Welcome To The Sackville Community College Website For The 2003 World Challenge Expedition To Namibia



Swakopmund

Swakopmund, an old German colonial town, boasts an impressive array of R&R activities. In the town are several companies who specialise in 'adrenaline sports', such as sandboarding, quad-biking and skydiving. My team went sandboarding with Alter Action, the only sandboarding company in Swakop. Alter Action offer both lying-down-boarding and stand-up-boarding. Lie-down-boarding requires no previous experience and is very addictive - travelling at 50 mph with your face just inches from the sand gives a unique kind of adrenaline rush!

You get picked up at 9.30, driven to the dunes overlooking Swakop, go boarding, have lunch with drinks (provided) and get back to Swakop for about 1.30pm. The price is very reasonable too, only N$200, which was about £18, at the the time. At 7pm on the same day, they show the video (professionally finished by a studio) of the day in the bar of the Hotel Gruner Kranz (where we stayed), which you can then buy for N$100 (about £9). Everyone who went thoroughly recommends it as an R&R activity.

Where To Stay/Eat
This is the only part of the expedition where you, the team, have any control over where you stay. After studying the Lonely Planet and Footprint guides, we elected to stay in the Hotel Gruner Kranz. The Gruner Kranz is ideal as it has soft beds (!), internet access, cafe, restaurant, bar, laundry service, a closed courtyard to park the truck in and is close to all the shops and banks. There are also some cheaper options in the shape of backpackers hostels but if your budget can stretch to it, I recommend the Gruner Kranz.

The restaurant in the hotel is very reasonably-priced and the food is very good - I would personally vouch for the Ostrich Stew! There is also a restaurant across the road called Napolitana which serves great Italian food, again at a very reasonable price. The Lighthouse restaurant is also reputed to be very good for seafood but it was a little pricey, too much for our budget to meet. Breakfast is served in the cafe in the front of the hotel and again is good value for money (N$30 (£2.50 at the time) for a large cooked breakfast). There is also the Out Of Africa coffee shop in the town which does a selection of very good breakfast items.



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