I Am Briefly Back From Namibia,

for just a couple of days before leaving for Thailand, 

as I am back a very short, quick post of my trip, firstly I should say it was organised by master photographer Will Gray, who provided all of us with unlimited advice, tips and techniques throughout the trip and was supported by his charming wife Sal, who looked after all of us with unflinching devotion, also I must mention Howard, who was a tour de force for his on the ground help with vehicles and hardware for the trip, his company is Namibia Car Rentals, if you need a car or a 4 x 4 he is the go to guy in town, (Windhoek), back to the photos, all taken on my mobile telephone or my pocket Panasonic Lumix DMC TZ 30, these are just a few of some of the places we visited, tomorrow I will try to begin at the start of journey, it will be a tad difficult as I will lose a day traveling to Thailand, also I will not have my desktop computer with me, so I will not be able to 'fine tune' any of them, I have not retouched them or improved them in any way except from cropping a couple, I will leave all of that to when I am back in Blighty mid December, when I can start looking at the photographs I took with my Fujifilm camera and my infrared Panasonic, above one of the cutie's on the trip, a meerkat, 

doing what they do best, digging, 

although we were on the lookout for live animals, at our first stop there was a animal cemetery, 

my accommodation for the night, 

the back of the 4 x 4 cruiser open as we ready to set off,

 

many of the drives between lodges were a tad long, so a stop every now and then, 

one of the places we called into,

where the quiver trees grow, and no they do not 'quiver', the name arises from the fact that the indigenous San people, (Bushmen), traditionally used their hollowed-out branches to make quivers for carrying their arrows, as it happens despite looking like rugged desert trees, they are actually a large, branching species of aloe (Aloidendron dichotomum, formerly Aloe dichotoma) native to South Africa and Namibia,

the lodge, 

the dining area under a branch roof, 

a huge barrel cactus, both Echinocactus and Ferrocactus were here, the Echinocactus has a fuzzy crown of fine spines, while the Ferrocactus are ferociously thorned, also in my cactus keeping days they were rather unkindly known as Mother-in-law's pillows! 

one of the quiver trees,

and a succulent in seed, 

another shady corner in the compound, 

we made our way to the quiver tree forest, 

and stunning they were, 

as a rock hyrax, (Procavia capensis) looked on, 

it was stony going, 

but worth the walk, 

Andrew and Seyhan getting down low,

as well as Will and Sal,

looking at this little beauty, 

Will getting in close,

sort of group photo, as we bumped into some other travellers here, 

it was that time of the evening, a tradition, a sundowner,

wherever we were a table was set up, 

for a evening tipple and a few snacks, 

a relaxing way to end the day, from left to right, Helen, Sal, Will, our driver Hosia, Helen and Andrew,

before returning to our lodge, our evening's meal, these are just a few photos, I will try to pop some more on the blog before I leave on Thursday.