The Extreme Sports Capital of Africa (and it looks like Leavenworth)

I forget the dog's real name, but we all thought he looks just like Willie Nelson. He's the dune boarding mascot, and ran all over the sand dunes without getting tired. He's definately in better shape than me.
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Swakopmund looks more German than most of Germany--at least that's what Antonia, our German friend, said.  It's the vacation hot spot for German youth coming down for winter break, and is very tourist oriented.  You can also do a few different extreme sports from there, though it's no Interlakken, Switzerland.  Saftey standards are also probably quetionable, but we had no problems and heard no complaints.

We came in early the next morning after a night in the retirement town of Walvis bay, and checked in with a need to make some decent plans.  But instead of waiting around, we decided to go out that day to do one of the coolest things ever: Dune Boarding.  Dune boarding is like snow boarding on a sand dune.  In fact, that's exactly what it is.  I have a video of it, but very few pictures (wind and sand and expensive digital cameras don't mix).  We had to hike up and down this massive sand dune to do it, and by the end of the day we were exhausted, but it was good fun.

Dune boarding was probably the coolest thing ever.

Matt trying on one of the boards before we went up.
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We had to make a ton of phone calls because our goal was to get out to the mythical Namibian Dune Sea--32,000 square kilometers of Sand Dunes.  You had to either go with a tour group or rent a car, and then you had to get a reservation at the super popular camp ground inside the park (the only one in the area that lets you in early enough to see the sunrise).  So after the dune boarding there was a lot of phone calls, planning, and discussing going on.  I'll get into that later.  The highlight was definately dune boarding though.

This is us afterwards. Note the sand on faces.
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Enjoy the pictures.