Day 17 - morning
Day 10 - Northern Experience tour
15 Celsius, overcast
In the early hours of the morning, we followed the barren Atlantic Coast line on our way out of Swakopmund.
The sky was overcast but I'd gotten used to this kind of unpredictable weather in this part of the country! We were on our way to visit Cape Cross, several kilometers away when a shipwreck was seen along the ocean’s shore! By swiftly getting off the road, NTando drove a short distance away on the desert sand in order to get much closer to the abandoned vessel!
Years of abandonment had done its toll to this vessel as it laid rusted on the ocean’s floor. Birds appeared quite comfortable perched high above the ship’s poles having made it their home while waves came crashing non-stop around them.
It kind of made you wonder and ask yourself what could have happened to this vessel for it to lay like that and look like a ghostly figure along the Atlantic coast line. I knew that we were near the southern section of Namibia’s "Skeleton Coast" therefore……..I had the answer to my question!
As our guide explained to us, this southern section of "Skeleton Coast" which continues for several hundreds of kilometers way up to the northern part of Namibia is what one would call “a land of hell”. A land where the upwelling of the cold Benguela current gives rise to dense ocean fog mostly all year round! A land where the winds blow from land to sea, where rainfall rarely exceeds 10 mm annually and where climate is highly inhospitable.
In the past, whoever survived these shipwrecks due to offshore rocks and heavy fog probably died later from dehydration because of having to walk hundreds of kilometers in this hot and arid desert land. Today, more than a thousand such vessels of various sizes and shapes litter the coast. So now you know why it’s called “Skeleton Coast”! Interesting facts!
Back inside Mhondoro, we continued our drive down the paved roadway as if nothing happened but this time around, I had big eyes open as I tried to spot any other shipwrecks along the coast!
Patrick! Hope you're reading this blog because your question of the other day on a previous sighted shipwreck was answered above! Monique :-)