If you have trouble finding endless fascination with desolate landscapes, Namibia may not be the place for you. With a population of 2 million people, spread out over an area half the size of Alaska, Namibia is the second least densely populated country in the world, next to Mongolia. Urban centers are not Namibia’s strong suit. Most Namibian towns are quite small, and often spread out by a few hours drive. Petrol stations are few and far between, and it is fairly common for them to be out of petrol. But if you can enjoy that kind of remoteness, Namibia is stunning.

I had a field day (or 7) with the camera, and we saw all kinds of wild animals I had no expectations of seeing, including wild zebras, tons of antelope, desert foxes, etc. In North America when you go camping, you have to lock up your food at night so bears don’t get it. In Namibia, you have to worry about baboons. We woke up one morning to discover that a baboon had trashed a box of our oatmeal. Not to mention the giant bugs.

Namibia is somewhat of a strange country to blast around with nine other young Americans in a giant van. Inside the van, everything is abrasive, with music roaring for every foot of the 2600 mile trip, people singing, laughing, sometimes dancing, and on rare occasion, crowd surfing. But outside the van is an overwhelming silence that is damn near impossible to obtain if you are near any kind of human civilization. There is little in between these two extremes.

The largest dose of civilization we had was two nights spent in Swakupmond, a pretty town located on the Atlantic coast. Swakupmond was originally colonized by Germans, and is now a place where Europeans come to vacation. It was a refreshing burst of tourism at the end of a long drive through the desert. Nate and I spent the better part of our morning in Swakupmond antiquing, an activity that generally does not characterize our demographic. Here is a gif of Nate licking our hostel’s electric fence:

Below I’ve posted photos. Comments are welcomed.

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When you’re walking past a parking lot in broad daylight, only to discover an unattended fire burning in the corner, “T.I.A.”

When the university makes all the study abroad students take a 4-hour-long standardized test to test everyone’s literacy (a test that was written by someone who clearly did not speak English as a first language), “T.I.A.” (On a bathroom break, I overheard a fellow test-taker remark, “I could be blackout drunk, and still pass this fucking test!”)

When the a $70 million ship crashes up on shore, “T.I.A.”

The more I’m here, the more I like it here. Maybe this be because none of my stuff has gotten jacked yet, minus a pair of sunglasses that a drunken study abroad student swiped during the”Braai Day” celebration that occurs weekly at my house. Fortunately those glasses were an inexpensive replacement for my previous pair of sunglasses which had been run over by 2 cars in a row only a week earlier. But it’s hard to feel upset about such things when you look up, and there is a gorgeous mountain sitting right there in front of you.

Many of the following pictures have captions. If you click on them, you should be able to read the captions.

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“Uh… There’s a lot more of black people here… oh, and the mountain is awesome!”

I didn’t have anything valuable to contribute. But now that I’ve been here for some time, I’ve collected some better observations.

Being a cheapskate, the first thing I had to check out were the prices. To my delight, things here are generally quite cheap. My friend and I went out for dinner the other day. I paid for both of us. It cost less than $5 for the two of us combined. A beer at a bar costs around $2. Our security guard gets paid around $15 for a 12 hour shift. Food is cheap. Booze is cheap. Labor is cheap.

But everything balances out. Some things are unreasonably expensive. Like the Internet. Living in the U.S., it’s easy to forget that the Internet isn’t universally excellent. Unlimited internet here seems to be virtually nonexistent, either that, or it’s extraordinarily slow. My internet is rationed out. I wasn’t sure exactly how much I was allotted, but a 10 minute Skype chat with my parents killed 2% of my Internet allowance for my first two months here. This allowance costs about $90. If I used internet here like I do at home, I’d undoubtedly be paying hundreds of dollars.

(Also, Listerine is mad expensive. A half liter of it here costs about $8. At home, a full liter costs around $3.50. Those who know my passion for a proper oral hygiene regimen, will understand how crushing this is to me. Also, Listerine strips are not sold in this country. Here’s a word to the wise: If you want to make a buck, buy Listerine strips in bulk, somehow import them to South Africa, and sell them to me.)

I’m starting to understand why Cape Town is a good place to go and study geography. First of all, you’ve got this great mountain smack dab in the middle of the city, with the sprawl wrapping all the way around it. All you have to do it get on top of the mountain, and you can see exactly how the city is laid out, where the new developments have popped up, etc, all without looking at a map. We’ve had a number of lectures doing just that.

I think the most impressive part of Cape Town’s landscape is the mountain itself. When you’re actually on the mountain, the rest of the landscape isn’t particularly impressive. The downtown isn’t particularly tall, and while there are a number of high rises, none of them are particularly remarkable, or work well as landmarks. The area of the sprawl is massive, but most buildings are short, and there aren’t a lot of things that grab the attention. As far as I’m concerned, two things really stand out. First are a pair of “nuclear” cooling towers, (which are actually part of an old coal plant) positioned in the middle of the sprawl. The second is Cape Town’s new soccer stadium built for the World Cup.

There's Cape Town's new stadium.

I’m also starting to understand why South Africa is a great place for an environmental studies program. As the Cape region by itself is one of the world’s six floral kingdoms (for comparison, the other 5 floral kingdoms are continent sized), it is home to all kinds of temperamental species that are found nowhere else on the earth. When the environment starts acting up, some of these species inevitably kick the bucket, acting as canaries in the coal mine for researchers to observe. Most of the Cape’s biodiversity is in the form of plants, “fynbos” to be specific, plants that require the occasional wild fire to stimulate the reproductive cycle. You can hike through the Cape peninsula and see more species of shrubby, fire-loving plants than you will ever care to know exist. It’s really quite astounding what you get when you pack an entire floral kingdom into a small portion of a country.

However, some of these species are animals, and for unsophisticated American students looking for a good time, they are all the rage. Check out this lizard!

Sometimes it’s hard to appreciate wildlife when the animals’ habitat is also a tourist destination. It doesn’t really feel like nature anymore. It feels like a zoo. This Penguin hotspot near Simon’s Town is exactly what I’m talking about. There are all kinds of decks and balconies covering the place that tourists can use to view and photograph the penguins.

I was kind of surprised the Penguins hadn’t moved out, as their home attracts droves of white people on a daily basis, so I had to double check. Yes, apparently the penguins actually choose to live there. (In fact, we’ve maintained 10% of the original penguin population, thanks to the fact that penguins are “charismatic mega fauna!”)

However, there are some good parts of making it a popular tourist destination. First of all, I get to see Penguins. It’s pretty much impossible to be anything less than impressed by Penguins. They are rather human-like the way they walk around. Look at them cover that rock and socialize, while all the other birds just blindly follow each other:

Secondly, tourist destinations attract more tourists. These means that there’s always someone with a bigger camera than me, making me feel like less of a douche bag. This guy wins:

"Aww yeah. National Geographic can't turn me down now!"

Not all the wildlife here is that cool. I am specifically talking about baboons. I know what you’re thinking. “Baboons!? You over-privileged bastard! I’m sitting here freezing in North America, and you’re seeing baboons, and not appreciating them?” Well sort of. I was impressed when I first saw baboons. And saddened when I found out they were endangered… and then disappointed when I heard they were dangerous.

And then I discovered why they were endangered… and dangerous. Because if you have food, they will come up, and violently try and steal it straight out of your hands! I mean, I’m sympathetic towards endangered species, but a man’s got to come by his food honestly. This isn’t the part of Africa where food is hard to come by. There is plenty of it!

Here is my friend Elliot after a baboon fought him for his bag of peanuts. Elliot won.

Lastly, the sun in South Africa is scalding hot. This is Elliot’s legendary sunburn. Though you can escape the wrath of baboons, you cannot avoid the sun.

But without the scalding hot sun, this place wouldn’t have the wildfires, thus all of the biodiversity it’s known for. People often compare the climate and landscape here to California. I kind of agree with that, but I’ve also seen things that make me compare it to West Virginia.

This must be what ecotourism is.

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