The following day took us to another, bigger waterfall coming from a lakelike widening the river formed. The river split into two parts there and a rock island had been formed in the middle. There were interesting rock formations in marvellous colours: black, red and green. It was a long walk that day as we skipped one camp. I felt it was far too hot to carry on walking and I really got to a point that I did not want to continue anymore. Not that I was exhausted, but just tired from the heat. Finally we reached a dusty place under a tree which was our camp. Some areas of the riverbank were blocked off with cut bushes to prevent crocodiles coming on land. We were directed to a shallow, stony stretch where we could wash off the sweat of the day, cautiously watching the water. In the evening people from the nearby Himba village visited us and there was some chatting, dancing and singing going on. They were friends and family of our guide and two of his kids were living there, a boy of 10 and a girl of 8 years. The kids joined us for the rest of the trip, going to live with relatives at Marienfluss. Even though they were so young they knew the way cross country and they were able to go much faster than us, even barefoot on all these stones and thorns! They helped their dad, never complained and we accepted them as our guides. Tough kids in a hostile environment.
The whole area was not as deserted as I thought: all the time we were crossing paths and every couple of kilometres we passed a few huts and a kraal, where Himbas had lived for a while with their cattle grazing. In front of some huts we even found quite sophisticated wooden toy cars, probably carved with a machete. They had proper wheels and the kids used a stick to move them around.
