There are a large number of tourist attractions in our country, and a great number of tourists come here each year to view them. By far the most famous and most visited must be the Etosha National Game Park, which is situated in the northern area of the country. There are three rest camps at which to stay in the park, which are called Okaukuejo, Halali and Namutoni respectively. One must not be fooled by the term “rest camp”, they are actually very close to luxury holiday resorts. By far the most luxurious (and expensive) is the Okaukuejo camp, with its large swimming pools and bungalows less than fifty meters from a favourite drinking hole of the animals. During most hours of the day and night, one is able to see flamingoes, zebras, wildebeest, antelope, giraffes and the occasional rhino drinking at the waterhole. Lions and elephants are not seen quite so often, mostly during dry seasons, mainly because they get most of their water from the food they eat. It is perfectly safe, however, as there are large walls and fences on the camp side of the waterhole. Hunting is a growing tourist attraction and foreign money earner in our country, whether it be with rifles or bows. There is strong interest in this internationally, as we have a large number of game on various farms that freely allow hunting. Bow hunting is especially a favourite of Americans, who come here and shoot all they can and then take the trophies back home.
Another great tourist attraction is the Skeleton Coast. Swakopmund, a quaint old German style town from the colonial era, provides a particular attraction to German tourists. The towns of Swakopmund and Walvis Bay are only thirty kilometers apart, with Walvis Bay possessing its own particular charm through the vast flocks of flamingoes that frequent the lagoon there. The lagoon is an international Ramsar site, and is thus protected from exploitation and pollution by various international treaties. One can embark on various tours on four-wheeled motorcycles into the dunes, or on 4x4 trips up the Swakopmund River or to Sandwich harbour, one of the best fishing spots in Namibia. Namibia has a very unique coastline, because the dunes come right up to the ocean, and this is rarely seen anywhere else in the world. When one drives up north, one comes to the Skeleton Coast proper, so called because of the remains of ships and humans that can be found along the coastline for many kilometers. The coastal area is also home to the Welwitscia Mirabilis, a plant that is only found in our country and the southern parts of Angola. It is an amazing plant, miraculously living in the middle of the desert, yet surviving for many years. It only has two leaves, but it appears as if there are many because the dust storms have cut and shredded them so. We have the oldest one in the world, at approximately one thousand five hundred years old.
The varied cultural history of Namibia is well demonstrated in the rock paintings, which can be found in caves all over Namibia. Perhaps the most famous painting exists in a cave in the Brandberg Mountain. It is called the White Lady and is a picture of an apparently Caucasian woman wielding a bow and arrow. These paintings were mostly painted by the San people, more commonly known as Bushmen, hundreds of years ago.
Unfortunately ours is a rather arid land, and we suffer continuously from water shortages. Luckily we had a good start to the rainy season this year, with enough water to last for two dry seasons. The average rainfall in the northeastern area of Namibia is equal to seven hundred millimeters per year, whereas the rainfall in the southwest is only equal to about twenty millimeters per year. Mostly our skies are clear and sunny, and most of the country has a pleasant climate, although some places get quite hot during the summer, sometimes reaching temperatures of forty degrees Celsius or more. We have a relatively pollution free environment and atmosphere, and one rarely hears of diseases related to pollution.
Another tourist attraction is the Hoba meteorite near the town of Grootfontein, which is the largest one in the world. On the Waterberg Mountain near the town of Otjiwarongo, there are also fossils of dinosaur footprints, which are quite famous. Sossusvlei is one of the main tourist attractions, as it is home to the highest dunes in the world. The Fish River Canyon is the second largest canyon in the world, just after the Grand Canyon in America. It takes four days to hike from one end to the other, a total of ninety kilometers.
We have a good telecommunications network, on par with that of South Africa, we have normal and ISDN Internet connectivity, and a successful and rapidly expanding cell phone network. We are also up to date with the latest computer technology, although it does come at a price. We have very good national infrastructure, with our roads and railways in good condition. People might say that South Africa is a better country to live in than Namibia, but they do not think of the disadvantages of South Africa and the advantages of Namibia. South Africa is a much larger country, has much more rain than we do, has larger cities and has a better economy than Namibia, but their rate of unemployment is much higher than ours. Also, their crime rate is much higher than ours. The city of Johannesburg is notorious for its high crime rate and it has earned itself the nickname of Gangster’s Paradise.
Even though we are a relatively small country, we have had a Miss Universe (Michelle McLean), a middleweight world boxing champion (Harry Simon) and a world-class sprint athlete (Frankie Fredericks). Our education system, which is on par with international standards, utilises the Cambridge syllabus. We also have a very good healthcare system and a successful police force, as statistics show that we have one of the lowest crime rates in the world. We also have the potential to become an economic hub for the rest of Southern Africa, because of our large natural harbour and lagoon at Walvis Bay, which is linked by road and rail to most of the landlocked countries such as Botswana and Zimbabwe and provides a direct and shorter route to Johannesburg in South Africa. We have a large fishing industry at Walvis Bay, and we provide fish for the whole of our country and some of the neighbouring countries.
Recently, I had a conversation with someone who desperately wanted to emigrate from Namibia to Australia. He said that he wanted to move away from Namibia’s dry climate. I could not understand this, as Australia has almost exactly the same weather patterns that we do, and I told him so, but he only shrugged and changed the subject. I did some research on the internet, and it seems to be a fact that hundreds of people have already emigrated all over the world, to Australia, Greece, Canada, America and the United Kingdom to name a few, and hundreds more want to go. But it is also true that one out of every five emigrants returns to Namibia, claiming to have been unable to adapt. I think that they are just covering up for the fact that the move had not quite reached their expectations, and they realized what a mistake they had made. As far as I can see, there is absolutely no reason to move from Namibia to anywhere else in the world, as we have everything one could possibly want from a country, except maybe a space program.
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