After our first night sleeping in Namibia and a delicious breakfast of pancakes, we set off in ‘The Beast’ for our first long drive of the holiday. We had a trusty Sat Nav and some excellent written directions courtesy of Wilderness Safaris, which included where to stop for fuel and refreshments. The directions said we had about a 5.5 hour drive ahead of us, mostly on gravel roads.

Paul was first in the drivers’ seat and we hadn’t gone far out of Windhoek when the smooth tarmac road was replaced by a wide but bumpy dirt track! The roads aren’t great, but they are really wide, and if you stick to the speed limits and drive down the middle of the road like the locals, you can avoid the worst of it. The ruts are the horrible bit as they literally rattle every part of the car and you! You definitely need a 4×4 to be safe.

We approached the long drives as part of the adventure and a chance to spot wildlife. Whoever was the passenger was designated official ‘animal lookout’ and after a few false alarms where I mistook a rock for a rhino, we saw our first Zebra trotting down the middle of the road. That was a bit of a wow moment!! I have lots nicer photos of Zebras later, but this was our first so deserves to be included.

The directions gave us the option of a scenic route over a mountain pass or a boring route, so we opted for scenic! The Spreetshoogte Pass connects the Namib Desert with the Khomas Highland and it was well worth the steep mountain drive, we were even treated to a few kilometres of concrete road!

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Our first stop off point was the small settlement of Solitaire for a refuel and bite to eat. I mention this because it has a quaint little bakery there which is famous for its apple crumble. I can confirm the apple crumble is absolutely worth a visit to Solitaire, however being a Brit I would have liked some custard to go with it…probably an unreasonable expectation in the middle of a desert!

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Now it was time for me to take the wheel and experience my first drive in Namibia. Paul looked a little nervous but I soon felt comfortable steering ‘The Beast’ over many different types of terrain. The last part of the drive was probably the worst road conditions we encountered on the whole trip, it felt like you were driving across the worlds longest cattle grid..not nice! Eventually we pulled up at the utterly stunning Kulala Dessert Lodge, home for the next two nights.

We were greeted at the lodge entrance with ice cold towels and apple juice. Admittedly, after 5.5 hours in a car a beer would have been better, but it was a nice touch none the less! We were all inclusive at the hotel which included scheduled activities the next day, so we booked onto two trips and then went to see our Kulala or posh tent!

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The first thing that struck us in the accommodation was the heat…I know, who’d have thought the desert was hot right…however the heat did take us by surprise, so we quickly worked out how to get the ceiling fan on so we could breathe!. No air con in the Kulala unfortunately, but we were really impressed with the size of the room and the huge comfy bed. The desert views from our veranda were breathtaking, so we got some drinks from the bar and watched the sunset. As we sat there we heard a clip clop sound getting closer and closer and were very excited to see a Oryx walk right past us going about his business.

With the sun gone for the night and the temperature now bearable, we headed out to dinner at the outside candlelight restaurant. They serve your starter and dessert at the table, and the main course is a self serve buffet. We had lentil soup to start which was creamy and rich, piri piri chicken for main, which was tasty but a tad spicy for me and a bread and butter pudding with caramel, does what it says on the tin…yum! Suitably stuffed and pretty tired after a long day we headed for bed ready for our 6am alarm call!!!