Iona
"For all the toll the desert takes of a man it gives compensations, deep breaths, deep sleep, and the communion of the stars."
Mary Hunter Austin
Iona is a remote and arid park, established in 1964 it covers 15000km 2. It is part of a larger transfrontier conservation area and occupies the southern part of Namibe province. After 4 decades of border and civil conflict much of the game was eradicated. Small populations of oryx, zebra, hyena, jackal, springbok, cheetah and leopard remain. In 2023 a few Angolan giraffe were reintroduced.
In 2019 the Angolan government partnered with African Parks to improve management, engage the community and develop facilities but the visitor numbers are still small.
It is a desert area with sand dunes at the coast and stony, sandy plains and rocky hills inland. Water is scarce. A small community in the centre of the park has drinkable water but otherwise there are no resources. You need to be self sufficient here. We were keen to see what Iona had to offer.
Scenic Ruins
On the way out of Tombua we spotted an old church on the edge of the ocean, clearly abandoned. We hung a left and drove across the beach to explore.
Mike and Sonia got themselves stuck in the sand at the curb. We thought they were sulking because we careered off the road without warning. Oops.
Anyway the abandoned Portugese church on the edge of a cliff overlooking the sea was fantastically scenic. It is daubed in graffiti and hyena and jackal tracks cross the sand. I could find out nothing else about it but it gave us 30 minutes of photographic enjoyment while Mike and Sonia tried to dig themselves out.
We did go back to help them, eventually!
Welwitschia
Welwitschia is a unique plant endemic to the coastal desert of Namibia and Angola. It is a monotypic genus which basically means there is only one plant in the whole family, Welwitschia mirabilis.
It has only 2 leaves which grow circumferentially around the base and may reach 4 m long. The leaves split and fray and lie in a tangle around the base. The diameter of the base may reach up to 5 m. I won’t lie, it’s not a pretty plant but it is, most definitely, a miracle of nature.
There are male and female plants and they are insect pollinated. They may live for 1000 years or more so they really are the dinosaurs of plants. The seed, or cones, may be eaten raw or baked.
We found many of the plants in flower when we travelled and we took several detours to hunt out the giants. In this remote corner we saw more, and bigger, Welwitschia than we have ever seen before.
Iona National Park
The road to Iona took us back the way we had come, past Arco and Colinas, before turning south for the gate. The road was challenging and slow going, sandy and stony tracks winding across plains and through valleys. Welwitschia plants grew in big collections like gardens, some massive, and there were shepherd trees and many different types of corkwoods. Plenty of blackthorn and some acacias. Our guide book had shown Omaha lodge with a campsite en route and we headed there with high hopes but alas, the gates were barred.
With our dream of showers in tatters we turned back to the desert.
We actually made a beautiful campsite under the stars against a cliff. Wild camping is really special in Angola, but the lack of water was still stretching our hygiene needs. As there is limited water in Iona we felt the need to conserve until we saw how it would be.
Another wet wipe bath and into bed under a glistening canopy of stars.
Our camp site and the loo with a view. The area is pristine. You take everything you bring in, out again. It makes you very conscious of the waste you produce in daily life.
Arriving at Iona Gate
Next day we got up to a lovely morning and set off the last 12 km to the park. We drove on a sandy road between the sandstone cliffs. At the gate there was a reception and a very pleasant guy there. Unfortunately he could only speak Portugese so we struggled with the payment and instructions. He said we could get water at the rivers but it would be salty. Well I think that is what he said!
The first river crossing was rimmed with salt so I guess he was not exaggerating about the water. The track was well signed, African Parks in action I suspect, but there were many roads not on our GPS so it was difficult to know where they all went. The guy at the gate had no maps to give us.
Our plan was to cross the park and exit in the east and travel down to the border that way. We were not going to the west although you can travel all the way down to Foz do Cunene, Cunene river mouth, on the Namibian border. We did not have fuel for that. Carmen was still adamant she would find us fuel but we had no confidence in its availability.
We headed to an area Stefan had recommended. Again we were still following his advice. The landscape was wild and beautiful. Initially we saw cows and donkeys but then more springbok appeared. The rocks were very spiky shale mounds. I would not want to walk on them. Euphorbia and more of the low corkwood shrubs/ trees thrived.
A few springbok, an occasional oryx and jackal were the only game we saw in the park. Numbers are increasing but clearly it will take time before this features as a spot for game viewing.
Iona is the place for desert landscapes and a glorious sense of solitude.
We crossed sandy plains and we could see dunes and desert in the background. We continued West to go sleep at a cave but found it occupied by guys readying it for a tour group. They were friendly but we moved on for some privacy. I guess we had become addicted to the solitude.
Wild Camping
We found a spot under a tree at the end of a sandy wadi and set up the shade to rest. The heat in the middle of the day was hard to take. We decided to camp for the night and continue east the next day. We sheltered under the awning as the desert wind blew and when the sun was less intense everyone walked up the sand dunes to see the view and take photographs.
We spent 3 nights wild camping in Iona and it was glorious. Far from the madding crowd, surrounded by incredible landscapes, drinking in the orange skies at dawn and dusk and a perfect sense of peace. We dug a hole for our little camp toilet behind assorted bushes and made sure we took nothing but photos and left nothing behind.
Because there are few wild animals, and nothing much likely to hurt you, there was a sense of peace which is not always there in unfenced camps in game reserves where lions and elephants roam. Not that I advocate the absence of lions or elephants, but it allows a greater freedom to experience this type of wilderness up close and personal. Walking to the top of the sand dunes and wandering around in the dark without fear.
Comet C/2023A3 and the Night Skies
I may have mentioned the incredible night skies in Angola but it is worth another mention.
We have watched the night skies all over Africa in remote reserves and deserts but nowhere have I ever seen skies as bright and un polluted as in Angola, and Iona was the pinnacle.
Ian and Dudley set up for star photography but then Sonia found a comet that Michael had been looking for for a long time. It was easy to see from the edge of your eye with quite a long tail. Apparently it appears only once every 87,000 years. C/2023A3 is its name, first seen in 2023. We were very privileged to see it in this perfect spot.
We immediately became comet chasers. Every night we tried to camp in an area with open views to the west. This meant that instead of tucking in the shadow of the cliffs at night, we were often on a windswept plateau but one must suffer for science…and art. We need practice with star trails that's for sure.
The Local Tribes
Apart from the small town of Iona, the villages in the park were just a scattering of huts and shelters.
One of the major draws for Iona is the local tribes which make up the population living in the park. Many are Muhimba similar to the Namibian Himba but with some variations in dress and custom. It was the Muhimba we encountered most commonly. The Mucubal are also there as well as the Muhacaona or Mucawana tribe.
We dropped in to the small town of Iona about midway in the park looking for water and were given very sweet water at the Governors House.
The town had a small school and clinic.
Carmen tried her luck with fuel but they said they had none. I think that they definitely have fuel, mostly petrol for the bikes, but not so much diesel, although we saw a few land cruisers in town. I am sure they are not about to give us a couple of hundred litres when it is so difficult to transport for their own use. We did not stress, we had already calculated our needs quite carefully.
The Governors House
They gave us sweet drinkable water, the only source in the park.
The Governor told us the Iona municipality consists of about 10,000 people but we saw nowhere near those numbers. On our meanderings in the park we often saw small villages of tiny straw huts.
Sometimes, in the middle of nowhere we would bump into a small group of people going somewhere, usually with a donkey, sometimes with a motor bike, sometimes just on foot. There were often a few goats grazing. The population increased the further east we went.
They were dressed colourfully, sometimes in full traditional dress and daubed in ochre pigment. They were friendly and a bit curious and some would offer to pose for pictures. Most wanted food but the further east we went the more money was also required.
Some were all dressed up waiting to ambush a passerby, but some were just going about their business. At night they would often pop up while we cooked, to share our supper.
Eventually it became a bit much, people popping out of the bush every few hundred meters and we had to just smile and wave. We were haemorrhaging fruit and biscuits by then. One man tried to push his half clad child/sister through my window, he was so anxious for us to engage. We really needed a translator so we could have more meaningful interactions but we respected their tough life choices and shared what food we had.
The Travellers Code
We have always had a strict travellers code for finding anyone in distress on the roads. We have been helped more times than I can remember by passers by with water or food or just a kindly enquiry during our many and varied mechanical adventures, and we try to pay it forward. So when we found a guy with his motorbike by the side of the road we all stopped and the boys jumped out and burst into action.
In actual fact I think he taught us more than we taught him, but we could at least lend him some tools and an air compressor.
He had a puncture in his back inner tube so first we had to get his tyre off. I am pretty sure, with the enthusiastic application of our tyre irons, a few more holes were added to the inner tube. Anyway the inner tube looked like a train smash with a mosaic of patches and previous repairs. Out of his little pouch he produced glue and a spare piece of tubing and proceeded to meticulously repair each one, cleaning the rubber with a really sharp knife and then cutting patches to fit. This went on for a long time and it really should have worked but , in the end, the final hole was at the valve and beyond his skill set.
In the end we donated him the tyre irons, water, some biscuits and fruit, and gave him money for a new inner tube. He blew the tyre optimistically and set off for the nearest town.
We had made a friend and learned a lot about how to fix inner tubes.
Au Revoir Angola
So we finally popped out from Iona and drove the dirt roads back towards the Namibian border. We planned to exit at Ruacana and had hoped to fill up before we left but no opportunity arose. As I said before the Namibians come across and empty the pumps. Apparently there are moves afoot to stop this but R6 a litre is quite some incentive to overcome.
We stopped at the Angolan side of the Ruacana falls for lunch and were joined by a small family of Muhimba children. The falls were a mere trickle on this side but it was the height of the dry season.
The border crossing was painless and we drove straight to the first small lodge we could find and spent the next 3 hours in the swimming pool getting clean!
We had survived Angola and what an incredible, unique, welcoming and beautiful place. We were fired up with the need to return, and soon, before tourism and technology changes the landscape for good. I hope so, we definitely have more on our Angola bucket list, that's for sure.
“Everyone smiles in the same language,
Happiness knows no frontiers, no age.”
Ana Claudia Antunes,