Namibia

A view of Luderitz from the Goerke Haus. Kehaulani is resting at anchor at the far left center of this picture. Notice outside the city nothing but rocky, sandy dessert is found.


Just a few kilometers outside Luderitz is the abandonded ghost diamond mining town of Kolmanskop. The desert has slowly re-claimed it's disturbed land and is filling the buildings with sand.


Kolmanskop was a very active and modern town in the early 20th century but was abandoned in 1954 due to lack of new deposits. They had the first x-ray machine in Namibia, made their own ice (in the middle of a desert!), a gymnasium, a swimming pool, and even a bowling alley. Sorry Hugh, I think it's closed.


Sailing to Walvis Bay from Luderitz was extremely cold and foggy. Much of the time there was no wind so we resorted to motoring. I really hate motoring; it's loud, smelly, and wasteful. Although it provides us with hot water and heat to warm the cabin (hot engine coolant is circulated to the water heater and the cabin heater, warming the water and air, respectively).


John and I decided we'd tour Walvis Bay Lagoon by sea kayak since it's much too shallow to sail the yacht around.


We spotted a few flamingos on our tour (it looks like a large number, but normally the lagoon is home to 60,000 of these birds). These are rarely seen in Walvis Bay this time of year as they're supposed to be in Etosha breeding in the shallow fresh water pan (Etosha is the famous Namibian game park about 800KM from Walvis Bay).


These are cape fur seals. Notice their funny little ears hanging off the sides of their heads like worms.


An oasis in the desert. With flooding in the north and almost nightly thunder showers here in the desert, Namibia has seen unusually large amounts of rain this year.