Join more than 165,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with the latest financial news, insights and expert analysis to help you understand what really matters when it comes to your finances.
You are now subscribed
Your newsletter sign-up was successful
Want to add more newsletters?
An account already exists for this email address, please log in.
Sun and sand in Africa – with a difference
There's plenty of sand, but this isn't your usual holiday, says Chris Carter. You won't find any beaches in these three African deserts.
The Namib desert features the world's highest sand dunes
Namib, Namibia
From the plunge pool of the Wolwedans Dune Camp, located in the reserve, you can watch them coming to drink at the camp's personal water hole. From the nearby city of Swakopmund, an "adventurer's paradise" on the coast, you can take a "sand safari" to see the "fragile and beautiful flora and fauna", such as the "bizarre reptiles and invertebrates" hidden in the dunes.
From £5,045 per person for a 16-night self-drive safari, including flights and 4x4 hire.Contact: NaturalWorldSafaris.com, 01273-691642.
A family holiday in the Sahara
Unesco-listed Chinguetti is one of foursurviving ksours (fortified towns) that area reminder of when the region grew richoff the back of the camel trains, loadedwith dates and salt, that crisscrossed thedesert in the Middle Ages. Today, manyof the houses, with their acacia-wooddoors, lie abandoned, "half-buried inthe sand".
Start your trial of MoneyWeek today
Get unparalleled financial insight, analysis and expert opinion you can profit from.
Sign up for MoneyWeek’s free twice-daily newsletter.
Join more than 165,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with latest financial news, insights and expert analysis to help you understand what really matters when it comes to your finances.
Join more than 165,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with latest financial news, insights and expert analysis to help you understand what really matters when it comes to your finances.
But just off the main street, atthe "welcoming" La Guela guesthouse,you can enjoy dinner under the stars,while a small fountain tinkles "in thelush garden, bold with bougainvillea".Alternatively, take a trip into thesurrounding "apricot and cream-yellowdunes", where you can settle down toeat mchoui "a traditional nomads'feast of goat slow-cooked over a firesunk into the sand".
But for all its savage beauty, the Kalahari Desert is no full-blown "sandstorm" more a "dusty menagerie" compared to "Africa's desert titan", the Sahara. This semi-arid savannah covers most of Botswana, and parts of Namibia and South Africa.
It is home to a wide range of wildlife and forms a "direct contrast to the lush wetlands" of Botswana's Okavango Delta. Within the 20,000 square miles of the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, lions, cheetahs and leopards prowl the bush and grassland.
From £3,062 per person, including flights,on the 15-night Cheetah self-drive safari.Contact: ExpertAfrica.com, 020-8232 9777.
Sign up for MoneyWeek's newsletters
Join more than 165,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with the latest financial news, insights and expert analysis to help you understand what really matters when it comes to your finances.
