Day 3: Sesriem to Swakopmund

Cullinan says: 350 km / 218 mi, 5 hr 30 min
Google says: 346 km / 215 mi, 4 hr 27 min
Actual: 345 km / 214 mi, 5 hr 30 min (gravel roads 285 km / 177 mi)

Hard to get the driving estimates wrong, as it was pretty much one road today!

We left Sossusvlei Lodge after breakfast at 9.15am, and our first – and pretty much only – stop was Solitaire, about 83km away, which took us about an hour. Solitaire is a cluster of about 5 or 6 shops and a petrol station all huddled together, and the whole place has a big Route 66 vibe, with old abandoned cars and petrol pumps among the cactuses and brush. There’s a separate page for Solitaire here.

After that, it was on to Walvis Bay and then Swapokmund, with no towns or services for about 263km. We stopped after about 60km at the Tropic of Capricorn signs for a few photos, but that was pretty much it.

The road was the C14, gravel all the way to Walvis Bay, and the first 200km or so was pretty poor, restricting speed to 40kmh in some places – but as we got towards the coast, it improved and the last 100km of gravel was pretty good, with very little corrugation.

We both cheered when we hit the asphalted road at Walvis Bay! Our instructions told us to go down the spectacular B2 for the last part of the journey – but this turned out to be the old B2, as there is a new motorway (also B2) opened, which Google has down as the D1986. This was a 4 lane dual carriageway and we managed to get from Walvis Bay to Swapokmund in just over 20 minutes.

I liked that most signs were in English but you’d get the occasional sign in Afrikaans only. Can’t be because of the people who lived there – no towns to be seen anywhere near either sign!