GO Cait GO!!!

That's the theme to this vacation. So i'm in Namibia right now with Cait, my very best friend who stays in Southern province. We are having the most fun. This vacation ranks as top 3 in my lifetime for sure. i know i say that after every vacation, but seriously this trip has been amazing. We've done a little of everything. We came to Swakopmund, namibia which is right on the coast of the alantic ocean and spent three days on the beach and eating amazing food. i burnt the back of my legs so bad..ooops! It was a much needed rest after is took us 49 hours to get to namibia from zambia. our bus broke down just inside the namibian border where we spent 9 hours at a shell gas station while they tried to fix the bus. Long story short the bus continued to break down and Cait and i had no other option but to bail ship. We decided to hitch. That was the best decision we ever made. We got two really great hitches and made it to our destination on time. After our relaxation time on the beach, we headed up to Damaraland. This is seriously an amazing place. Its extremely bush and isolated, but the beauty far outways the annoyance of transport on the rough sand/gravel roads. We saw a petrified forrest with trees over 260 million years old. We spent a day at the Brandberg mountain, where we hiked around and saw some ancient rock paintings that date more than 2000 years old. Then we spent the next day at the Spitzkopffe. Words and photos cannot describe the beauty of this place. It was an outdoorsmans paradise. We spent the day, climbing over boulders bigger than houses and climbed to this place called Bushman's Paradise. After an extremely steep climb up about 300 meters on pure rock, we were able to climb rock to rock exploring this amazing place. This is also where we camped. The sites are so isolated and we had a campsite that was completely surounded by the most amazing red rock formations that i've ever seen. It was the coolest camping i've ever done. We freaked ourselves out a bit by the fact that leopards roam these rocks at night. It was so amazing. We sat up on a set of rocks and watched the sun set while listening to music on our ipod. Then we headed to the very touristy Sossuvlei in the Namib desert. This is the most accessible of the famous red sand dunes in Namibia. It was gorgeous. It was my first time to hike sand dunes. i felt like i was in egypt. We decided to run down the side of one of them. i was scared, but so glad we did it. We've just been surrounded by so much beauty here. This country is unlike any place I've ever been. then today we decided to go sand boarding. If you're an adrenaline junky this is the thing to do. We were "sliding" down dunes at speeds up to 75km an hour. It was so scary, yet so much fun. It took hours to get all the sand out of my body. We went down about 5 times. Tonight we get to go to the beach house to watch our complimentary dvd. Can't wait. People here are great. However, Swakopmund is strange....it feels so much like germany. Everyone here speaks german, and everyone knows we are american even before we speak. Funny stuff. So tonights our last night and we'll be livin it up. This vacation has been so amazing. i can't wait to continue traveling. there's so many cool things to see in this world. Cait is great...we've been having so much fun and get along great. She's trying to convince me to move to colorado when i get home. She almost has me convinced. We'll see. i still have 4 months!!!! Ahhhhh!!! Well, when i get back this week, someone from the US Embassy is coming out to my site to see how volunteers are working with Zambian people. Its an honor that i was chosen, unfortunately I'll just be arriving back the night before. i'll be doing a fish transport with one of my farmers when they come. Then the following week i'll be doing more fish transports and the week after that, Kristina and I are conducting a three day HIV/AIDs workshop for Chief Madzimawe and 30 of his headman. Should be really great. Times wrapping up and i'm busier than ever. Life is great and i wouldn't want to be anywhere else right now. Oh and the title of this blog is a little inside joke on this vacation.... ;)