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Lüderitz, Kolmanskop and Diaz Point

Lüderitz is another German town caught in a time warp. It sits at the northern end of the huge restricted diamond fields which run from the South African border all along the coast to here and inland a few hundred kilometres. Once, diamonds could be picked up off the ground and, even today, there are diamonds being mined just below the surface and even being dredged for offshore here. It is a mining and fishing town, and with the same German houses and shops with distinctive rooflines and windows as Swakopmund, though it is much smaller and built on extraordinary rocky outcrops. While we ate lunch on the terrace of a restaurant overlooking the boats and a big cruise liner in the harbour, the mist rolled in, the air became noticeably cooler and suddenly we could see the boats no more!

Kolmanskop is a mining ghost town, dating from the early 1900s and finally abandoned in 1956. It is (or was) quite a town. The houses were substantial, the hospital had 250 beds, there was a casino, theatre, bowling alley, a school and a narrow rail line with small carriages that ran all around the town as transport for the residents. The manager, the architect and the book-keeper all had mansions, while the shopkeeper was reputedly the richest person in town - if money was short to pay for goods, then payment was made in diamonds. But it doesn't take long for the environment to take over when people have gone. Most of the buildings are in poor condition, filled with drifting sand and being covered by dunes. Some like the hospital show some effort to keep the sand out and a couple of the big houses are being restored. But work is not fast enough to halt the slide to ruin for most of the site.

The drive out to Diaz Point was through a desolate moonscape of contorted and twisted rocks and hills. Grey and white rock - basalt interleaved with sedimentary rocks - writhed and turned with not a blade of grass growing. Sharp edged strata rising out of the ground at steep angles gave rise to the sharp, flat rocks scattered all over the surface. At low points crystalline salt deposits shone, while signs on our left warned of dire consequences if we strayed into the restricted diamond area starting at the edge of the road!

Diaz Point itself, wrapped in mist, was a small, rocky hill cut off at high tide by water. A wooden-planked walkway, which had seen better days and precious little maintenance, connected it to the mainland. Atop the rock, a replica of the stone cross that Bartolemeo Diaz erected in 1488 stands overlooking the two islands just offshore, one with Cape Fur Seals which we could see in the haze, and one with a penguin colony which we could only just make out.

In the small bays surrounding the point, dozens of dolphins rose in and out of the water. A red and white lighthouse shared the area with a small exposed campground, and a quite civilised cafe served coffee and cake!

In these wide windswept plains, we hadn't seen much wildlife - only the occasional herd of 3 or 4 ostrich. But in one place are the Namib Wild Horses and we turned off to the hide next to the spring to see them. No-one is quite sure where they came from, but the most popular theory is that they were German Army horses whose riders set them free rather than shoot them at the end of the First World War. How they have survived, and indeed multiplied, in the desert is the subject of much debate and study. The horses, many in family groups of two adults and a foal, are certainly in good condition and healthy.

And a bit more wildlife back at camp near Aus. Above our heads in a tree, Sociable Weavers carried grass and continued to build their ever-spreading communal nest, and came to investigate what was on offer at mealtimes. Tiny Striped Mice scurried between clumps of grass, picking up grass seeds. Hundreds of tiny white butterflies flitted all around a tree, making it seem to shiver. And a strangely coloured large scorpion, black but with sand coloured legs and nippers, emerged from under Hans and Jenny's tent in the morning.