ostrich Archives - Chris de Blank Photography

Namibian Birds – Well how do I start.

Those of you who know me well know that I love to photograph birds. I didn’t realise that birding would play such an important part in my trip to Namibia, but I was wrong coming home with more than just a handful of species.

There are about 600 birds species native to Namibia. I think I managed to capture about 10% of these. Most are just record shots but others I’m very happy with. You could easily make birding your primary reason for a trip to this Namibia.

I should mention that 90% of these images were taken with a full frame camera and a 70-200mm f2.8 lens with a 1.4x converter attached. I was resting my camera on the vehicle for most of the photos. Because I can’t hold the camera steady with much over a 200mm focal length I really need to use a tripod when ever I can.

Great White Pelican

Ostrich

Yellow-billed Hornbill Aka Flying Banana

Kori Bustard

Greater Flamingo

Sossusvlei – Valley of Dunes

Dunes

Sossusvlei would have to be one of the highlights of this trip for me due to the amazing sand dunes (another was Etosha). The Namib-Naukluft National Park covers an area of nearly 50,000 square kms. It is one of the largest nature reserves on our planet. Sossusvlei is located in its southern reaches and is where mountainous sand dunes cloak the Namib Desert. These are known as star dunes because they are formed by equally strong winds from different directions. The Sossusvlei dunes are considered to be the world’s highest.

Sossus Dune Lodge

We spent three nights at the Sossus Dune Loge in huts spread out around the base of a mountain, joined by a boardwalk with quite a long walk to reach our rooms. Our first day here in 46 degree heat wasn’t the most comfortable. Our rooms although nicely appointed didn’t have air-conditioning,

Thankfully the next couple of days the temperature dropped to mid to high 30s. As well as trips to the dunes, we had options of helicopter flights and ballooning. I did both and will bring you pics in a future post.