Today it’s off to andBeyond Sossusvlei Desert Lodge for 5 nights. I’m leaving the rental car behind and flying to the lodge.
Swakopmund airport is so tiny, I have to ring the car rental company to see if it’s safe to leave the car at the airport and find out where to return the keys to. As you can see from the photos below, arrivals and departures is a room with two toilets off to the side. The car rental keys go into a box on the wall.
I find a good home for my remaining Namibian coins in another box that helps to feed the airport’s adopted cat called Cessna, who pays a fleeting visit to the ‘airport lounge’.
I’m the only passenger in the 6 seater (2 for the pilots) Cessna from Scenic Air, which is a typical hard-working no-frills airplane, which safely ferries me the 1 hour flight to Sossusvlei, which would otherwise be a 5-6 hour drive.
It’s a spectacular flight of just over one hour to Sossusvlei Desert Lodge’s airstrip.
As I arrive, another couple is leaving. The protocol at a gravel airport is that the guide on the ground has to wait until the plane takes off safely.
andBeyond Sossusvlei Desert Lodge doesn’t look like much from the air, but the 10 chalets are magnificent – split level lounge/bedroom, separate bathroom, outdoor shower, fully stocked mini-bar etc and beautifully decorated in desert neutral tones.
Each room comes complete with it’s own private oryx…
The game drive in the late afternoon is less about wildlife and more about scenery, but this is an area for aardwolf, the smallest, termite-eating member of the hyena family, so that’s my objective for the next 5 nights – to find and photograph an aardwolf!
This area is also famous for the as yet unexplained ‘fairy circles’, characterised by the ring of grasses that the herbivores such as the oryx and springbok refuse to eat.
Whilst there is a leopard and cheetah around the area, neither are big enough to bring down an adult oryx, so the oryx have it pretty good here. They just have to keep an eye on their calves, which are prey for the leopards and cheetah.
