The Heat is On

The alarm goes off at 5am. It’s still dark outside with just a hint of the approaching dawn. We shuffle out of the tents and into our cycling clothes stiff with yesterday’s sweat. We’re in the desert now and it’s important to get all the cycling done before the worst of the heat sets in (around 1pm). The mornings are still surprisingly cool and there is usually a nice breeze. In the afternoons that breeze approaches gale-force, either blowing us sideways off the bikes or slowing the progress to less than walking speed. Somehow we never seem to have tailwind.

Since visiting the big sand dunes of Sossusvlei we have turned onto the “godforsaken C27” (quote from another cyclist). It has been likened to an emotionally and at times physically abusive relationship. We feel the comparison deeply as we are shaken to the core by rocky stretches and endless washboard sections. No wonder we are developing tennis elbow. Then the gravel is suddenly loose and our front wheels skid and get stuck abruptly. We huff and puff, then proceed to waddle awkwardly to the other side of the road that looks so much better, yet usually disappoints.

And then there is the sand. Where flash floods have washed away the road we encounter gulleys of deep reddish sand where there is nothing left for us to do but push the bikes. Thankfully there are three of us. That way everyone feels compelled to regulate their emotions somewhat. It lifts the mood to know someone else is suffering too. Sometimes we laugh, sometimes curse, sometimes just exchange silent looks of frustration. But we do it all together and cheer to conquering the road day after day.

Our stubborn and frankly somewhat pathetic efforts (covering only about 50km a day) are rewarded though. The desert is a brutal place, but also one of the most amazing landscapes we’ve ever been in. On the left we pass barren hills and fields of rocks. On the right we gaze at the sand dunes of the Namib – the oldest desert in the world. The vastness poses an added sense of adventure. About once per hour a car passes us by. We go without phone signal for days and days. There are no towns for hundreds of kilometers, maybe a hamlet or a farm every 50km or so.

At a little ranger station we watch zebra and oryx at the watering hole and ostriches running in the distance. The sun sets in a fog of blowing sand. We visit the spotted eagle owls and score some pepper and eggplant for our dinner from the garden. There is a little life in the desert after all. Every morning it is a little harder to get up. The days of 10+ hours of sleep in east Africa are long past. Now the late sunset and relentless alarm monster allow less than eight hours.

One day we rock up at Barby’s guest farm after another tough day. We’re excited because Leslie – the owner – is supposed to be quite bicycle friendly and may give us a good price for a cottage. Ellie greets him with the friendliest smile and in her signature Oxford (Brookes) accent. Then we ask about the price for the cottage. “For you people it’s 350NAD per person.” … Awkward silence. That’s crazy high! We’ve heard from other people that cyclists sometimes get the whole cottage for 250NAD. And what does he mean by “You people”?

In typical British fashion we suppress these questions and somewhat dejectedly opt for camping. We spend at least an hour dissecting his words. Later in the afternoon Leslie comes by again and asks us where we’re all from. “If only I had known that one of you is German!” he tells Lina conspiratorially in German. He’s Scottish in the 5th generation and the mock animosity towards the English seems to run quite strong in his family. Lina kicks herself internally. She could probably have had a night for free in the cottage while the bloody English are confined to the tents.

After a surprisingly cool night we head over to Leslie’s house for a little morning chat. He is nursing a vodka hangover because we drank all his coke the day before. The stories he tells of other travelers staying at the farm are quite something. Once there were these three boring vegans (he despises vegans), two skinny and one “unbelievably fat”. Due to the boring conversation he drank more than usual and proceeded to ask why the one girl was so fat. Another long awkward silence and then the answer: peanut butter addiction.

The loneliness of the desert certainly breeds and attracts interesting characters and we have a hard time leaving Leslie and his stories about emotional support parrots and how he once “taught an ISIS kid” (a middle eastern boy) how to shoot. From Barby farm it’s mostly downhill and the heat is gathering force again. We stop for lunch at a little hotel with staff who are so unwelcoming it’s almost comical. In the afternoon we turn onto the first decent gravel road since leaving Windhoek. What a relief for us and especially Jo, Olive and Shania Chain (Ellie’s bike).

We stay on that road for 70km the next day. Finally we are making some decent progress! The hills to the east have become a mesa-like escarpment and we cruise around their edge to the oldest town in Namibia: Bethanie. We’re not sure if it once had the glory that this label espouses. We’re also not sure why anyone would choose to build a town on this parched patch of land miles away from the sea or a river. The nuns at a local Benedictine eco camp show us the Why: a cute little mosquito nursery not far from our campsite (aka a spring).

They generously take us to the top of one of the mesas for a sundowner and we look out over the plains below. The sand looks almost black from up here and the dry grass, shimmering golden in the setting sun, traces the dried-up remnants of rivers and streams. The wind pulls at our clothes, but for the first time in forever we don’t have to pay attention from which direction it’s coming. We get out the camping chairs, pass around cokes and cookies and then just enjoy our front row seats to another beautiful sunset over the desert.