To the end of the Earth and back

My travel sketchbook from South Africa and Namibia

Dearest Friend,

We are still shaking the sand out of our shoes and backpacks.

This morning, as I left the house to run some errands, I reached into the inside pocket of my handbag to find my lipstick and was greeted with a fistful of sand. Was it from the ancient Namib desert? Or the beaches in Cape Town?

We spent three weeks exploring Namibia and South Africa, specifically Cape Town and the desert around Swakopmund. My husband grew up in Cape Town, and his mother grew up in Namibia. So the places feel deeply woven into our family DNA. The glittering sand is part of our psyche.

In Cape Town, we rested, we jumped over waves, we watched the clouds form and reform over Table Mountain.

In Namibia, we traveled for hours and hours on the dustiest, hottest, bumpiest desert roads I have ever experienced to witness the results of the first rains in over a decade in the oldest desert in the world. The moonscape-like landscape burst with yellow wildflowers and grasses so vibrantly green that they almost hurt the eyes to look at them.

The landscape is ancient, but it looks like a modernist painting.

Every few miles we had to check our tire pressure and our engine temperature. Drink more water. Stretch our legs.

That feels a bit like daily life, doesn’t it?

I was reminded that each day of normal life can feel equally arduous. If we don’t check our tire pressure (as in stress levels), and engine temperature (as in emotional levels) and make sure to drink enough water and stretch our legs, we might break down on the way, too.

Even if the journey is just another trip to the grocery store because you forgot the milk, again, or to the post office to mail those forms, or… fill in the blank…

May your emotional tire pressure give you the smoothest ride today, wherever your destination is,

Jane

P.S. this is a long email. If it gets cut off, just click "View entire message"

P.P.S. As always… share, like and reply!

Namibia is a land of contrasts… the sea and the stark desert side by side.

Stopped in the middle of nowhere to buy a snack on the way. It is hot and dusty.

Our lodge looked at the distant mountains and the desert grasslands.

Sossusvlei and Deadvlei. These trees died 900 years ago during a time of climate change and have been standing in an amphitheatre of red dunes ever since, petrified.

Wildflowers from the rare rain that fell.

Collage dunes.

On the road to nowhere!

The Namibian seaside. And the airport in the dunes.

Cape Town felt so lush in comparison!

We played in the family pool and made friends with the African penguins.