Camping on the Atlantic Ocean

Spending Christmas on the beach

It’s loud. The ocean. That’s all I can hear. The sound of the waves. The crashing sound when they hit the beach. The Atlantic ocean is rough. Especially today. The waves are big. But I love this sound.

The sound of the waves is a continuous sound. A sound I can easily fell asleep to. It’s a sound with a relaxing effect.

Just close your eyes and listen. Listen to the waves. Listen to the sounds you can hear. Let the ocean take your thoughts away. Let them fly far and high.

Yes, it’s Christmas day and we’re lying on the beach. We put our mattress in the back of the bakkie (South African for “pick-up truck”). Facing the ocean. Not like I can see much. It’s dark already. But you can’t miss the sound.

Here in Namibia, people don’t sit indoors on Christmas. They take the whole family and go to the beach. Christmas day will be spent on the beach. The coastline is packed with people. All the way from the northern border to Angola up to the southern border to South Africa. One camp next to the other one.

Okay, maybe not that much. But all the accessible parts at least. People pack their cars and drive to the beach early in the morning already. To get a good spot. They bring their gazebo, tents, wind nets, and their mother-in-law.

Because remember it’s Christmas.

Kids play in the water. The men throw their fishing rods in the water in the hope to catch some fish. The women tan in the sun. The whole family is trying to forget why they didn’t like this or that person and just spend a day together on the beach.

During the afternoon the beaches get emptied. Car by car they leave the coastline.

But not us. We stayed. The family left. But my partner I set our camp for the night. We prepared steaks for dinner and build a shelter around the car. Wind protection. The nights here on the Atlantic ocean can be very cold.

But we are prepared. With lots of blankets and wind protection.

So here I am. On the beach. Alone. Not a single car to be seen. No sounds to be heard. Except for the ocean.

The night was lovely. We got a bit too warm in the back of the car. The opposite of what we expected. But we had built quite a castle around us. Our worries of getting reached by the waves during high tide were for nothing. The jackals came closer than the waves.

Their footprints gave them away in the morning. We still saw them in the distance. They probably inspected our trash bin. Judging by the steps in the sand. But we slept well. Didn’t hear anything apart from the sound of the ocean. The waves were loud. Very loud.

“To find the pearls in life’s ocean, you have to venture out far past the shore.” — Unknown

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Anne Bonfert is a traveler. Photographer. Writer. Teacher. Skydiving instructor. Adventure enthusiast. Nature lover. And fell in love with the African continent.