The Skeleton Coast : Namibia

This story first appeared in the September 2004 issue of "TRACKS" magazine.

Click HERE for photographs of this trip. (opens in a new window)

‘When a heavy sea-fog rests on these uncouth and rugged surfaces’, wrote the Swedish explorer Charles John Anderson, ‘A place fitter to represent the infernal regions could scarcely, in searching the world round, be found. A shudder amounting almost to fear came over me when its frightful desolation first suddenly broke upon my view. ‘Death’, I proclaimed, would be preferable to banishment to such a country’.

And it was in this bleak country that we picked up Albert, the seventeen year old hitchhiker, who, carrying no food, water or money, had already spent two days cheerfully marching over this ‘frightful desolation’ en-route to visit his mother more than three hundred kilometres away. If we hadn’t stopped to pick him up he told us how he would have continued walking for as long as it took to get there, but maybe he’d never have
made it. Maybe his bones would have joined those of the twelve headless skeletons found lying together on an empty beach. Maybe he’d have become like the crumbling remains of the young girl discovered heaped up in the corner of an abandoned hut. Maybe his death would have become as much a mystery as that of the skeleton found buried in a shallow grave in a bolt upright position. Or maybe, before the thirst became too much for him, he’d have scrawled a message of help, similar to the one found on a weather beaten slate reading, ‘I am proceeding to a river sixty miles north, and should anyone find this and follow me, God will help him’. And if the story of Albert hadn’t had a happy ending then it’s unlikely that anyone would have known, because this coastline is full of mysterious deaths and lonely graves.

This coast of forgotten graves is to be found in Namibia in southwest Africa and it forms the coastal section of the formidable Namib Desert, which at eighty million years of age is the oldest desert in the world. It’s a land of great hardship. It’s a land that alternates between searing heat that can boil you from the inside out too icy winds that chill you to the bone. It’s a land of massive horizons where mirages dance in the distance only to be replaced moments later by heavy fogs bringing darkness at midday. It’s a land where ‘dead’ plants live for two thousand years and where scientists put the unexplainable down to fairies. It’s a land where penguins and ducks feed in the desert and lions stalk seals on the beach. It is the ‘Coast of Hell’. It is the ‘Coast of Skulls’. It is the ‘Graveyard of Ships’. This is the Skeleton Coast and, despite its menacing nicknames and terrible reputation, it is actually one of the most fragile and unique ecosystems on earth.

So fragile in fact that the whole place is literally glued together by fields of lichen that keep the loose soil in place, acting as the grass of the desert and preventing what little soil there is from blowing away on the strong winds. Off this feed other, increasingly large plants and animals, but just one set of car tyres can cause damage to the lichens that is still visible nearly a century later. And if the lichens are damaged then in turn
everything else is damaged. It’s a place that by its very nature can only support a tiny number of people and animals and it’s an environment that, despite its protected status, has been battered through mining prospectors, over fishing, poaching, harbour proposals and plain old bad management. The scars from a few of mans previous attempts to wrest a profit from the Skeleton Coast still lie amongst the magnificence of nature. A collapsed and rusting oil well, that sent its millionaire entrepreneur bankrupt before construction was even completed and a disused diamond mine that brought nothing but shattered dreams. Nowadays cormorants have made homes on the frail remnants of both and jackals scavenge amongst the bones for fallen birds. Rotting away out here today, these industrial skeletons seem pathetic and of no consequence to the land, but the threats keep coming and each new money making proposal becomes ever more dangerous. The harbour and town mooted for remote Mãwe Bay is only the latest, but if it succeeds then this coastal desert that has itself claimed so many bones will have finally been sent to its own grave.

Even if it seems at the moment that money might once again take priority over the natural world we shouldn’t give up on it, because the Skeleton Coast is no lifeless patch of land not worth the effort of saving. Its gravel plains and razor edged dunes contain more wildlife than any other sand desert on the planet. And its all thanks to the frigid but nutrient rich Benguela current that sweeps up the coast from Antarctica bringing with it life giving moisture in the form of the near daily fogs that penetrate way inland and provide plants and animals that are found nowhere else in the world with a much needed drink. There are gymnastic beetles that perform handstands at the
summit of sand dunes in order to drink and snakes that get their water by allowing the fog to condense on their scales. Old river courses are the veins of life on the Skeleton Coast and they act like motorways, allowing for the free movement of plants and animals that are completely un-associated with deserts. Elephants, rhinos, giraffes, antelopes and occasionally even lions pace down these relatively lush highways from the wetter and greener interior of Namibia. One resident group of elephant have adapted so well to their sandy home that they are sometimes seen in the early morning light surfing down the side of wine red dunes.

It was into this strange environment that three of us, Ian Kruger, Jon Bowen and myself had come in search of surf. When you first glance at a map Namibia looks to be a promising destination. Its southwest angled coast facing straight into the might of the South Atlantic seems riddled with headlands sheltering potential points and there’s little doubt that Namibia does contain obscene waves, hidden away behind miles of sand dunes, but that’s were the problems start. Almost the entire length of the Skeleton Coast is a road-less, sand blasted wilderness with zero access. This is the graveyard of ships, so a boat is clearly of no use to the budding surf explorer. With a convoy of jeeps and lots of experience of desert driving you’d find something, but the best option might be a light plane and nerves of steel when it comes to sandy landings. Not having an aeroplane stashed away in my board bag and with our boat driving skills limited to a gentle paddle around a boating lake we found ourselves limited to the family saloon hire car option and the slightly more accessible central coast which does at least have a dirt road running along its length. This stretch of several hundred kilometres is still enough to keep the feelings of exploration, as well as the chance of a perfect wave, sky-high. After dropping Albert the hitchhiker off at his mothers in the small town of Swakopmund we drove northwards through stark desolation and on the way we found more than enough waves and more than enough graves and bones. The Skeleton Coast is made up of long sandy
beaches, gentle cliffs with rocky points and scattered reefs sat just offshore. On a glassy morning there are a never-ending range of peaks, some mellow, some spitting.
With little to distinguish one section of coast from any other we just picked sandy turn offs that in some way or other appealed to us. Mostly we found nothing but cold onshore winds blasting across the sea and turning the waves into an angry mess. Sometimes we’d strike gold though in the form of a hollow beach break or playful point and even if we didn’t there was always something of interest to discover. Masses of seabirds as well as the occasional pelican and a hundred different shells and colourful stones. It was stones and the promise of wealth that had been the reason why European’s came into contact with the Skeleton Coast in the first place. Sometime back towards the turn of the previous century someone picked a tiny sparkling crystal out of the sand and the world’s richest diamond fields had been discovered. As soon as news of this leaked out the rush was on and the first arrivals to these bleak beaches spoke of diamonds in such numbers that they could be scooped off the surface of the ground in great handfuls. For these early explorers and opportunists the going was tough, sometimes too tough. The Skeleton Coast is known as the Graveyard of Ships for a reason. Little remains of the
ancient wrecks but the giant swells, strong currents, heavy fogs, shifting sand bars and treacherous reefs continue to be a mariners nightmare and every couple of years the torn shells of new ships are added to the bone count of this shore. The most famous wreak of all is probably that of the 1942 Dunedin Star and the operation to rescue its crew and passengers that took more than two weeks and resulted in the sinking of one of the rescue boats, an aeroplane crash and the bogging down and loss of the truck convoy sent to bring the rapidly swelling number of victims back to safety. It was a scenario that even a Hollywood scriptwriter could feel proud in conjuring up.

With improvements in communication disasters at sea are becoming rarer, but if it does all go wrong then don’t even think about what dangers are waiting for you on dry land until you’re actually standing there, because as a contrast to the sterility of the land the ocean here truly is alive. The cold waters of the Benguela Current contain a thick soup of plankton that makes Namibian waters some of the richest fishing grounds in the world and brings fishermen from near and far. Checking a shore break one afternoon we watched as a group of fishermen hacked and tore at a small shark that they’d caught earlier that morning. Each clump of bloody flesh that they wrenched from the fish was tossed back into the sea. I walked over to ask them what they were doing,

“We’re fishing for sharks and this is our bait”,
“Any luck?” I ask, despite knowing that I’m not going to like the answer.
“No, not really”,
A wave of relief passes through me, but it lasts only a short time before they continue,
“All morning we’ve been fishing and we’ve only taken three of the buggers”.
“Oh, right”, I reply in a stunned voice, “How big?”
“Biggest was about three metres”,
Trying to sound as nonchalant as possible I continue with my questioning, “So where exactly are you fishing for these sharks then?”
“Well you see where the waves just start to break?”
“Erm, yes”,
“Just there. They really like it there because the water gets deep very quickly. I’d say it’s swarming with sharks around here”.

After such an unsettling conversation we made it a rule never to speak with fishermen before going in the water, but then everything about surfing the Skeleton Coast is designed to scare you, the icy waters, the strong winds, the eerie fogs, the snooping hyenas, the thick kelp, the numerous sharks and the shifty, heavy line-ups. Even camping is not something that you’d want to do alone because when the cold wind sends the fog seeping in over the bone-strewn beaches this coast becomes as chilling in spirit as in heat. Though of all the fears of the Skeleton Coast it was maybe our fellow surfers of the wildlife type who set our hearts racing the most.

Cape Cross is Namibia’s best-known wave and it draws in the crowds by the thousand. This high quality set up consists of three separate left point breaks scattered over a couple of kilometres. The angle of the coast here means, with the predominate
southerly wind, that all day, every day is offshore. The wave breaking furthest out on the point predictably picks up the most swell and is a long, though quite fat ride that sections a little. The middle point is shorter, but racy fast and full of hollow moments. The third point, though the most sheltered of the three still has waves pretty much every single day of the year and alternates day by day between a walled up, pushy kind of cutback wave and a screaming barrel as good as you’ll find anywhere. It is of course no surprise to learn that the line ups here are busy and drop ins are par for the course, but these surfers aren’t riding thrusters, longboards or even bodyboards. These surfers are seals, up to quarter of a million of them, making Cape Cross home to the biggest seal colony in the southern hemisphere. They prefer the outside point and hundreds upon
hundreds of them clog the waves like a living oil slick. It didn’t even cross our minds to attempt to paddle out and surf this wave, we doubted if it was even possible, but Cape Cross lies inside a National Park and the park authorities told us the somewhat staggering news that one group of surfers had come here and attempted to surf in amongst the heart of the seals. Their ignorance has cost all of the rest of us the chance to surf the middle point, which prior to this act of stupidity and selfishness used to be allowed by the National Parks Board. Now all that remains for us is the inside point, but this is no real hardship as we found on our first evening when we had a phenomenal session here. The wave began with an easy and mellow take off and bottom turn
before it found the reef properly and turned into a speed barrel. The first section was high and tight, the second, wider, faster and heavier. Underneath us, as we rode, darted dark shadows, twisting and turning with the waves and mimicking our every turn. Other seals sat in the channel, faces above the water watching us surf. At times such as this the Skeleton Coast had a friendly face, but where there are seals there are others who feed on seals. We didn’t encounter any of their water born predators, but the Skeleton Coast threw plenty of land locked death at the seals. Humans used to take a huge toll, the luxury Cape Cross Lodge run by Cape Townian surfer and all round cool guy, Dillon, might now be a beacon of calm on this otherwise devastating coast, but it sits on the site where for many years thousands of seals were annually clubbed to death for the fashion needs of man. And when we’re not engaged in senseless slaughter nature has her needs. Shaggy Brown Hyenas and fox like Jackals scour the beaches every day for vulnerable young seal pups whose bones they add to those already so liberally scattered across this graveyard of men, animals and ships.

As we left Cape Cross and drove northwards to lesser-known waves, we saw, in the distance, an object on the roadside. It was a grave, its form melting and reappearing in the desert haze. As we approached I stopped the car and got out to walk over to it. Under my feet crunched a hundred bones of the men and animals that have died here
before, their spirits torn from the flesh and blown away by the wind across the Coast of Hell. The grave was new and at the centre of the solid wooden cross was a picture of a kind and friendly looking man smiling out at me. It was the face of a man who had never returned to his family. It was the face of a man who had died in Hell. It was the face of the Skeleton Coast and it scared me like nothing else ever has.

Many thanks to Oceansurf Publications, www.oceansurfpublications.co.uk and Local Surfer, www.localsurfer.co.uk for providing support and Dillon at the Cape Cross Lodge, www.capecross.org. For the best accommodation and food on the Skeleton Coast.