Fish River Canyon has a “grand” reputation in Namibia as an equal to the Grand Canyon in the US. There are similarities. Like the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon, the Fish River meanders through ancient layered rock carved by erosion and wind, and the viewpoints provide excellent photo opportunities. We stop at the first point and chat with a couple from Germany who, when they realize we are from the USA, ask us straight off if the Fish River canyon is better than the Grand. What makes one canyon better than another, I wonder? Jim is very diplomatic and says they are both wonderful. He has to say that again to the next people who ask the same question.

As expected, the pounding washboard road going into the canyon has not been improved overnight. The ugly road makes an afternoon visit uninviting so we have sunrise breakfast at the canyon’s edge and stay a long time, play a card game, enjoy the view, eat some more and finally tackle the road back to camp to get our shit rolled in a ball and moved on – like a dung beetle, Jim says. Not sure where. Maybe the park at the southern border of Namibia and South Africa. . . but we hesitate to go south, only to go north again. Straight North wins out.

The town of Aus becomes our next destination and it takes all day to get there. Jim likes the sound of Aus, it has only three letters unlike so many other towns we have been in. Towns, streets and signage mostly comprise an incomprehensible combination of many consonants and just as many vowels. Still, nearly everyone we deal with speaks the local language (usually Afrikans), English, some German, and their own dialect. It is humbling to hear the waitress switch languages from one table to the next.

Aus is as simple as its spelling; a nice old hotel, a fuel stop, and a camping area in the back of the fuel stop. We pull in at 5pm, happy to stop driving. The railway line still runs through Aus and in its heyday the town served the giant diamond industry in Kolmanskop outside Luteritz. The lovely Banoff hotel has a train, a diamond and a quiver tree on its logo, covering all the bases.