Our Namibian Adventure – Written by Elen Robshaw, 5-week expeditioner!

  Week one of our Namibian adventure, and it’s fair to say we were thrown into it at the deep end.

After our twelve-hour flight, four miss-placed bags in Johannesburg, three of which were found when the rest of us arrived in Upington, a short stop at The Guest House to get the rest of our group and a rocky forty-minute ride to base camp, we were shown our tents and fed a traditional Namibian meal of potjie, pap and home-baked bread. After our meal, we were given a briefing from Dre and Red, our fearless camp managers, on what we were going to do and what was expected of us while we were here. At nine the next morning, we packed our rucksacks and set off on an almost three-hour trek down to the Orange River through a dried-up river bed. When we arrived at the river, everyone immediately jumped into the river to cool off and we spent the rest of the day relaxing by the river, setting up our tents and setting up the fire, ready for dinner. In the evening, we ate our rice and sausage dinner while admiring the crystal-clear view of the Milky Way and all the stars around it before trying the two types of whiskey Red had brought with him and heading to bed.

 

Wild, Beauty, FUN!

I absolutely loved my time at Oana, easily one of the best trips of my life. It balanced work with play perfectly and I never felt bored for one moment, with every activity having a clear purpose it made it even more satisfying. However by far the most enjoyable aspect of my time at Oana was the atmosphere, at no time did I feel like I was a tourist, Dre and Red made camp a home for us in our brief stay and I cant thank them enough. My top two activities are probably rafting and the camera traps, but its hard to say with certainty as I enjoyed every activity. The three words to describe Oana would be wild, beauty, FUN!

( Still can’t believe I fell for the helicopter pizza delivery )

 

James Allsop

 

Week Three

 

The arrival of Jackie and Chloe brought on a new round of luck with animals this week. Hanging onto the land cruiser for dear life as Red veered off-piste we followed a herd of mountain zebra, eland and a couple of gemsbok who were all grazing together. Our camera traps also proved fruitful with over 3,000 photos of a family of leopards (which hopefully can result in individuals being identified) and Dennis the donkey was pretty much demolished! There were also pictures of the cape fox, mountain zebra, mongoose, black eagles, porcupines, the brown hyena and every kind of antelope going – a Namibian Piccadilly Circus at night.

 

Join us

 

Sign up this year by getting in touch via
http://oana-ff.org/get-in-touch/

 

Week One: New set of Volunteers

From aardvarks to herds of 66 springbok, cold showers to Fred’s cooking, the first week at Oana has been a blast. Our mission for the three weeks is to try to capture the enigmatic leopard: so far we have set up 14 camera traps, James has butchered a donkey (its halves affectionately known as Denis and Denise), and the aim is to document the leopards’ identities through photos. We have also joined forces with Kali, an overenthusiastic scat dog, who in the near future will help us on our endeavours.

So far, around Oana we have hiked up volcanos, had sundowners looking across the vast plains, and been (temporarily) abandoned in the dark due to the challenges of driving without a sat nav. Our morning mountain biking proved to be better suited to the adrenaline junkies, whereas our efforts at yoga provided a calming antidote. In camp, the biscuit jar is never full, hakuna matata is sung late into the night, and the bird bath we created is a beautiful rock feature.

Our excursions from the farm have involved creating netball courts for the local school in Warmbad, and we have done a two day trip to Fish River. While there we swam in natural hot springs, saw the largest canyon in Africa, and ate our first gemsbok steak.

Wish us luck for week 2!

Biltong, White Water Rafting, Campfire Moments and of course Big Bunny!

Our week started with a two-day hike across the conservancy to the Orange River, something we had all been looking forward to and dreading at the same time. The night before we set off, we scaled up the side of a hill for a sundowner, where we were told by Red and Dre that our hike over the next day would be a chilled three hour walk and wouldn’t be too strenuous, relief to both mine and Mia’s ears who were struggling to even get to up the slope for the sundowner. The start of the hike was early next morning, and we all set off at a good pace with plenty of scaling up mountains, and nibbling on the biltong we had made with Karlene earlier in the week. Red had the treat of carrying two mattresses on his back the whole way, and Max managed to leave his water bottle a few hundred metres back which led to a sprint there and back from him, but on the whole, it was a smooth start.

Camera traps, game catching and animal tracking!

This week started very exciting for us, because we’ve got the chance to be part of a “game capture”. For that we had to drive to the “Oas Stables”, where a very lovely guy called Mantie and his wife Pennie welcomed us. The phrase “My friend”,which Mantie used a lot, is still stuck in our heads today. It was an unbelievable experience for all of us to get so close to the wild animals like the Springboks. Another highlight was the last evening at Mantie’s. We’ve been in a real building for the first time since our arrival, which gave all of us a happy feeling, and the boys could play pool! It was a wonderful time over there.

On our way back we made it to the library, were we could finally get in touch with our loved ones back home, so this weekend was full of highlights.

 

Our first week in the Namibian wilderness

As we all arrived to a sunny Uppington after long flights, we hooked up with Red and started our 4-hour drive, most of which consisted of catching up on sleep and checking our bags hadn’t fallen off!

Once we got to Oana we were straight away welcomed with sights of animals and ridiculous views. Our arrival to base camp was a very welcome one, and Drey showed us the ropes around camp. However, the face on Will when he asked for the wifi password only to find out it wasn’t for us was definitely a face of shock!