text: We started out this morning heading towards another large desert park in South Africa, but soon changed our mind again. Too many kms for what we would get. So we turned south on another gravel road and by noon we were at FishRiverCanyon, exceeded in size only by Grand Canyon in the US. We had to backtrack to get gas, and had lunch in a funky Canyon Roadhouse while being gassed up. The visit to the canyon, in three different spots was interesting, but I am getting tired of rocks. We have seen very little but rocks for many days now. There is a 90 km long hike along the canyon floor that can be done in mid winter, but not now or for most of the years. It is too hot and there is the risk of flash floods at times. It does look interesting though.
  We continued on gravel, in the early morning light. At one point a herd of Springbok ran out on the road and with us for a while, and then minutes later, some Gemsbok did the same thing. We have passed countless of these animals, but never had the act this way. We finally hit pavement 70 km before entering South Africa. Even though there is a good pavement road the length, north/south through Namibia we had driven the whole way on side roads seeking out the attractions we were after. The border crossing was easy and an hour or so later we were in Springbok, and we stopped to get money and to check out the Namaqualand flowers. The height of the flowering wild flowers here is late Aug, early Sept, but we wanted to have a look anyway. On the road in, for the last 50 km or so we saw quite a few green and flowering clumps, and after the rocks of Namibia they looked pretty good to us. A small park was mentioned close to Springbok so we drove out, to be told by the young girl at the gate that there wasn’t a single flower on the 14 km drive through the park; we were two months late. But, she said, there was a formal succulent garden and a few things to look at. So we headed off, greatly enjoyed the formal garden, watching workers installing a new thatched roof.
  We then headed off on the park drive. A one lane dirt track, through the park, wound its way through the country fields and amongst small rocky hills. We saw flowers everywhere and could only wonder if this was no flowers, what it must be like in peak times. Along the way we saw more Gemsbok and Springbok. This is a delightful small park.
  We are now in a lovely guest house in Springbok washing away four nights of dusty camping and hopefully catching up a bit on internet doings. Tomorrow we will head on towards Cape Town, likely bypassing the city, heading for the Indian Ocean Side for our last days here.