The thing that Namibia is perhpas best known for is its huge sand dunes and vast deserts. I could not possibly have gone to Namibia and missed the desert which is how I found myself climbing a sand dune in the middle of nowhere at 5:30am the other day. I was with a short tour and we were in the desert to watch the sun rise over the dunes.

By the time we got to Dune 45 (the dune to climb for sunrise) dawn had just broken, but the sun was still behind the dunes. The goal (mine anyway) was to make it to the top before the sun was out. We all took off our shoes and started climbing up, our bare feet sinking into the cool sand and sliding back partway with each step we took. It was incredibly hard work. The first section was a steep slope up. That wasn't too bad. The next section was quite a bit more level, just a slight upward slope. Which one might think would be easier than the steeper slope. But it was worse. Probably partly because I was tired out from the first section. But mostly because most of the way I was in the lead. No one else's footprints to walk in. Everyone was agreed that walking in front was a LOT harder. Luckily, on the third section (uphill again) a couple other people were leading most of the way.

I managed to be the first to reach the banana peel on a stick that someone had put up there to mark the top. And when i got there I wasn't paying attention to where the sun was. Just sat down, took off my sweatshirt, and drank more water than I have ever before needed after walking 300 meters. (Only 9 out of about 15 made it to the top and only six of us made it before sunrise. None of us made it without taking breaks on the way up.)

After a little bit of a breather I was finally able to enjoy the scenery. The sunrise itself wasn't particularly spectacular, but the dunes themselves were. How they were caught in the light was particularly beautiful. With the sun low in the sky the eastern sides of the dunes were lit up while the western sides remained in completely black shadow.

We stayed at the top for probably about twenty minutes before the much, much easier walk back down the dunes. In fact, a couple of us actually ran down the final slope.

After breakfast it was time to go out walking in the desert. We had a 2km walk out among the orange dunes to Hidden Vlei (vlei means river that does not reach the ocean). The walk out was, thankfully, almost flat. In addition to sand we saw scattered trees and shrubs (a good number of them dead) as well as a lizard or two. The vlei itself (like much of Namibia) was beautiful and desolate. It was, basically a dry riverbed surounded by sand dunes. Most of the ground was white cracked dry mud or grayish gravel rather than the orange sand of the dunes. There was a springbok off in the distance and a few small plants. What was most memorable though were the midium-sized dead gray trees and and how the black and white ground contrasted against the orange dunes and cloudless blue sky.