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As we journey north through Namibia, leaving Windhoek behind, we arrive in Swakopmund—a charming coastal town where German heritage and Namibian landscapes collide. Day one invites us to explore the town’s picturesque German architecture and watch the sunset over the iconic pier. Then, on day two, we embark on an exhilarating fat bike tour, cruising over the vast sand dunes that crash into the ocean. Swakopmund is such a unique city full of adventure and beauty, and here’s how it went…
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As we journey north through Namibia, leaving Vind Hook behind, we arrive in Swakapmund, a charming coastal town where German heritage and Namibian landscapes collide. Day one invites us to explore the town’s picturesque German architecture and watch the sunset over the iconic pier. Then on day two, we embark on an exhilarating fat bike tour, cruising over the vast sand dunes that crash into the ocean. Swakmund is such a unique city full of adventure and beauty. And here’s how it went. Good afternoon, guys, and welcome back to Namibia. We’ve just finished the first part of our Namibia trip doing the southern part where we crossed over from the South African border. We saw the Fish River Canyon, Soslay. Then we ended up in Vind Hook for a couple days to secure some visas. And today we have just driven about four or five hours to Swakapmund, which is right on the coast of Namibia. So it’s where the desert meets the ocean. You have these beautiful yellow sand dunes that crash into the blue water. And then the town of Swakapmund is actually this like small German colonial town. And as we learned in the last video going to some of the independence museums, Namibia used to be a German colony for a little bit. So you have a lot of German influence. And you really see that here in Swakapmund. It almost feels like a little coastal German town. You have all of these old like colorful colonial buildings and church steeples. But again, you’re it’s coastal. So you have like these palm trees and the beaches here. So, we’re going to be spending the next week or so exploring the northern part of Namibia, starting from here in Swakabund and heading up to Spitzcop and Atoia and then eventually working our way out the northern part to Angola. So, yeah, it’s going to be a really cool adventure exploring this northern part of Namibia here. And Swakamun’s kind of like the adventure capital of Namibia here. There’s lots of really cool activities you can do. You can go skydiving. You can go 4x4ing through the dunes. And one of the coolest things you can do is the Sandwich Harbor, but I did that last time I was here. I have a whole video on Sandwich Harbor, and that is where the sand dunes meet the ocean. It’s like one of the most beautiful places I’ve seen here in Namibia. Very cool. Going up and down those sand dunes and getting these beautiful views of the desert and the ocean. But it’s about like 140 bucks to do that tour. So, I don’t think I’m going to do that this time. But tomorrow we’re going to be doing a biking tour going up and down some of the dunes that’ll give us some beautiful views of the desert here in Swakamund. But this evening I have about 2 hours before the sunset. So I just wanted to give you guys a quick overview of the town of Swakmund and just show you a couple of the main things here. So I’m going to start by walking through the old town of Swakamund here, showing you one of the classic German buildings that’s like right near the center of town here. So, let’s start with that and then we’ll end by watching the sunset on the ocean this evening. So, yeah, let’s go for a little walk. [Music] As I’ve just walked through the tiny little historic old town of Swakupmund here and I’ve come to the Vorman house which is one of the main iconic buildings here in Swakmund. You have this very German style architecture and this like yellow and green Bavarian looking house and then there’s a really tall tower that has some nice views overlooking the ocean. We’re only about a block block and a half away from the ocean here and you can see the palm trees. So anyways, I think it’s about $1.50 50 or about 30 Namibian dollars to enter the tower here. And there might be a little bit of a gallery in the lower part of this house, too. But just beautiful architecture. But I’m going to pick up a ticket and go up the tower here and see some of the views that we get overlooking the city of Swakam. [Music] I just bought my ticket at a little gift store across the street from the tower and then I’ve come up the a few flights of stairs here. I’m a little out of breath and I have the whole viewing platform to myself and it’s just amazing. You get these incredible views looking out over the blue ocean. You can see some of the sand dunes on the outer edge of town. And then as you’re just looking over this desert landscape, you’ll just see these like German Bavarian looking clock towers just sticking up and just a really fascinating view and just contrast of like this German town in the dunes and the ocean. So yeah, let’s enjoy some of these views and then we’ll keep exploring Swan. [Music] [Applause] That was a really cool view from the top of the Vorman Tower there just getting a nice overview of the city of Swakmund and nice view of the ocean and this little German town in the desert and again that building was built in 1904 and you have a lot of these like Germanstyle architecture throughout the town of Swakamun so very interesting so from here we have about just a block and a half to get to the water and from the top of the tower there we were looking down on the jetty so let’s head to the coast there and check out the jetty that juts out into the Atlantic [Music] I’ve just walked about 5 minutes from the Vorman house there and I’m on the coast of Swakmund right at the beginning of the jetty here. And the jetty was built in 1905 because Swakupmund doesn’t have like a natural harbor. So they needed to build a jetty out there so that they could load some cargo and passengers out on some of the ships that would come here to Swakamun. But now it’s just like this really nice long jetty that takes you out above the ocean. It looks like there’s a couple like restaurants. There’s this nice little doughut bar here which isn’t open right now, but it’s a cute little doughnut shop. And then you can walk probably about 50 m out into the ocean here. So yeah, let’s walk out on the jetty and just get some of the views looking back on the coastline. Heat. Heat. N. [Music] I’ve just walked all the way out to the edge of the jetty and at the end here, the jetty goes up these little stairs and you’re up above a little restaurant here. So, you could get some drinks right beneath the jetty here. And from the jetty again, you’re about maybe 50 to 100 meters off the coast here. So you have this beautiful view looking back on some of the colorful homes along the coast of Swakmund. And then way in the distance there, you can see some of the towering sand dunes that crash right into the ocean there. You can watch the waves coming in and all of these birds here. So beautiful little view. So from here, I’m going to head back off the jetty and then walk along the coastline here a little bit. There’s just like a big public beach and the mole which has like some shopping and stuff not too far along the beach here and it’ll be a good place to watch the sunset. So yeah, let’s continue wandering along the coast. [Music] [Music] [Music] So I’ve just walked along the very rugged coastline of Swakmund here and I have come to the Mole which is another little peninsula that kind of juts out and kind of creates this little protected beach area. There’s some shops that are along the boardwalk area here. And then you have this public beach where people are like swimming, hanging out cuz you have some nice calm water to swim in the little mole beach area here. So yeah, anyways, I think I’m just going to hang out here, watch the sunset over the Atlantic coast here, and just enjoy this like rugged rural beach. And it’s kind of crazy that this is like one of the main beach towns in Namibia cuz it’s a very quiet little town here. And yeah, it doesn’t seem like there’s too much going on in the city center there. I’m sure there are some other museums and other old architecture that you could check out if you have a couple days here in Swakmun. But tomorrow will be our main exploration day. And I think I’ve decided that I’m going to take a bike and bike over some of the dunes there and just get some views of the desert of Namibia here along the western coast. So yeah, anyways, that’s it for just like a quick overview of Swakund today. Cute little old colonial German town right on the water. And yeah, again, tomorrow we’ll show you a little bit more of some of the adventures that you can go on just outside of the city of Swakmund here. So yeah, going to watch the sunset and I’ll see you guys tomorrow when we go on some adventures. [Music] [Music] Good morning, guys. This is our second day here in Swakup Mund and yesterday we had a beautiful sunset over at the Atlantic there. We ended up hanging out by the jetty and then getting some local food here and then this morning we’ve woken up and it’s kind of a foggy morning but we’ve signed up for one of the fat bike tours which we’ll be cycling up and over some of the dunes here. So we’re heading to the fat bike shop this morning and then we’ll be riding out of town and yeah hopefully seeing a little bit more of the desert landscape just outside the city of Swan. So let’s head to the shop. [Music] We have just gotten fitted for our fat bikes here. And we have these really fat, rugged tires that are kind of soft here that are going to help us go through the dunes and through the desert a little bit. So, we’re starting right in the middle of Swakaban. So, we’re going to start with a little ride out of town out towards the dunes and then we’ll start going through the desert. But, yeah, pretty excited for this unique adventure. [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. [Music] All right, guys. We have just ridden about 15 minutes through the town here and we are at the edge of Swaketmund and it just opens up into this massive sand dune. You can So, we’re going to take our bikes off-roading here down through these rocks and then we’re going to be zooming through the sand dunes here a little bit on our bikes. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] We’ve just done our first little bit of riding along the dunes here and it’s been super fun riding on the sand. I’ve never done this activity before. So, really fun, really exciting and honestly like not that hard with these big fat tires that have lots of grip. So, from here, we can just see this layer of dunes, and we’re going to head straight towards those and go up a few of those dunes over there. So, yeah, let’s go. [Music] It’s about 12:16. We’ve been riding for about an hour and 15 minutes and it’s been super fun going up and down these little sand dunes. And we’ve come up to one of the highest points that we’ll hit on the tour here. Just have this amazing view looking over all of the ridges of the sand dunes over this way. And there’s just so many layers of the sand. So yeah, been a very fun activity, a fun way to get out into the dunes just outside of Swakamund here. And again, I’ve never done this before, but the fat tire really gives you a lot of traction as you’re going up and down some of the sand dunes here. But yeah, definitely a leg workout compared to like if you’re doing an ATV or 4×4. So yeah, let’s enjoy some of these views and then we’ll carry on down some of the dunes. Hey, hey, hey. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] From that sand dune, we ended up coming down this like little riverbed and we were riding through the riverbed for a while and we’ve taken that all the way out to the ocean here. And we have the remains of an old train bridge that washed away in 1926. But this used to take the railway right over like the mouth of the ocean here. And then we just have these waves crashing here. And it still has a bit of like a misty look here right on the ocean this afternoon. But when we were in the dunes, we were up above the mist and just had some really good views up there. So I think we’re going to continue biking along the beach here a little bit and then eventually head back to town. Heat [Music] up [Music] here. We have just come back to the town of Swakapmun there and it was fun just riding along the beach a little bit and then we just cruised through town again enjoying some of like the old German colonial architecture and yeah that was a really cool excursion. I’ve never done something like that before. So, it was fun to just like get out into the dunes a little bit, see a little bit more than just the city of Swakmund here. And riding up and over those dunes and just seeing how vast the desert is here on the edge of Namibia here, right where the desert meets the ocean was really cool to get that experience. So, yeah. Anyways, we are back in Swakmund. Here we have it’s only about 1:00 in the afternoon, but I think I’m just going to kind of relax, maybe go to one of the beaches, enjoy some of the nice cafes that they have here in Swakmun this afternoon, and probably catch another nice sunset. But I already kind of showed you some of the main things to do here in Swakman yesterday. And we have a lot more of Northern Namibia to show you the next couple days on our way up to Angola. So yeah, I’m going to relax this afternoon and I’ll see you guys bright and early tomorrow morning when we head up to Spitzop, which should only be a couple hours drive from Swakabund here. So I’ll see you guys tomorrow morning. [Music] [Music]