Namibia versus...

Leaving Namibia to see other African countries for the first time gave us new vantage points for some comparing and contrasting.

Namibia... mostly arid and flat with occasional hills or small mountains in some parts. South Africa consists of more varying landscapes. We probably saw mostly lush, vast rolling hills. Lesotho, known as the "Kingdom in the Sky" has the highest low point of any other country with its mountainous terrain. To elaborate on its nickname, most people literally do live and exist in the sky, high up in the mountains rather than in the valleys. Driving on these roads, therefore, made for breathtaking views. Interestingly, Lesotho formed its own independent kingdom nation (apart from SA, which completely surrounds it) largely thanks to its terrain when it escaped colonization as tribal king Moshoeshoe gathered his people to successfully defend their mountain fortress.

Each of these countries are certainly beautiful in their own right.

Development-wise, South Africa > Namibia > Lesotho. Part of this conclusion comes from the general sense of the places. SA has a more modern feel, and Cape Town is as developed as any major city in the world. In the towns of Lesotho, on the other hand, you get that more hustle-bustle "Africa" feel with busy food stands, large crowds and animals around, and low traffic control (with pedestrians crossing the street as they felt like it without much regard for motor vehicles). Driving through rural areas takes you through rustic farm communities with people living out of the coexisting mix of huts and corrugated tin shacks.

While traveling, we came to really internalize Namibia's very low population density* which has become so normal to us, when we incorrectly expected to be able to get out of the car to use the bush toilet most any time we weren't in a town. You see, when one is going from Point A to Point B in Namibia, this usually means driving 50-100+ kilometers (at least where we are, in "the South") through farms of 5000 hectares a piece, with very few souls or man-made structures throughout the entire stretch. In SA, other cars on the road were usually what spoiled our privacy, while in Lesotho it was often people who were working in the hills around their houses or farms, trying to get somewhere, or just enjoying the day.

On the note of population, because SA's 60 million towers over Namibia's 2 million, SA has remained the manufacturing and import/export center of southern Africa.

So back to development, Namibia has a pretty solid infrastructure. Namibia boasts some very nicely saved roads between virtually anywhere major you might want to go (though there are still gravel roads of varying degrees of courseness also), which gives it an edge over many other African countries in the eyes of tourists (most of whom come from SA or Germany (the country that colonized Namibia) and Europe). And remember that tourism is a top industry for Namibia. Landlines and cell phone towers (and internet!) are adequate, though, as expected, the degree of reception largely correlates to the population of the area (or: more bush = less reception). Most of Namibia has clean running water and electricity. Even huts in rural areas (usually in "the North") are often wired. Though facilities may not be of the highest caliber or number, hospitals and clinics, police stations, post offices, etc are easily found throughout the country.

And then of course, there's the topic of schools. It will be best to save this analysis for future posts (coming soon?) and for now just say that Namibia's education system strives to keep up to a first world level. Despite how little we've publicly written about Namibian schools thus far, we are full of many facts and opinions, which we discuss with each other frequently (though "vent" may sometimes be a more accurate verb!).


* Namibia is currently the second least densely populated country in the world after Mongolia.

Capricorn and car

Crossed the Tropic of Capricorn!  Where, as you can somewhat see, Patches felt it appropriate to give us some big, wet kisses. (Oh right, Patches always finds it appropriate to give us (and everyone he meets, especially PCV's) big, wet kisses.)

 

Our trip to South Africa and Lesotho was made possible by renting a car and driving (stick) on the left (which we have done a couple years ago "Down Under"), which was made possible by those who taught us to drive stick (Dad Bachmann for me, Mark and Papa Metz for Kevin) and those who allowed us to practice driving stick on their vehicles (Mom and Steve Bachmann). So thanks guys!  (Tip: If you're thinking about visiting us here and renting a car, get comfortable driving stick shift!)

Can I just say quickly... look at those trees!!!! (How we miss them here in Namibia.)

Oh yes, and all this made possible, well, Patches' deepening enjoyment of car rides. What a life, huh?

(No, we didn't actually let him ride in the trunk!  He had just jumped in himself.. maybe because he was cold (we were in the mountains at the time) or maybe because he wanted to make sure we didn't leave without him.)

From departing Lesotho (since I already posted those photos and Lesotho roads aren't really on Googlemaps yet), here is our approximate route down and around the South African cape.

View Larger Map

The following blog posts are going to be broken up a bit, as to help keep my and Kevin's brains organized and to hopefully help you better absorb our experience. Enjoy!

PS... I should add that all this is made possible by the fuel provided by Birthday and Easter treats sent by many amazing people at home so THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Best of Lesotho

Wanted to post a few more, but figured this is better than nothing, right??  We are still on holiday, but since the opportunity arose, we figured we could show you a bit of where we've been.

The following were taken for your viewing pleasure, mostly out of our car window.  (Actually now that I check, the last 4 were taken out the car window.  But of our very large number of total photos taken, the vast majority were indeed taken while driving.)

What an amazing sunset can do...

On a hike...

 

Yep, Patches is here too!

One of our accommodations, very lovely...

Young boy herding sheep.. across the road where we were driving...

Stunning views...

 

More to come of the rest of our holiday adventures!