Namibia

Namibia With all the times I've come to South West Africa, now called Namibia, I've acquired enough experience of this place, and like South Africa, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Australia and New Zealand, I know it like the back of my hand. For two whole seasons I worked as a guide in Namibia for two local tour operators who are in turn backed by Italian tour operators. With the nine-seat minibus I'm waiting for the arrival of the four Italian clients. Unfortunately, though, one of their suitcases doesn't arrive, and South African Airways apologises and says it will do its best to get it there as soon as possible. Damn, couldn't have asked for that; the tour starts badly. So I pick up the tourists and take them to the chosen hotel in Windhoek. In the evening I have dinner with them and make myself a bit known, and start answering their questions about the tour we're about to do.

I suggest they come back the next day before setting off, to the airport, to see if the suitcase arrives on the 10.00 flight from Johannesburg. And so we do, but unfortunately it's a wasted trip. So, three hours behind schedule, we set off for Etosha National Park. These clients are over 50, and have already travelled half the world, so this is a trip like any other for them; you can see at once, in fact, that their enthusiasm is at 50%, or even less with the lost suitcase. We stay at Namutoni, the first of the three equipped camps inside the Park. I try to do my best to make them forget the suitcase, but nothing. There are medicines and other important things in it, they say. Whatever! So the next morning they get cross with me because I'm not doing anything; I gave the itinerary to the company people, now it's up to them to bring us the suitcase. My morale has dropped too now.

We set off for the morning safari and at midday we stop as planned at Halali for lunch, and while we're at the table I see a van of South African Airways parking. I understood at once that the suitcase had arrived, and I told the person concerned, who turned from black in the face like a chameleon to shining pink, he even looked ten years younger. But what was in that suitcase, a gold ingot? Anyway he was so happy that he gave the Namibian boy a tip of 100 American dollars, which means two months' wages for him. Anyway I thanked him too for taking this weight off me. From then on they started their holiday too and began to see the zebras and all the animals they hadn't seen before, though they were right before our eyes. That evening we sleep in a luxury lodge just outside Etosha Park, the Epacha Lodge.

Nicely showered and rested, the next day we do a mini safari in the lodge's private reserve, one on foot and one in their 4x4, then in the afternoon there's clay-pigeon shooting. I take a few shots too and discover I'm quite good: four clays out of five. The next day we're back on the dusty roads on the northern route for Opuwo and then, arriving in the evening, at the Epupa Falls, where we see the Himba tribes; we take photos and videos of them. In the evening from the hill, two steps from Angola, we witness a magical sunset. We set off back towards the centre of Namibia, Damaraland and then the Skeleton Coast, to see the seals at Cape Cross. In the evening we're at Swakopmund eating fish in a typical little restaurant.

At Walvis Bay, by speedboat, we go on an excursion on the calm sea and are surrounded by pelicans and gulls; the dolphins show up later and other seals greet us, to the delight of our cameras. We set off again for the desert; passing through the Moon Landscape we reach the Naukluft Park; some springbok and ostriches are visible in the endless desert. Here, when it rains, it becomes a garden of flowers. At Solitaire we fill up the Hyundai van that I drive, and then we stay at another exclusive resort, right next to the sand dunes of Sossusvlei, which we visit the next day. Here are the highest red-sand dunes in the world. The last stop is a bit further south; this is the last lodge where we stay, the Sossusvlei Mountain Lodge, a bit pricey for my taste, but I'm not paying, in fact I'm being paid to go to these places, 1,000 euros a night per person.

Certainly the view is stunning and so is the luxury. The next day I say goodbye to the ladies and gentlemen and set off alone for the return to Windhoek in six hours. They have hired a twin-engine with a pilot to get from the lodge to the airport directly in one hour's flight, and then leave for Italy. Bye bye