Chapter 5: The journey is never-ending
After an eventful couple of days travelling between Swakopmund, Walvis Bay, Solitaire and Sesriem, we ended up in the small settlement of Betta to rest for the night. We continued on our journey the morning and hit the C13 main road towards Aus. A little town with a rich history.
Aus used to be active back in the day when the military was present, in fact, it used to be the site of a prisoner-of-war camp used by the South African army to house German inmates during WWI in 1915. The camp closed in 1919 and was converted into a residential area in 1925. Today, there is a plaque that marks the site and some of the houses that the German prisoners lived in are still standing, although they have been reconstructed over the years.
The town isn’t very active anymore but they still have a hotel called The Bahnhof Hotel Aus for passersby. We checked into the hotel and once we spoke to the owner about the expedition, he offered to take us on a tour of the town’s back roads for a morning drive. We heard that the town is noted for a herd of feral horses that live in the desert, on the outskirts of town, and have been roaming freely for over 100 years. These are horses that broke loose back when this was still a military town, over the years they have learned to adapt to the harsh environment and they go as long as five days without waters. We managed to capture some incredible footage of them galloping about on the open plains.
On the way back into town, we saw a group of kids playing soccer in the river beds. We interacted with them and had a lovely chat about where we were from and what we were doing in town. We gave them some branded merchandise (Mahindra branded soccer and rugby balls) as a parting gift before we headed back to the hotel for rest for the day. Next, we will be heading South on the C13 onwards to Rosh Pinah, a small mining town, to visit a farming community called Aussenkehr, an area that is famous for its table grapes.
Join us in part six of our ongoing blog series as we explore all that Southern Africa has to offer and we Unleash The Explorer In You!
Chapter 12: The journey ends
After over 8,580km and dozens of stops across three countries our journey has finally come to end. When we started this expedition over three weeks ago, we were given a simple task; drive the new Karoo Special Edition range of bakkies on the most grueling terrains in...
Chapter 11: The Golden Gate
After spending some time on, arguably, the most iconic mountain pass in all of Southern Africa, we headed further north to the Free State as we edged closer to home. Our first destination was a small town roughly East of Sani Pass, close to the National Mandela...
Chapter 10: Roof of Africa
We’re almost at the finish line! It is within reach and we can feel it. After a brief but welcome respite in Bloemfontein, we left early in the morning and made the arduous journey to, what we consider, every 4×4 enthusiast and off-roader’s Disneyland; Sani Pass....