned of, at least not for us. We had such a genuine human experience and I think, or at least hope, they enjoyed it nearly as much as we did. Tanya coined the following phrase on our Facebook page that actually floored me the first time I read it, as really sums up our adventure riding experience thus far in an incredible way.

“A car is a bubble; a bike is a bridge”. This was certainly the case that day.

The lady who seemed to really enjoy interacting with us