THE DUNES OF SOSSUSVLEI

The colossal red-orange dunes of Sossusvlei in Namibia are the world’s highest, largest, and oldest sand dunes.  The one you see here is nicknamed Big Daddy at over 1,000 feet high.  You climb it barefoot in early morning – and take plenty of water!  The sand of Big Daddy is five million years old, filled with iron oxide giving its color.

Sossusvlei is in the middle of the Namib Sand Sea, which is the oldest desert on Earth, over 60 million years old.  Plants, small animals and insects live here on the water from fog than often blankets the desert near the Atlantic Ocean.  The Namib coastline is known as the Skeleton Coast for all the shipwrecks along it due to the impenetrable fog. Along it you’ll also find vast breeding colonies of fur seals numbering in the thousands.  This is one of our planet’s most fascinating yet little known places waiting for you to explore. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #274 photo ©Jack Wheeler)