The next morning we went out on the Atlantic to see the dunes from the water and view two species of dolphins, colonies of seals and visit the oyster farms. We saw a huge rose colored jelly fish that was bigger than one of the seals! We were startled when a friendly seal named Fluffy jumped up onto our boat. We fed him some fish, but he like it so much that we had a hard time getting him to leave the deck. On the way back to Swakopmund, our Captain broke out some champagne and shucked some fresh oysters for us. Why can't they do that at the Jersey Shore?
Later that afternoon, Clay, Kristin and Max went quad biking on the dunes. Although it sounded like a lot of fun, Laura and Alex went back to the hotel for a nap....we are worn out.
Tuesday morning we left for Etosha Wildlife Park. It is a huge game conservancy in the northern, central part of Namibia. We checked into our tent camp and went off to see the animals. We had unbelievable luck as we drove out the gate a family of lions was walking down the road. There was a mother with 3 cubs and 3 male lions. They walked right by our car and we got excellent pictures of them.
The next morning we went on an all day game drive and saw elephants, lions, a black rhinocerous (extremely rare), kudu, springbok, red hardebeest, wildebeests, waterbucks and many beautiful, brightly colored birds (think Zazu in real life).
After 3 nights in the game park, we moved to Dirk's ranch 5 hours south of Etosha. It is a tented camp, but very luxurious and equipted with everything that we need. We spent a few lazy days reading and watching True Blood while Max and Clay hunted. Then Dirk's wife, Rena, took us into Windhoek for a couple of nights. Windhoek is the capital of Namibia, but felt more like a small town to us - maybe something like the size of Landsdale. It had a very cosmopolitan feel to it and Kristin commented "If someone dropped me off here and asked me "Where are you?" I would never guess Africa. Dirk says that Namibia is Africa's best kept secret and we have to agree. We shopped and went out to Joe's Beer House for dinner. It was a jolly place with crazy decor and hearty German food. Everywhere you go in Namibia, you can feel the German influence.
A couple more days at the ranch included an encounter with a Black Mambo snake that was over 10 feet long (I'm not kidding). Clay shot it as they are very dangerous and can stand up to half of their body length and look you in the eye - yikes! Laura was glad she was not along for that adventure.
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