Day 9--Sesrium

Sossusvlei National Park

This morning I was up super early. I was the first person up at 4:00 AM to build the fire. We left the campsite at 5:15 AM to climb a huge red sand dune (Dune 47) and watch the sun rise. The sand dunes are so large because the wind from the ocean built them up and they're red because the rocks that were broken down to form the sand dunes had a high iron content and the iron rusted. The sand dune was really hard to climb because the sand was really deep and the dune was really steep.

Upon leaving the sand dune, we went to Sossusvlei. It is a national park full of red sand dunes. We rode safari vehicles (actually modified pick-up trucks) further into the park and got out to walk around. On the ride in we saw an oryx! Burger found a Mist Beetle and explained to us that it leans forward on its front legs to allow the water to run forwards toward its mouth. It gets water from the early morning dew and can drink up to 200x its body weight. Because of this, it's called the water bottle of the desert. Other animals eat it as a source of water.

He then showed us a spiny plant, the Nara plant, one of the only plants to grow in such a harsh environment. He told us that they're the only reason the Topnaar people survive in their environment. The Nara plant produces melons that they eat and get water from.

Andy managed to catch a shovel-snouted lizard--a reptile endemic to Namibia. It's nose is shaped like a shovel so it's easier for the lizard to burrow in the sand during the heat of the day.

There were trees still standing there that have been dead for 600 years. They do not rot because the air is too dry. The ground between the sand dunes is covered in a hard, white, dried clay left over from the river that used to run there. These sand dunes are the the world's highest shifting dunes. Because of the cold wind from the ocean and the warm wind from the desert, the sand dunes are slowly but consistently shifting their shape and moving.

Later in the afternoon, we went to Tsauchab River Canyon. It was much smaller than Fish River Canyon, but it was pretty nonetheless.

on the way back, we saw some ostriches and Patrick did his presentation. We learned that the ostrich has the largest egg of any bird, but the smallest egg in proportion to the size of the full grown bird. We also learned that ostriches do not bury their heads in the sand--that phrase was most likely coined shortly after Jesus' death in a letter written by a gentleman comparing the likelihood of something happening to the likelihood of of an ostrich being able to hide by sticking his head in the sand.