Signature Namibia,
Luxury Self-Drive Safari

Arrival, Windhoek

Welcome to Namibia. Your Secret Namibia representative meets you at Hosea Kutako International Airport, hands over your tour file and walks you through your 4x4: the handover, gravel driving, tyres and fuel range, and anything you want to ask before your first drive. It is about 45 minutes into Windhoek, where your first night is at Am Weinberg Boutique Hotel on the hillside of Klein Windhoek, with views over the city and the Life Day Spa on the estate. A good dinner, an early night, and the road south in the morning.

Kalahari

An easy first drive of about two and a half hours south on the B1 tar road brings you to Kalahari Red Dune Lodge, just past Kalkrand, where the plains of central Namibia meet the first red dunes of the Kalahari. Eleven suites look out over a vlei in the dunes. Take a nature drive or walk in the afternoon, climb a dune for sundowners, and eat under a sky that is already far darker than anything at home.

• Optional: Nature drive, Guided walk

NamibRand

This is the longest drive of the safari, about five hours west on gravel through Maltahöhe and over the escarpment into the Namib, and it is worth every kilometre. You leave the 4x4 at the Wolwedans base and the camp takes you in to Wolwedans Dune Camp: six tented rooms and a family suite on the edge of a 250 metre dune in the NamibRand Nature Reserve, with star beds on the decks and nothing but desert in every direction.

Three nights here are the heart of the safari. Scenic drives across the reserve's grass plains and red dunes with the Wolwedans guides, walks at first light, long lunches, and nights under the stars: the NamibRand was declared Africa's first International Dark Sky Reserve, and the skies are the darkest you are likely to see. All meals, local drinks and the guided activities are included.

• Included at the lodge: Scenic nature drives, Guided walks, Stargazing
• Optional: Hot-air balloon flight

Sossusvlei

A short drive north along the edge of the dune sea brings you to Little Kulala in the 27,000 hectare Kulala Wilderness Reserve. Eleven villas each have a private plunge pool and a star bed on the roof, and the reserve has its own gate into the Namib-Naukluft National Park, so you reach the dunes of Sossusvlei before the crowds from Sesriem.

Day 7 starts in the dark for the classic Sossusvlei morning: climb Big Daddy or Dune 45 as the light comes up, walk out to the white clay pan and dead camelthorn trees of Deadvlei, and visit Sesriem Canyon on the way back. The afternoon is for the pool, an e-bike ride or a nature drive on the reserve. Meals, local drinks and the guided activities are included.

• Included at the lodge: Guided Sossusvlei and Deadvlei excursion, Sesriem Canyon, Nature drives, E-biking
• Optional: Hot-air balloon flight

Swakopmund

The drive to the coast is one of the great road trips in Namibia: through Solitaire for its apple pie, over the Gaub and Kuiseb passes, across the gravel plains to Walvis Bay and its flamingos, and up the coast road to Swakopmund, about five hours in all. The Strand Hotel stands on the Mole, the old harbour wall, with the beach on one side and the town on the other.

Day 9 is yours. Book a Sandwich Harbour excursion where the dunes fall into the Atlantic, a catamaran cruise on the Walvis Bay lagoon with the seals and dolphins, a Living Desert tour, or a scenic flight back over the dune sea, or simply walk the town and eat well. After a week in the desert, the sea air is a welcome change.

• Optional: Sandwich Harbour 4x4 excursion, Walvis Bay lagoon cruise, Living Desert tour, Scenic flight

Damaraland

Head north up the coast and inland past the Brandberg, Namibia's highest mountain, into Damaraland, about four and a half hours. Onduli Ridge sets six suites among the granite boulders of a ridge in the Doro Nawas Conservancy, with the Brandberg on the horizon and a star bed on every deck. The camp runs on solar power and is fully inclusive, with its guided activities part of the stay.

Three nights give you time for Damaraland's great wildlife: tracking desert-adapted black rhino with the conservancy rangers, a drive down the dry Aba Huab and Huab riverbeds for the desert-adapted elephant, and an afternoon at the Twyfelfontein rock engravings, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Leave the 4x4 parked for three days; the guides do the driving here.

• Included at the lodge: Desert-adapted elephant tracking, Desert-adapted rhino tracking, Twyfelfontein rock engravings, Nature drives and walks

Etosha South

The last drive of the safari runs east through Khorixas and Outjo to the Ongava Game Reserve, on the southern boundary of Etosha National Park, about four hours. Andersson's at Ongava has seven suites and a two-suite family unit looking over a waterhole, with a sunken hide at water level where elephant, rhino and lion come to drink a few metres from your lens.

Spend two full days with the Ongava guides: game drives into Etosha through the Andersson Gate opposite the reserve, where the waterholes around Okaukuejo draw everything in during the dry season, black and white rhino tracked on foot on Ongava itself, and night drives for the animals that only come out after dark. Meals, local drinks, park fees and the guided activities are included.

• Included at the lodge: Guided game drives into Etosha, Rhino tracking on foot, Night drives, Waterhole hide

Departure

After a last morning at the waterhole it is about five hours back to Windhoek and Hosea Kutako International Airport, where you return the 4x4 in time for an evening flight. If your flight leaves earlier in the day, we add a night in Windhoek on the way.