Swakopmund

Swakopmund is on Namibia's coast (in the west) roughly in line with the capital Windhoek.

It is 1400 km from Katima Mulilo, and it takes around 16 hours to drive in a car. 1400km is around 875 miles, so the whole distance there and back is 1750 miles. The road is very long and can get very boring at times.







The sun makes the road ahead look as though it disappears. This is called a ‘mirage’.

There were many road signs like these, to warn drivers to watch out for elephants. There were also road signs showing warthogs and kudu (a kind of antelope). Although we didn’t see these animals, we did see several families of baboons and ostriches, a single giraffe, two elephants and a large stag deer, possibly an oryx.

Rossing Uranium Mine near Swakopmund

is an open cast mine which extracts uranium from the earth. 

The pieces of rock are crushed and processed until they end up as pure uranium, which gives energy. One barrel of uranium gives the same energy as 40 000 barrels of oil. The processed uranium is radio-active and so there are many, many safety measures in place to ensure everyone who works at or near the mine is safe. The uranium was first discovered by an ‘amateur prospector’ called Rossing in the 1930s. It took until 1980 to begin mining in Namibia. The shovels on the vehicles are enormous! The dust cloud is from the blasting.  

The Museum in Swakopmund has many interesting things, showing how life used to be in Namibia. Things are changing very slowly. The musical instruments and the necklace were of particular interest.

Women from the Himba tribe

The Himba people put special paste on their skin to make it a red colour. These ladies were selling crafts and jewellery. The lady in the picture is holding the very bracelet I bought for my daughter. I will give it to her when I return to England.