MY EPIC SWAKOPMUND ADVENTURE (part one)

Okay, so this trip was OFFICIALLY to pick up items for the gala, WHICH we did. Unofficially, it was a vacation/ food tour. Which in my opinion is the best combination there is!

We woke up at 4am to leave for Swakop on Saturday morning. It was dark, our electricity was out, and it was rather cold. Surprisingly, I was wide awake! Which I’ve noticed is the norm if I wake up before the sun rises here. Fortunately, I have no idea (well some idea) how to drive stick, so I ended up squashed in the back of a tiny car with three other girls, but I had the option of sleep. Of course, I was so excited by the beach trip that I didn’t sleep AT ALL. Well, that and I was petrified that we’d hit an animal in the dark. There is a REASON that it is advised NOT to drive at night in Namibia.

Anyways, it was a 5 ½ hour car ride to Swakop and we only stopped for coffee and bathroom once. It actually was surprisingly good. The view was interesting as the sun was coming up and as we approached Swakop, there was this… WALL of fog starting at the mountains. Also accompanying the fog was a change in scenery: from scrubby, Idaho-esk scenery to BARREN DESERT OF DOOM. Seriously. So we drove into this fog and kept expecting one of us to vanish into thin air, stolen by the fog like some kind of horror movie. Basically, we all had the hysterical giggles for half an hour.



Before we went into town, we stopped by at Laurie’s friend Susan’s house to pick up some prints. She had this adorable house in the middle of a plot that used to be a riverbed that seemed REALLY DESOLATE. Like, seriously, I was getting depressed driving through her neighborhood. (which consisted on four or five houses in the sand) She had these three ADORABLE dogs who were SO excited to see us. She invited us in for coffee and we sat down and talked about which places in Swakop may give us donations. She was… a bit of a miser. Every place we mentioned we were going (which had had STUNNING reviews from people back at CCF) was met with a frown and weariness. Basically, she told us the best restaurant in town was a rip-off and that the beach bar we were going to was… not a nice place to go… Yeah, we didn’t take a lot of her reviews seriously. But we left in high spirits after fending off her over-enthusiastic dogs.

When we rolled into town 20 mins later, the fog was still there and everything was a bit cloudy and dreary… this did NOT bode well for our trip, but we put on a smile and found our hotel. Well, backpackers lodge called the Gruner Krantz. Yeah, I TOTALLY didn’t realize that this place was a lodge, bar, and NIGHT CLUB. TOOOOOOOTALLY missed that. But it was cheap (40 USD for to nights!) and we got a LOCKED dorm room to ourselves, so we figured we could get over the noise.



Anyways, we settled into our hotel and then went to the Village Café to meet with Laurie’s OTHER friend Leen. This one was MUCH nicer and reminded me of some sort of cool grandma. The village café was ALSO awesome and barely had room to fit us! Their coffee was delicious and the whole place was a hodge-podge of decorations and witty quotes. I had a M’offee (some sort of malt and coffee drink) and a bacon and egg brotchen. (BAAAAASSICALLY a sandwich-roll thing…) it was delicious! Then we wandered around town to the shops that Leen mentioned. It was a right shame though, because all of the shops apparently close at noonish on Saturdays! So we didn’t do much shopping, but that was okay. After that, we headed towards the Tiger Reef pub that sat on the beach overlooking the ocean. By this time the sun had come out! So I grabbed a Savanna Light (cider thingy) from the bar and relaxed on the deck. I was SLIGHTLY jealous when the other girls got chips (eg French fries) that were FANTASTIC. But I wasn’t hungry, so I abstained. It was all VERY relaxing. And Swakop is VERY gorgeous in the sunshine.

After that, we headed back to the room to change for dinner. (We were eating at a fancy restaurant) It was a tad chilly but nothing we couldn’t handle. I wore that mostly-pink outfit that makes me look adorable. (rolls eyes) and my hair was wavy and lovely from when I had it up in braids the day before. It felt nice to wear non-work clothes. We went over to the pier and took pictures from there for a while while the sun was starting to set. Then we went below deck to the SUSHI BAR at the end of the pier! Unfortunately, one of the girls didn’t like fish, so we weren’t actually EATING there, but we bought drinks at the bar so that we could sit out of the wind (it WAS rather gusty) and watch the sun go down. African sunsets are AMAZING no matter where you are. I got a champagne/ cherry concoction that was OK but which I ended up sharing with the other girls. But it was nice and fancy.

After that we went over to a restaurant called The Tug which was ALSO right on the beach. We spent the whole meal practicing table manners and giggling a lot. This was MOSTLY because when the waiter brought Margo and Jess their wine, he held out the bottle for Margo’s scrutiny and she GRABBED IT OUT OF HIS HANDS…. LOL! She’s never been to fancy restaurants before and so she didn’t KNOW that she was supposed to just nod at it like she knew it was a good vintage or something. LOL! And so Brittany and Jess spent the meal periodically dropping tidbits from their manners classes. (Apparently those exist in COLLEGE…)

After dinner, we went back to the Gruner Krantz and found, to our dismay and amusement, that the Gruner Krantz is the loudest place in all of Swakop on Saturday nights. Wow. Loud. But we gamely joined in on the party and danced for a VERY long time. Margo made friends with A LOT of people, but most notably the DJ/ MANAGER. And that was a very good idea. She got some free drinks and he let us dance behind the DJ booth. Which was good because it stopped people from spilling their drinks on my skirt. I MUCH prefer dances in which alcohol is not an integral part of the dance floor. Lols.

AWAIT PART TWO!!!!