Namibian Roundtrip

Our honeymoon trip across Namibia is nearly completed. We just returned the camper to Kea (highly recommended rental car company in Southern Africa with excellent 4x4 campers and extremely friendly and supporting staff) and checked in at Hotel Heinitzburg in Windhoek (many Thanx to Katrin & Michael and Margret & Georg for an awesome dinner) before we will return to Europe tomorrow. 

Very exciting and inspiring weeks are behind us and we both enjoyed the time in the desert and in the bush very much. I guess this won't be neither the last time in Namibia nor the last time that we have done a camping trip. We are already making plans for our big world trip and another trip to Namibia, including Botswana the next time. 

As usual I have carried too much camera equipment with me. This time not just nearly the whole Nikon gear, but also my Leica M9 with all the lenses I have. I just wanted to know for the next time if the Leica M9 does a good job on traveling. I appreciate the advantages of a camera that doesn't weigh half a ton when hiking in the mountains. However I am still a bit disappointed with the noise of the Leica (Kodak) sensor. I guess an image like the one of the giraffe would not have been possible with the Leica M9 without further processing (the one above is straight out of the Nikon D700, shot with ISO 1600). 

Our roundtrip started in Windhoek, where we picked up our 4x4 camper and went straight to Swakopmund. From there we made our way southward through the Namib desert. We used either camping sites with all the facilities you need or sites in the wilderness that just offered some plain sandy ground for the camper and a tree for some shadow. After spending a few nights in desert, bathing in a nearly dried river and collecting tons of sand in our camper, we had a night in a lodge in the middle of the Namib Naukluft Park (many thanx to Uli and Hannes, this was the perfect timing). From there we went hiking into the Naukluft mountains before proceeding to the mighty dunes of Sossousvlei:

On our way to and from Sossousvlei we passed by Solitaire, just to fill up Diesel and to enjoy Moose McGregor's awesome apple pie. If you are in going to Sossousvlei, you must go to Solitaire (not the most attractive place on earth as it just has a pump, a tire repair, a curio shop and general store, some camels to rent AND Moose McGregor's bakery!). His pies and bread are worth any detour if you are in the area. 

The ballooning was a very special and personal highlight on the trip, which gave a complete different perspective onto the desert: 

We decided that an Africa trip wouldn't be complete without having been in a game park, so we made our way up northbound to Etosha

where we needed to fix a few broken welds (tribute to thousands of km's gravel road)  in an open roof garage with the helping hands of some local mechanics:

Finally, after two weeks in the desert with tons of sand and lot of heat, we made our way back to Windhoek. We spent our last night in the camper with heavy rain all night, flooding the interior...