Camping trip to the Brandberg (with Namibian music)

Another Namibian excuse to camp! A five-day weekend, centered around Ascension Day and Africa Day. Namibian is officially a Christian country, so Christian holidays are officially observed. Whatever the reason, it was a great excuse to ascend to new heights in the great outdoors. This time the goal was the highest point in Namibia--Brandberg Mountain.

We didn't actually climb the Brandberg, which can only be done by mountain climbers. But, we camped at the Brandberg White Lady Lodge at the foot of the mountain with our fellow Fulbrighters, the Bates family. Brandberg is about 4.5 hours from Windhoek in northwest Namibia, on the edge of the mountainous Damaraland region. We had gone through quickly on our trip with our friend Uapii in April, but didn't get to explore the area thoroughly.

It was a relaxing weekend, with the end of the semester looming at Polytechnic and multiple trips with visiting friends from the states at hand. So, it was great to just go to one place and stay there--with time to sit and relax. One of the thrills we had was falling asleep on two different nights to the sounds of native Namibian music. One of the 'people-mover-camping lorries' (see photo on previous blog here) at an adjacent site hired a local group to come sing around their campfire. Click the links below to listen and imagine being under a spectacular Milky Way and the Southern Cross, drowsily falling asleep to their music. It's beautiful and really made a great end to the day. I recorded it as a video on my cell phone, so I apologize for the scratchy quality. There is no video--it was pitch dark when I recorded it.

The Lodge is near the 2000-year-old White Lady rock painting, partially depicted in the photo here. It turns out that the white lady is neither white nor a lady. It was thought to be a visiting female from the Nile area originally, but is now thought to be a local man with ash on his legs from dancing around a fire for too long.

More photos of the trip, with more details of adventures, at the Picasa photo site.