We woke up, this time without the buzzing of bees. But the sun was shining and it looked like being a lovely day. We packed up as quickly as possible, but Marianne could not resist clambering about in the koppie behind the camp site to take some pictures. We did get away around 09h00 and briefly stopped at the hotel to see if we could get some information. Strangely, Marianne walked right through the hotel and even peeked into the kitchen, but no one was to be found, although the place was obviously operational. Along the gravel road to Skilpad in what is now the Namaqua National Park, it looked very dry and there were no flowers where we had seen many on last year's flower tour. Getting into the park was no problem - obviously pre-booking was not an issue here - and drove on to the office where we managed to get a camp site at the coast. We were delighted, because just a few days earlier only Northern Cape residents were allowed to overnight. The restrictions were lifted just in time for us. There were quite a few cars in the parking area and more arriving as things were obviously getting busier after the move to stage two and the opening of inter-provincial travel. We enjoyed our mandatory coffee and milk tart at the covered tables although the Skilpad flowers were a bit disappointing. Then it was off to the road that heads towards the coast. Marianne had been to this point many times on her tours, but has never been able to go beyond the sign that says "4x4 vehicles only beyond this point". Now we could, but 4x4 did not seem to be very necessary. The road wound steeply down and offered wonderful vistas of the plains stretching into the distance in front of us. There was a great variety of colours and we simply had to stop a few times to take pictures. We got to the old deserted settlement of Koeroebees where we stopped and walked about to explore the old mud buildings. It had been quite a large settlement with ruins spread along the dry river bed. The place had a strange and forlorn atmosphere. There were two permanent springs and with good water and several families were able to live here. We found one of the springs and the water was still flowing strongly. The route continued through a variety of landscapes and the quality of the road also varied. We have always been fascinated by the "spots"or "kolle" on the hills in this part of the world and have since established that they are the remnants of ancient termite mounds. We saw some excellent examples of these mounds along this route. We had opted to do the route to Soebatsfontein, because we have never been there. It proved to be a small settlement and also the exit gate of the park. The friendly girl at the gate suggested we do the Wallekraal road. This is a public road, but very attractive with a few tracks turning off to lonely goat farms and the odd windmill. There were also areas with lots of flowers, but every now and then we were in a desert for a while and we got the feeling that we could be in Namibia. We found a track to turn off on for lunch. There was water in a small dam at the turn off and there were fresh tyre tracks on the track and we wondered what there would be to find at the end of the road. But we refrained from going further and just enjoyed the pretty spot for lunch. There were flowers dotted all over the place and Stephen tried hard not to flatten the lovely white vygies as he had to turn the Cruiser. At the Wallekraal intersection we joined the main road from the N7 to Hondeklipbaai. We decided to go and see if anything had changed in this remote West Coast town. Fortunately we stopped to ask the ranger at the gate into the coastal section of the park at what time the gate closes. They do not let anyone in after 16h00 and so we had to be quick. Hondeklipbaai is not an inspiring place. We tried to drive to the wreck of the Aristea, but the corrugations were so bad that we decided it was not worth it. We briefly stopped at the "famous" stone that has given the town it's name and then slowly drove through the place. The old fishing factory was in ruin, but a few old fishing boats were lying in the little bay. There were signs of tourist activity with a few guest houses and a godforsaken looking campsite. One restaurant seems to be very popular, but generally the place looked quite poverty stricken. We had seen enough and now drove back to the gate and the next part of our Namaqua adventure. After the mining devastation along the road to Hondeklipbaai, it was good to be back in the park. Our first point of interest was the mouth of the Spoegrivier. This was a turnoff from the main road along the coast. This had generally been quite good, with little need for 4x4, but the corrugations were horrendous and we decided to drop our tyre pressures to soften the ride. I took them down to 1.4 bar and 200m further we came to a sign advising that pressures be dropped to 1.2 to 1.5 bar. We had been just in time and the Cruiser handled to now very soft sand so easily that I didn't bother to go into 4x4. The caves were quite remarkable and there were lots of habitable shelters mostly facing north. We spent some time exploring and agreed that it would be great place to camp, but there was a very definite no camping sign. We continued to the bird hide. It overlooked the mouth of the river and some largish pools where greater flamingos where doing their thing. It would have been good to spend more time there, but we had a fair way to go and no idea how long it would take. We were keen to see the seal colony marked on the map, but we had to turn off on a few side tracks to eventually find it. We were astounded. The colony was huge and the late afternoon light was perfect and the sea wild and stormy. Seals were trying to land and some appeared to be crashing on to the rocks. The noise was tremendous and the stink as well! There were lots of little ones wriggling about. To us this colony appears to be larger than the one at Cape Cross. We would have loved to stay longer, but we still had to get to our camp site. Soon after the seal colony we hit another stretch of deep sand as we passed through the Bitterrivier Dunefield. When we got to Koringkorrel, the camp site that we had on our reservation form, we found quite a few cars there and we realized that the camp sites had more than one site, since we saw several of the round "skerms" (shelters). We were disappointed, since we were looking forward to having a place all to ourselves. We decided to try the next camp site and we were relieved to find that Skuinsklip had no other occupants. It was also a much smaller site with only two skerms and one enviro loo. It is situated on a small rocky bay and the shore is laden with dried out kelp. We only managed to find a few pieces of light wood, but that would at least help us start the fire. The sound of the waves crashing against the shore were very loud. It was a delightful place!! We started to look for drift wood since our own wood supply was very low. There was no sign of driftwood, only kelp! We would have to make a very small fire to braai our wors. The skerm was well situated and provided good shelter from the fresh breeze. We struggled to get the fire going and we were wondering whether we would get our wors braaied but the wood way had made very good coals and all went well. After supper it was getting quite cold and we were getting quite desperate. Marianne decided to try burning some of the dry kelp. It was difficult to get going and it emitted a bit of a strange smell, but once it got burning we had a camp fire! It burnt very strangely. Initially it gave off some sparks, but then it started curling up and deforming into strange shapes. It was a fun experiment and it did give off some heat. The moon was starting to have some effect and the white foam of the huge waves had a mystical effect. It was wonderful to be camping at the West Coast despite the damp and lack of wood.

Geschreven door Leartravels