Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did.
So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. --- Mark Twain

Monday, April 23, 2012

Damaraland

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Day 458
Kamanjab,

51,377 km since the beginning of the journey

Damaras are one of the Namibian tribes, there are about 100,000 of them in this tribe and they are among the oldest inhabitants of Namibia. "Living Museum of the Damara" is a small Damara village near Twyfelfontein, in north-west of Namibia. It is an open-air museum, with a dozen semi-transparent round huts, and visitors can have the opportunity to follow the daily activities of the Damaras.

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At the moment of the arrival there are no tourists in the village, the chief of the village is appearing from a distance.

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And the guide will introduce the program of an hour-long visit at the office.

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The doctor and various herbs and other roots. There is a kind of remedy and cure for any illness.

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The next shelter. Meanwhile a car full of white tourists has arrived and the guests will be demonstrated how to light fire by two pieces of wood.

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Just like this, with the help of a wooden stick, a couple of minutes - and little by little the smoke is beginning to rise.

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Making the beer. Was not supposed to be ready yet, but the flies were already present and not able to fly any more, and by the smell - it seemed to be quite a strong beverage.

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Twyfelfontein is the first and currently the only UNESCO World Heritage Site in Namibia since the year of 2007, as there are over 2,500 petroglyphs or rock paintings there.

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One more attraction of Twyfelfontein - "Organ Pipes"

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And then by the road one can meet "Petrified Forest" or fossilized trunks - about 280 million years old. They look like ordinary trunks lying on the ground. And here, too, Welwitschias are growing.

Some pictures from the car window.

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Local road D2743.

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There is no traffic at all. Sometimes, there are gates on the road that are intended to prevent domestic animals from running around. And the children were curious and ran over to see a strange car.

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This single column is called Vingerklip. It is located on private land, the price of the visit is decent - 5N $ (the sum in words: five Namibian dollars, or about 50 eurocents)

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Today the overnight place is “Oppi-Koppi RestCamp” in Kamanjab. One reason for the selection of this place is the nice phrase on their website "Vehicles without an African record (for nationals) can use our camp for free." And so it was. Two more vehicles with German license plates caught my eye there as well.

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For dinner - you can have zebra with fries. The piece of meat is big and decent. And tastes like a steak. The price is 69 N $

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Cloudy sunset with a guinea fowl on the stone wall.

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Another late-night wanderer, almost as big as a chicken egg, good that didn`t trip over it.

And finally - the most peculiar insect of last months.

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I have never come across of this kind of an insect before in the wild You look at it and think that this kind of a bug cannot exist after all. Then you just recall that there really are some sort of strange insects behind the glass at some Zoos.

Stick Insect. Just like a branch, at the beginning it really deceived me.

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But then you start to inspect more closely – and there are indeed four legs and two eyes, and it is moving slowly upwards along the post.

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From a little distance.

And until the next time.

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