After a week of safari and two days in Cape Town, visiting the small ports along western Africa may seem a little… subdued. There may be two weeks until interesting posts, and eight of the next 14 days are sea days.
Luderitz is a small industrial port in southern Namibia… no, let’s be honest. Luderitz WANTS to be a small industrial port. Thruout the day our guide said things like “diamond mining returning”, “manganese and zinc exports”, “future petroleum companies.” The town/port is so small that I am taking a walking tour that takes less than three hours.
Even tho I visited Namibia in 2019, I totally missed that this area was “colonized” by Germany. You can see the 19th century influence in building architecture.
Outside of city planning, Namibia has herds of wild horses left over from the German withdrawal from Africa. Just like how the herds of horses in North America are from the horses abandoned by European explorers in the 16th century.
One of our early stops was the Luderitz museum. Like many such museums, I find it more educational on what the locals consider important than how well they maintain the exhibitions.
Adolph Luderitz is one of the founders of the colony who died early in the colony’s history.
When I was a child my mother had a large sand rose that she had from a visit to Lebanon in the 1970s. It was cool to see a collection again.
Hans Goerke was an architect, manager and co-owner of an early diamond company. Diamonds were discovered nearby laying on the sand. No, not mining under the sand, but raw diamonds on top of and just under the existing sand dunes. As you can see at the left, it is built on a very rocky base.
At the top of the city is the Lutheran church “Felsenkirche”, also built on stone outcrops. Much of the building material had to be imported from Germany. Seems the local sand is too salty, thus not usable for cement.
As we departed you can see how small the town is.
Next – return to Walvis Bay.