Humpata – Flamingo Lodge (Day 34)
- Desiré
- Jun 18, 2019
- 3 min read
18 June 2019
Distance: 264km Distance to date: 7556km
Road Conditions: (out of 10)
Humpata – Flamingo Lodge turnoff: 8 (tar, occasional potholes)
Turn off – Flamingo Lodge: 5 (sand/dirt, bad corrugated road and loose sand in some places)
Coffee, Tea, Rusks
Snacks
Lamb chops, Pap and Sauce
Dad and Mr. Roberto left early this morning to have a chat with Mr. Roberto’s cousin about Foz do Kunene and the fishing along the coast.
Mom and I packed everything up and I worked on the blog while waiting for Dad to come back.
Once Dad was back, we loaded everything into the bakkie, said thank you to Mr. Roberto and went on our way. We drove all the way back, down Leba pass and towards Namibe. We stopped next to the road to buy some firewood, and then just before Namibe Dad filled the bakkie up with Diesel. Next, we stopped once again at the Shoprite, for the things that we weren’t able to buy. Luckily Mr. Roberto was able to help us find someone that we could exchange Dollars with the day before.
The shopping trip was more successful and we were quickly on our way. The landscape in the area is very arid, it’s kilometres upon kilometres of sand and rock. This area is also relatively flat.
The 25 kilometre road toward Flamingo Lodge lays in a river bed, and there are more pathways than one to take – you can pick the one you like best and follow it all the way through to the Lodge. We had to deflate the tyres a little so that we could gain better traction in the sand, and so we wouldn’t shake too much on the terrible corrugated parts.
We stopped to take some photos of a giant Welwitchia plant along the way. These plants aren’t exactly pretty, but the fact that they can live out in the desert in those conditions and last to be more than a hundred years old is very impressive.
Finally we arrived at Flamingo Lodge and went straight to the restaurant. Here we met Emile, a young lad that seems to be running things around the Lodge. Dad and I had a beer and Mom had some complimentary tea. There was the sweetest puppy that I snuggled with while she slept on my lap. Apparently they found her at the Kunene River.
After speaking to Emile and some of the other lodgers, Dad gained some more info about fishing in the area and we left to go give the fishing a try before setting up camp.
We drove out all along the beach looking for “bait balls”, areas that you can see schools of fish moving about. Eventually we got to a spot that seemed to be good and Dad gave a couple of casts. There was another guy that passed us in his Landrover, one of the people staying at the lodge. We had heard that he had driven all the way from Switzerland.
After trying for about an hour and a half, we turned back and were pleasantly surprised to find some dolphins playing in the sunset lit waves.
Eventually we headed back towards the lodge. We set up camp and had dinner next to one of the bathrooms that the lodge is busy renovating, and therefore there was no hot water. Emile was kind enough to unlock one of the cabins so that we could still have a hot shower, so we all had a fantastic shower in Cabin number 8 before bed.
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