Following the train tracks we head for Luderitz and the coast. Three quarters of the way there, the track becomes buried by sand. Lots and lots of sand. There are stop signs and big warnings at the numerous railway/road crossings but no train is coming through that sand. Is this track old and unneeded? Why all the signage then? A desert mystery that is solved the following day.

Luderitz is a port and fishing town. The coast is jagged whitish rock and the Shark Island camping area is right on the edge of the water, with enough campsites for 50-60 groups of people. We are the only ones there. The Park manager says “Do you have a booking?” and it is all we can do not to laugh. Shark Island camp is not really an island, but it looks directly at the real Shark Island where the luckless Nama people (updated) were interned in concentration camp conditions after their futile effort to fight the colonizers.

The town we find charming, with colorful homes – green, orange, blue, yellow. turquoise – stacked up the short hillsides and standing out nicely against the whitish rock. Huge fishing trawlers are in harbor along with a couple of sea-going yachts. Buildings dating from the early 1900s show a German (my thought) or Dutch (Jim’s thought) influence, not especially in keeping with the southwest African coastal fishing village. Walking around we find the small museum – and what a find it is.

Opening promptly at 3:30pm, the Luderitz Museum is filled with ephemera, newspaper stories and excellent photographs of the diamond era and with exhibits covering stone age tools, local flora and fauna, and the various tribes who favored the region for thousands of years. Among the excellent displays of real stone digging tools and cutting blades formed from lava cobble hundreds of thousands of years ago is a replica of the Apollo 11 cave paintings. Discovered the same day man walked on the moon in 1969, the art depicting animals is dated at 27,000 years old approximately, and is thought to be the first art created by the San people. It reminds me of a Picasso. No photos are allowed though, and the strict volunteer staffers were to be feared, so I obey that rule. Almost wish I hadn’t, the place was so cool.

To read every interpretative detail here would take a week. Thankfully most of the descriptions are either in English or translated from whatever. Diamond industry history is fascinating; one fellow whose job it was to keep the rail line clear of sand is keen on rocks and gems and he facilitates the first find of diamonds. Then an amazing field of diamonds is discovered, countless diamonds just laying on the ground glistening in the sunlight. Imagine that. There are photos of people prone in the rocks picking up stones; some put the diamonds in their mouths when they ran out of pocket space.

And the rush is on to Luderitz. Fortunes are made overnight. Germany controls the country and moves to annex all the land along the coast from Hottentot north of Luderitz to the South African border. A rail line is built in three months to move supplies and people. The port of Luderitz sees everything imaginable coming in from Europe. The town of Kolmanskop is created to house the German officials and all the goods it takes to build their large homes and maintain that town are imported from Germany by rail or sea. Diamond finds go on and on, through WWI, until finally bigger, better diamonds are discovered downstream and the town of Kolmanskop is abandoned to later becomes a popular ghost town – Namibia markets it as quite an attraction. We buy a ticket to the morning tour to find answers to some questions.

Could this ghost town be any more depressing? Greyish drab sand covers every surface, inside and out. Grey sand, basically dirt – not pretty beachy sand. Monochrome buildings falling apart from the weight of the sand are lined up as if with a ruler, in the German way of things of course. The former German inhabitants apparently enjoyed delivery of a block of ice and eight liters of water daily, lucky them. A variety of entertainment from gymnastic tournaments to opera singers were presented in the town hall building; opera singers being brought in on the flourishing railway. All the rest of the time, I imagine, the wind howled like holy hell and the sand blew in with it. This was not mentioned on the tour. I put my camera on vivid shooting to create some color in the landscapes and hope to never see drab grey again.

There is a display room strictly for the exhibit of the many ways workers tried to smuggle diamonds out of the field. Not just workers either, administrators tried as well. They used crossbows to shoot bags of gems over the fence and even pulled their teeth for room to hide stones. The interpretative signage suggests that no matter the method, everyone who stole was caught. Diamonds remain a huge export for Namibia – no doubt stealing remains a problem.

The guide explains that once the town was abandoned the railway went into disuse and efforts to build a new line have taken 10 years already – what’s the hurry, right? With that mystery solved, it is time to say good bye to the ghosts and the coast and roll along elsewhere.