Day 4/5: Swakopmund and Walvis Bay

We’re in Swakopmund for two nights, at a very charming 1930s German colonial house called Villa Margarita. The floors are a bit creaky but I love it. Great view of the German Evangelical Lutheran Church opposite, too.

In fact the whole deal with this place is early 20th century Germany. Despite Namibia being English first and Afrikaans second, we were told several times this is “a German town”.

And it is – the old German colonial influence is everywhere, the tourists are German and the people who run the shops are German too. We had a couple of drinks in the Swakopmund Brauhaus, which is predictably a very German pub.

We weren’t able to get into our first choice restaurant, Gabrielle’s, so we had a walk around – it seemed like a safe place to walk around, even in the early evening.

We found two places – a bar and a small pizza place – both with the name Western Saloon, both next door to each other. You’d think they are connected, right? Wrong! There is a big sign on the bar door saying they do not serve hamburgers or pizzas there. So we went into the pizza place first and I had – without exaggeration – the best pizza of my life! No toilet though and I’m bursting, so we’ve decided to go to the bar next door – fed up with beer, I tried to order a Bailey’s, only to be told by the stonefaced German owner that he hasn’t been asked for a Baileys for more than 10 years, so it was back to Hansa.

Day 5 was Saturday morning and we went to the pier (they call it the jetty, and I don’t know the difference) and had lunch at the 1977 Doughnut Bar on the start of the pier. We also had a look in some antique shops. We drove to Walvis Bay for lunch – it’s about 40km each way, so didn’t take long to get to. We had a toasted sandwich at the Yacht Club, and then drove down a bit further to see the flamingoes (there are a LOT of flamingoes there). We didn’t spend very long looking around though.

In the evening we went into Swakopmund again for dinner, visiting Kucki’s restaurant. I had ribs and wings. I am eating a LOT of red meat in this country.