What about Luderitz? That's what I was thinking this week, feeling the pressure of the year pressing down on me, and longing for a place to burst.
I was there earlier this year, but in a kind of a rush, and with eyes wide from the newness of it. There was no time to wander alone into the desert to lie down on my back in the sand and look up at the stars.
I did that years ago while I was working on a film set in the Sani Desert just inland from Eilat at the southern tip of Israel.
Caught up in the romance of it, and thinking I was Lawrence of Arabia within sight of a victory over at Akaba across the Red Sea, I wondered late one evening deep into the desert and lay on my back on a soft dune to watch the night draw a canopy of stars over the sky just as it had done every evening for the past 580 million years or so.
I knew enough not to linger too long alone in the desert in the dark. A day or two earlier I had wandered into the dunes without being careful enough to mark my way and got temporarily lost. In a grip of panic fed by visions of death by thirst, and the white bones of my skeleton scattered in the sand, I was more than relieved to finally find my way home.
It could be like that in Namibia if you get lost in the Namib Desert. That's why I think Luderitz would hit the spot for anyone with time to spare over the festive season who wants a destination which is hot but where you can seriously chill.
It's one day's very long drive from Cape Town, or two more gentle days on the road if you sleep over in Springbok or nearby. To get there, head towards Langebaan and keep driving. A passport and papers confirming ownership of your car will get you across the border into Namibia and onto Grunau where you turn right towards Luderitz.
It's tar almost all the way so there is no need for any of the macho 4x4 stuff. Once you get to Luderitz you will find there are more than enough campsites, bed and breakfasts, hotels and restaurants to keep any traveller happy.
But most of all there is the desert. You see it first just down the road from Aus as you head into a valley where roadsigns warn of wild horses crossing. A few kilomertres further on you begin to see patches of orange sand in the grass, then in the distance, the dunes.
A few kilometres this side of Luderitz the first of the houses of Kolmanskop come into view - apparitions in the sand which were once at the centre of the Namibian diamond industry and which have subsequently been appropriated in a land grab by sand.
Then you get your first glimpse of Luderitz "discovered", according to the history books, in 1488 by Portuguese navigator Bartholomeu Diaz. The port is named after Adolf Luderitz, a merchant from Bremen. Once, in all its finery, it was apparently a sight to see. It is that now too, but not now for finery.
Today its is a place of mystery and wonder, of sand piled in corners, abandoned warehouses, ice cold seas and gaily painted houses - a port rich in intrigue for anyone with a windswept mind, where thoughts are free to wander and place enough to switch off, shut down and unwind. - Weekend Argus, Travel 2006
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