Hanging with Brad and Angelina

Well...not really but we may have sat where they sat and for darned sure, saw what they saw. Here’s the background and the last post from our fabulous time in the country of Namibia.

For our last three days we saved the best for last: a stay at the Wolwedans’ Dune Lodge in southern Namibia near the world famous towering red sand dunes. All-inclusive food, drink and activities, our own guide and the most spectacular scenery we have ever seen. The place is small and intimate and the best we could determine there were at least three workers for each guest. The facilities were world-class and the employees made us feel that we WERE Brad and Angelina…of course for the price we paid we would have expected nothing less. But it was well worth it. And speaking of the Pitts, the connection was that while they awaited the adoption of their Namibian baby several years ago, they stayed at the resort. Our bartender said he served them and hung with them without really knowing who they were until later. Anyway, the superlatives don’t do the place justice so please view the pictures for this piece of paradise.

This series of pictures was driving into the resort and our accommodations.

Front of our bungalow

Back of our bungalow

The walk to our bungalow

The evening gathering place 

Private planes..... much better than our very small car! 

We were able to custom craft the activities with our guide and we choose a morning desert walk with a real Bushman, an afternoon game drive with sundowner and a horseback ride with sundowner the final day. The sundowner is an African tradition of watching the sunsets…that are breathtaking…with a totty. The Bushman walk was particularly fascinating as he pointed out so much about the desert that the layman would never know or see. We also spent quite a bit of time just hanging at our villa or the pool or library reading, napping and enjoying the spectacular scenery.

Morning bushman walk:  We dug for spiders and found this White Lady deep in her hole covered by the silk she had woven for protection.

Sunrise on the walk

Bill and the Bushman, Udi

First day desert sundowner jeep ride

Riding to sunset...Click here for video! https://youtu.be/54h6nZlGSzY

Second evening we rode horses to the sunset.  We preferred the jeep ride...

Our guides

Andrea's horse on the right and below

We quickly became friends with the bartenders, Salome and Stanley

The meals were gourmet; multi-course and the evening meals were always presented with much African flair. The guests ate at community tables at night, which enables us to interact and trade safari stories with interesting people from all over the world. This resort was totally "green". All power was solar (Andrea managed to blow a fuse in our bungalow by attempting to use a blowdryer),  they grew all their own produce and fed the all the food trash to pigs that they later slaughtered for meals. 

 There were French, Germans, Swiss and even a few other Americans. Also, there was a Namibian family from Windhoek…Ron, Tonja, Zune and Krynauw Weber who were on holiday there for a couple of days. They were very interesting and fun folks. Daughter Zune is in training for a spot to represent Namibia in free-style swimming in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Son Krynauw was a 2013 world champion in the Triathlete competitions in Cyprus and a national karate champion in his weight class. Pretty impressive family. When they found out we were going to be back in Windhoek on Friday night they graciously invited us to their home for a “real” Namibian Braai. After texting our man Nico the taxi driver for a ride to their home, we had a most enjoyable evening with Ron and Tonya sharing commonalities as well as differences between our two worlds. AND, we had an outstanding Namibian meal! It was nice to see a different side of this beautiful country. They promised to someday make it to the United States and to contact us when they do.

Ron, Bill, Andrea, Tonja... what a memory!!!

Today is Saturday, May 27, 2017…day thirty-six of our trip and we are in the Windhoek airport awaiting the start of our long journey to segment three of our trip: Eastern Europe starting with Krakow, Poland. We’ll sleep tonight in Johannesburg and then catch the Air France overnighter tomorrow night back to Paris, to Amsterdam and finally…to Krakow. Sixty-two hours door to door.

In closing, Namibia is one of the most beautiful places in the world and we believe it is a great, reasonably safe place to visit on holiday or honeymoon. Tourism does not seem to have overrun the place at this point although even now it is already the number one driver of the economy. The people are friendly but many are very, very poor. In fact we were told that of the country’s two million population, about two thousand taxpayers pay ninety percent of the income taxes collected. It seems there is no easy path for the improvised to pull out of that…or do they even want do? We hope so.