Some time ago I posted a flight along the South African Wild Coast along the south coast. This time I decided on a different area: the West Coast of Namibia AKA the Skeleton Coast.
And wow, is it ever TOTALLY different!!! The Wild Coast is generally lush and green. The Skeleton Coast… not so much. If ever a stretch of coast and adjacent interior was aptly named, this is it! More than once as I was flying over stretches of dry, barren dunes and desert I was thinking: this is NOT the place to lose an engine! Or to have your ship run aground either: Wikipedia notes that there are more than 1,000 wrecks littering this stretch of coast!
I decided to fly from Walvis Bay all along the coast north to the mouth of the Kunene River (border between Namibia and Angola) and then a ways inland generally along the Kunene to land at Opuwo. Flight plan in Little NavMap:
What was interesting was the way the terrain changed while still staying generally the same: it was an education to see how many ways nature can do dry and sandy!
Leaving Walvis bay: All light coloured sand dunes
And then coming up to Swakopmund: from this shot you can see the terrain beyond Swakopmund looks rather different;
Henties Bay: a well known fishing town. If you are brave enough to go there…
And then I cheated a bit: changed the time of day around to get some pretty effects:
This is also Opuwo Airport but a different one (FYPM) compared to my destination (FYMF). But the one thing they have in common: they are certainly not overrun by civilisation… A confusing thing that I have noticed with some of the Southern African airports is this same name, different location and different ICAO code thing.
North of Opuwo before the Kunene mouth
And finally the Kunene mouth
Part 2 will cover the flight to the interior
