NamibRand Nature Reserve, Namibia

Posted on June 7, 2019

NamibRand Nature Reserve

One of the most beautiful and peaceful places on earth, the NamibRand Reserve is a small area that hosts unique wildlife and landscapes that will leave you breathless.

Traveling to NamibRand Nature Reserve, Namibia

The C27, the main road from Fish River Canyon to the Dunes, runs right through the NamibRand Nature Reserve. This Nature Reserve is directly east of the Namib-Naukluft National Park.

Camping and Accommodation at the NamibRand Nature Reserve, Namibia

There are very few places you can stay overnight while actually in the reserve. By few, we mean exactly 2 locations. Due to this, we have never been able to stay in the reserve overnight, rather we just explore during the day. The 2 places that offer accommodation could not be any more different from each other as well.

Wolwedans Dunes Lodge (and Collection): This is the high end luxury safari experience that you see in all advertisements and thrown about on Instagram. Open air safari tents and unparalleled service…all for a price.
Family Hideout: This is the self-catering and standard campsite that we normally would camp at. There are only 3 campsites at the location, so reservations can book up over 6 months in advance. Of the 3 campsites, 2 are only accessible by 4×4 vehicles that can handle the sand.

Our solution this roadtrip was to stay overnight at the Betta Campsite and drive the 45 minutes into the Reserve.

Activities in the NamibRand Nature Reserve, Namibia

There are limited activities that are accepted in the Reserve on a self-drive trip. Game viewing has been our favorite activity (as seen in the pictures below). There are not many places to stop and hike around either.

The hot air balloon pictures you have probably seen are from this Reserve. For a hefty price, you can too see the dunes from above!

The best activity to do in the NamibRand Nature Reserve is to slow down and stop. Stop to see the beauty around you. This is a rare landscape in the oldest desert on the globe. Many tourists travel to the Sossusvlei dunes from Swakopmund and never get to see this area. It is a quiet, still place to enjoy nature.

Namibian Roadtrip

Unfortunately we did not get to spend much time in the Nature Reserve this past time around. We were on a mission to get a campsite in Sesriem/Sossusvlei and needed to arrive before hoards of other people. Luckily we arrived when we did as we got the last “first come” campsite.

This particular trip to Namibia was completed with our two friends, Courtney and Tyler. It was both of their first times in South Africa/Namibia so it was an obvious choice to do our 10 day trip with both of them!

Courtney is a blogger as well- check her website out: https://awanderingbroadabroad.wordpress.com/