Grootfontein, Namibia

7am breakfast at Rainbow Camp then on the road. 400km drive today. We stopped about halfway at the town of Rundu for internet cafe and lunch at the Hungry Lion ("for the love of Chicken!"). Also picked up more supplies of Tafel beer and ice as Steve and I have been consuming the local brew at a rate of knots for the last few days. Got to Roys Camp near Grootfontein about 3pm and set up camp and no sooner had we finished than it poured down with rain. We were confined to the bus for a couple of hours but a bit of music, beer and wine had everyone in good spirits pretty quickly. It was so rainy and wet underfoot that I stayed in shorts and thongs all night which was all good except for the twenty or so sandfly bites I got all over my calves, ankles and feet which kept we awake half the night (or so it felt). It rained through the night and a dreamt of the tent flooding but fortunately we stayed dry throughout.

In the morning we awoke to find that the whole camp site was inundated with water and a new stream was forming through the middle including where the truck is parked! Our tent was sitting in a few centres of water but had stayed dry thankfully. After breakfast we left the tents as they were as we are camping here again tonight before jumping on the truck for the drive our to visit the San People (aka the Kalahari bushmen) for a village tour. On the way along shoddy sandy roads we got severely bogged but after maybe half an hour we managed to get out again.

On the village tour it was fasciniating to learn about the San people's unique hunter gatherer way of life, see them light fire the traditional way and set traps for birds and forrage for herbal remedies, hidden water and bush food. I bought a small hand made knife as a souvenir as the money goes back to the people - hopefully I will not lose it at customs somewhere down the track! After the village tour we had lunch in the shade of a big tree as it was extremely bloody hot (read: 35 plus degrees). Back on the truck we started for the drive back to Roys Camp. Along the way we saw spectacular lightning in the distant and storms approaching and before long we were in the middle of a torrential downpour. As we drove into Roy's Camp it was a site of destruction as many tents had completely blown over and the water was seemingly everywhere. Luckily our tent had survived again but many others were completely saturated including sleeping bags and mattresses. We moved our tent to higher ground, had some dinner and headed for the bar. Again I got attacked by sandflies! The woman running the bar at Roys was one to remember: she had the physique of a rugby player and the head of Arnold Schwarzenegger! Nobody was going to mess with her that was for sure.