All of a quiver

This morning (actually Saturday, 30th - must correct the date/time) we are waking up to clear blue skies and a very quiet campsite near the town of Keetmanshoop, a wild west type of town in the south of Namibia. There is a small group of the strange looking Quiver Trees next to the Enterprise. I read that there is a forest of them not far away. 

We arrived on Tuesday morning, 2 hours late at Windhoek due to having to change planes in Frankfurt because the first plane wouldn't start! We were met by Manfred and his wife in 2 cars as coincidentally 2 German couples had been on the same flight as us and had vehicles stored at his place. The Enterprise was so happy to see us it started almost at once, but had a flat tyre - no problem as Chris soon had it inflated with our air compressor.

The first day back at Manfred's was spent unpacking and organising the things we had brought back from the UK, plus a nap, visit to Windhoek for food shopping and an early night. It was comfortable to be back at our bush campsite on our own, apart from the wild animals. On the drive in we saw a dead springbok. Manfred told us there was a hyena about and it had already killed 5 springbok in the past week. On our third evening there we heard a gruesome squealing sound and believe the hyena was on the attack again.

Compared to last time we were here, the landscape is very dry. There was no water at all in the big waterhole next to our campsite, but we did see an ostrich having a dust bath there yesterday morning. The main lake was greatly depleted but meant there were a lot of antelope and ostriches around it to drink. The thorn tree leaves are just coming out but there is spring blossom everywhere. Windhoek was a sea of lilac acacia trees looking down from the hillside approach. The drive south out along the B1 looked completely different to our last journey along it to Rehoboth, not so dramatic as when we had the thunderstorms and wonderful colour of the mountain scenery. Now the hues are paler and washed out in the heat haze, so it appeared like another country to us.

All day Wednesday was spent in Kai's garage (Manfred's son) having the kingpins replaced. We had brought the new ones out with us from the UK. I took the opportunity to catch up on sleep. There was more work to do on Thursday morning and then another trip into Windhoek for small spares and shopping, so we were ready to leave yesterday morning. We have decided that we will continue our journey to Cape Town now, visiting Fish River Canyon in Namibia en route.