8- The White Mountain

We had been told that in our area there was a mountain, the "White Mountain", which, at least in the past, was a much greener area than the rest around it. The second largest mountain in the area, but unlike the largest one, was not basaltic, so what we were told could perfectly happen.

We had nothing to lose by trying.

So we took the old "Blou pou" (the Land Rover, our great travel companion), and got going. But we had to take into account the time, because it was quite far away. We approached the "road" point closest to the mountain, which was visible on the horizon, and began the walk.

The Blou pou (blue peacock, in Afrikaans)

After a long walk along a dry riverbed, tedious due to its loose sandy substrate, we reached a point where we thought we could climb.

And we set off on the climb. There I could find a fast Trachylepis occidentalis. The second specimen we had found, after seeing an individual who lived around the house and on one occasion sneaked into our kitchen.

Trachylepis occidentalis

After this, we continue the climb to the top of the mountain range. The last few steps made me anxious. It was one of the farthest areas of the territory, the farthest to the south that we had visited. What would be on the other side of the mountain? An orchard like we had not seen before? Wouldn't it change anything?

And, well, the truth is that in terms of vegetation the landscape hardly changed. The presence of large succulents increased, but not in an exacerbated way. There was an enormous riverbed that continued to wind its way southward through the mountains.

But not content with that, I decided to continue the mountain range to higher peaks in case something changed. I knew that no, many years ago it might have been true that this area was very green, but after the years of drought, it was not going to be like that.

I continued for quite a while, but things were still the same, and after that journey through the mountains, our hope of finding new species for us was fading.

There is something I have not told you, and that is that the mountains of Namibia have some stone quarries of different sizes on their slopes. This makes the climb a little more complicated, but the descent much more difficult.

So we looked for a suitable route that would take us a little further south to travel in the opposite direction of the huge dry riverbed. It took us a while to reach the point where we initially started the climb. And the sun was already starting to fall.

It was our turn to retrace our steps... and it was a good walk. We got to the car at dusk, tired of the sandy road with our backpacks. We were returning home and although the landscape was not what we expected and we did not find any new reptiles, it was worth it. The image from the top was very beautiful, and after that time since our arrival and see everything we had not discovered, how immense it was all ... a curious feeling.