Hoanib Skeleton Coast Camp

Wednesday, August 30, 2017

We got up early and caught another airplane south to the Skeleton Coast area via the airstrip hub at Doro Nawas. The camp is at the red seal pin on the map.

We arrived about one o’clock in the afternoon and not long after went on a drive along a dry riverbed. 

Then we came upon a giraffe. 

Next up was a large herd of Springbok.

Here is a close up of an individual Springbok.

The landscape changes fast here!

Here is what the sunset looked like from our truck.

The next morning, Thursday, we packed up for a long trip out to the Skeleton Coast. First animal of the morning was a Black–backed Jackal.

As we pushed on, the soil changed to fractured clay.

As we got closer to the coast, the landscape changed to sand.

The dry riverbed had water in it quite near the coast. The river’s mouth was blocked by a lot of rocks, pushed up by the rough ocean.

Our guide had sharp eyes, and noticed a resting lion on the island!

The lion was one of the Hoanib Floodplain Pride’s three orphan cubs that are monitored by the desert lion project. The location of the other two cubs was known to the guides, so the hope is that they are old enough now to hunt and survive. The desert lion project is one of three conservation projects that receive some level of support from the Camp. The others include cheetahs and the brown hyena, a threatened species. We had an interesting presentation back at the Camp regarding hyena. We had only seen or known about spotted hyenas previously.

Our guide next spotted a rare brown hyena! Look at its hair.

When we reached the beach, there was a very powerful smell from 15,000 Cape fur seals living in a very small area. A lot of them were out in the water, too.

We saw about a dozen Black–back Jackals running around the seals, looking for young or weak seals to eat.

We then headed to an air strip, where we would fly back to camp. Here are white (juvenile) flamingos in the damned up river.

Here is what the waves and the beach look like from the air. The ocean current is very cold, we were told. That didn’t surprise us, as the temperature at the camp was, well, chilly and breezy. Everyone wore warm jackets while we were at the Hoanib Skeleton Coast Camp.

The next morning, Friday, we went out in the truck and toured the riverbed again. The area has a lot of giraffes.

Here is a giraffe on a desert sand dune.

Here is an ostrich.

We came upon a large herd of elephants. Here is a mom and her baby.

More of the herd and a view of the landscape.

Here a baby elephant gets some milk from mom.

The large elephant here is pulling down branches and leaves from a tasty tree for the smaller elephants that can’t reach them.

Some of the elephants decided to climb up, out of the riverbed.

These are Rüppell’s Korhaan birds, a type of bustard.

This cheetah watched us closely as we drove by. She has a tracking device around her neck.

Tomorrow we will be leaving for Johannesburg via Windhoek, arriving early in the evening. After a night’s stay, we’re getting back on a plane and heading to Botswana. Here again is the map of the airstrip routes in Namibia we took between the three camps. The flight back to Windhoek from Doro Nawas, was the longest and in the smallest aircraft, a five seater, plane, with one of us  seated next to the pilot!

We definitely enjoyed Namibia with its varied desert landscapes and animals adapted to its harsh conditions (eg, elephants, cheetahs and lions). The people were really warm and friendly.

On Wednesday morning, we flew south to Hoanib Skeleton Coast Camp, where we will stay for three nights.