Namibia Itinerary - Epic Journey of Discovery to (or from) Pretoria to Walvis Bay (Namibia) on the luxurious train, Rovos Rail, visiting Fish River Canyon, Keetmanshoop, Windhoek, Sossusvlei, Etosha and Swakopmund.
Rovos Rail is closely monitoring the situation, which is evolving on a moment by moment basis. We have cancelled all journeys running from now until 5 January 2021. At this time we are still operating as per our schedules from 6 January 2021 onwards.
As we work towards that date, we will be approaching each journey as it comes to establish the risk while also adhering to government requirements and listening to the wishes of our passengers. In order to accommodate the varying worldwide travel restrictions, we have introduced special COVID-19 Policy Terms (detailed below) that will take effect 60 days prior to each departure. Should Rovos Rail cancel a journey, a 100% refund will be offered or clients will have the option to postpone their booking to a future date. Given the unpredictability of global events, we recommend clients wait until 31 days prior to their departure date to make a decision to postpone or cancel. Should clients elect to postpone or cancel bookings that are 61 days or more away from the departure date, Rovos Rail’s standard T&C apply.
This journey takes the train from the savannahs of the Highveld to the Atlantic in the west. Departing from Pretoria, the first stop is Kimberley, centre of one of the world’s famous diamond rushes where there is an opportunity to savour the 1870s atmosphere of the mining village. The train traverses the stark vistas of the Northern Cape to the Fish River Canyon – second in size to the Grand Canyon – and Garas Park with its quiver-tree forest. Guests continue across the untamed beauty of the Kalahari Desert to Namibia’s capital for a tour; Windhoek is a lively, cosmopolitan city with a strong German flavour. Then it’s a short flight to Sossusvlei, a stunning pan in the Namib Desert, for an overnight stay followed by a night in the game-rich Etosha National Park. On the last morning, the train travels the Namib to the perfectly preserved 19th-century German Hansa town of Swakopmund and Walvis Bay – an unforgettable end to a remarkable journey. Available in reverse.
From 2022, the Namibia Safari will be 9 nights/10 days including a visit to a cheetah conservation project.
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PRETORIA - WALVIS BAY:
8 - 16 April 2021, 29 April - 7 May 2021 & 6 - 14 May 2021 (Eight night itinerary)
5-14 April 2022, 27 April- 6 May 2022 & 4-13 May 2022 (Nine night itinerary) |
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Day 1
PRETORIA
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11am | Depart Pretoria from Rovos Rail’s private Capital Park station. Travel south via the goldfields of the Witwatersrand. Guests may freshen up in their suites before joining fellow travellers in the lounge car or observation car at the rear of the train. |
| 1pm | Lunch is served in the dining cars. | |
| 4.30pm | Tea is served in the lounge and observation cars. | |
| 7.30pm | Dinner is served in the dining cars. Dress: Formal | |
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Day 2
KIMBERLEY
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7am | Breakfast is served in the dining cars. |
| 9.45am | Enjoy a tour of Kimberley’s Diamond Mine Museum and the Big Hole. Capital of the Northern Cape, Kimberley is well known for the discovery of diamonds that led to its establishment in 1871. | |
| 1pm | Lunch is served in the dining cars. The observation car will be leading the train until after tea. Travel through the Karoo, a vast semi-desert region that was once an enormous inland sea. Over millions of years, volcanic matter was ground down and deposited as silt upon the seabed to form what geologists call the Karoo system. | |
| 4.30pm | Tea in the lounge car and observation car at the front of the train en route to De Aar, an important railway junction. | |
| 7.30pm | Dinner is served in the dining cars. Dress: Formal | |
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Day 3
UPINGTON
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7am | Breakfast is served in the dining cars until 10:00. |
| 9am |
Disembark the train for an optional two-hour walking tour of Upington.
Attorney General of the Cape, Sir Thomas Upington was principally responsible for liquidating the business activities of all the Orange River pirates and capturing their leader, Klaas Lucas. When the desperadoes were finally chased away in 1884, the town was founded on the banks of the Orange River and named in his honor. |
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| 1pm | Lunch is served in the dining cars. Border formalities with Namibia. | |
| 4.30pm | Tea is served in the lounge car and observation car at the rear of the train. | |
| 7.30pm | Dinner is served in the dining cars en route to Holoog. Dress: Formal | |
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Day 4
FISH RIVER CANYON & GARAS PARK
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6am | Breakfast is served in the dining cars until departure. |
| 8am |
Disembark from the train for an excursion to the spectacular Fish River Canyon (approximately one-hour transfer).
The Fish River rises in the centre of the country before flowing south into the Orange River on Namibia’s border with South Africa. It has formed the great Fish River Canyon – the largest canyon in the southern hemisphere and probably only second to Arizona’s Grand Canyon in terms of size. The vast rocky landscape breaks up into a series of spectacular cliffs. Its size is impressive: 161km long, up to 27km wide and almost 550m at its deepest. |
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| 11am | Return to the train. | |
| 1pm | Lunch is served in the dining cars. The train travels along the southern reaches of the Kalahari Basin. | |
| 3pm | Visit Garas Park (Quiver Trees), home to roughly 300 specimens of the Aloe dichotomy. The prehistoric trees have forked branches that reach up to 5m making for great photographic opportunities. | |
| 4.30pm | Tea is served in the lounge car and observation car at the rear of the train. | |
| 7.30pm | Dinner is served in the dining cars. Dress: Formal. The train travels north through the Kalahari. | |
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Day 5
SOSSUSVLEI
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7am | Breakfast is served in the dining cars until 09:00. |
| 9am |
Disembark at Windhoek Station. Visit the train museum followed by a city tour en route to the airport.
Situated in Namibia’s central highlands, Windhoek is an attractive city surrounded by clusters of hills and the impressive Auas and Eros Mountains. The Trans-Namib Transport Museum outlines Namibian transport history, particularly that of the railway. The Independence Memorial Museum focuses on the anti-colonial resistance and the national liberation struggle of Namibia. |
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| 11am | Depart in a light aircraft for a one-hour flight to Sossusvlei. | |
| 12.30pm | After check-in, enjoy lunch at the restaurant. | |
| 4.30pm | Afternoon desert drive and a bush dinner after sunset. Overnight at the lodge. Dress: Casual | |
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Day 6
SOSSUSVLEI & WINDHOEK
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An early wake-up call with tea and coffee. Enjoy a desert drive with breakfast in the vlei.
The dunes of the Namib were created by sand carried by the wind from the coast. The sand here is over 5-million years old and is red due to its iron-oxide content. As the light changes during the day so does the appearance of the dunes’ characteristic colour allowing for interesting photographs at any time. The wind in the Sossusvlei area blows from all directions causing the sand to form a star shape with multiple arms, hence the name “star dunes”. |
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| 11am | Return to the lodge to use the facilities, check-out and transfer to the airstrip. | |
| 12pm | Depart in a light aircraft for the one-hour flight to Windhoek. | |
| 1.30pm | Lunch is served in the dining cars. The train travels to Otjiwarongo. | |
| 4.30pm | Tea is served in the lounge car and observation car at the rear of the train. | |
| 7.30pm | Dinner is served in the dining cars. Dress: Formal | |
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Day 7
ETOSHA NATIONAL PARK
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7am | Breakfast is served in the dining cars until 10:00. |
| 10.30am |
Transfer (120 min) to Mokuti Lodge in Etosha National Park. Check-in and enjoy lunch.
Etosha National Park (22270km2) offers great game viewing. It gets its name from the Etosha pan (4760km2), a large salt pan forming part of the Kalahari Basin. Etosha means ‘Great White Place’. |
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| 3pm | Afternoon game drive (approximately 3 hours). | |
| 7pm | Dinner at the lodge and overnight. | |
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Day 8
ETOSHA NATIONAL PARK
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An early wake-up call with tea and coffee. Enjoy a game drive in the Etosha National Park. | |
| 9.45am | Return to the lodge for breakfast and check-out. | |
| 11am | Meet in the foyer to check out and transfer (60 min) to the train at Tsumeb Station. | |
| 1pm | Lunch is served in the dining cars. | |
| 4.30pm | Tea is served in the lounge car and observation car at the rear of the train. | |
| 7.30pm | Dinner is served. The train travels southwest towards the Atlantic Ocean. Dress: “Africa” Theme or Smart Casual | |
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Day 9
WALVIS BAY |
7am |
Breakfast is served in the dining cars until 10:00. The train traverses the Namib Desert towards Walvis Bay.
The Namib Desert stretches for more than 2000km along the Atlantic coasts of Angola, Namibia and South Africa. The name is of Khoekhoegowab origin and means “vast place”. Having endured arid or semi-arid conditions for roughly 55-80 million years, the Namib may be the oldest desert in the world. The geology consists of sand seas near the coast while gravel plains and scattered mountain outcrops occur further inland. |
| 12pm | Arrive at journey’s end in Walvis Bay, Namibia. | |
The 2022 itinerary changes from Day 7:
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Day 7
CHEETAH CONSERVATION PROJECT
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7am | Breakfast is served in the dining cars until 10:00. |
| 12.30pm | Lunch is served in the dining cars. | |
| 2pm | Visit a cheetah conservation project in Otjiwarongo. Founded in Namibia in 1990, the Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF) is dedicated to saving the cheetah in the wild. TIME MIGHT BE EARLIER | |
| 7.30pm | Dinner is served in the dining cars en route to Otavi. Dress: Formal | |
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Day 8
ETOSHA NATIONAL PARK |
7am | Breakfast is served in the dining cars until 10:00. |
| 10.30am |
Transfer (120 min) to Mokuti Lodge in Etosha National Park. Check-in and enjoy lunch.
Etosha National Park (22270km2) offers great game viewing. It gets its name from the Etosha pan (4760km2), a large salt pan forming part of the Kalahari Basin. Etosha means ‘Great White Place’. |
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| 3pm | Afternoon game drive (approximately 3 hours). | |
| 7pm | Dinner at the lodge and overnight. | |
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Day 9
ETOSHA NATIONAL PARK |
An early wake-up call with tea and coffee. Enjoy a game drive in the Etosha National Park. | |
| 9.45am | Return to the lodge for breakfast and check-out. | |
| 11am | Meet in the foyer to check out and transfer (60 min) to the train at Tsumeb Station. | |
| 1pm | Lunch is served in the dining cars. | |
| 4.30pm | Tea is served in the lounge car and observation car at the rear of the train. | |
| 7.30pm | Dinner is served. The train travels southwest towards the Atlantic Ocean. Dress: “Africa” Theme or Smart Casual | |
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Day 10
WALVIS BAY |
7am |
Breakfast is served in the dining cars until 10:00. The train traverses the Namib Desert towards Walvis Bay.
The Namib Desert stretches for more than 2000km along the Atlantic coasts of Angola, Namibia and South Africa. The name is of Khoekhoegowab origin and means “vast place”. Having endured arid or semi-arid conditions for roughly 55-80 million years, the Namib may be the oldest desert in the world. The geology consists of sand seas near the coast while gravel plains and scattered mountain outcrops occur further inland. |
| 12pm | Arrive at journey’s end in Walvis Bay, Namibia. |
The Walvis Bay to Pretoria train runs in reverse on the following dates:
18 - 26 April 2021, 9 - 17 May 2021 & 16 - 24 May 2021 (Eight night itinerary)
16 - 25 April 2022, 8 -17 May 2022 & 15 - 24 May 2022 (Nine night itinerary)
16 - 25 April 2022, 8 -17 May 2022 & 15 - 24 May 2022 (Nine night itinerary)
2021 Price:
Pullman Suite: R81 500
Deluxe Suite: R120 000
Royal Suite: R162 000
Pullman Suite: R81 500
Deluxe Suite: R120 000
Royal Suite: R162 000
2022 Price:
Pullman Suite: R116 000
Deluxe Suite: R155 000
Royal Suite: R198 000
Pullman Suite: R116 000
Deluxe Suite: R155 000
Royal Suite: R198 000
Single Supplement +50% on all suites
Accommodation on board Rovos Rail:
All the suites offer passengers the opportunity to travel in privacy, comfort and luxury, with fittings and facilities that are of the highest standard. The wood paneled rebuilt sleeper coaches, remodeled and refurbished to mint condition, offer every modern convenience and comfort. In the en-suite bathrooms, original fittings combine with the modern technology of hot showers, hair dryers and shaver plugs. All are equipped with a writing surface and a personal safe for valuables. There is also a bar fridge filled with beverages of the passengers’ choice and room service is available 24 hours a day.
Accommodation on board Rovos Rail:
All the suites offer passengers the opportunity to travel in privacy, comfort and luxury, with fittings and facilities that are of the highest standard. The wood paneled rebuilt sleeper coaches, remodeled and refurbished to mint condition, offer every modern convenience and comfort. In the en-suite bathrooms, original fittings combine with the modern technology of hot showers, hair dryers and shaver plugs. All are equipped with a writing surface and a personal safe for valuables. There is also a bar fridge filled with beverages of the passengers’ choice and room service is available 24 hours a day.
The Pullman Suites (±7 sq metres/±76 sq feet) are equipped with a comfortable sofa-seat during the day with a conversion to double or twin beds (bunk) for the evening, and also have an en-suite bathroom with shower. These are ideal for single travelers due to their size.
The Deluxe Suites (±10 sq metres/±118 sq feet) accommodate two passengers in either twin or double beds and have a lounge area and en-suite bathroom with shower.
The Royal Suites, each of which take up half a carriage, are spacious and elegant measuring ±16 sq metres in size. Each has its own private lounge area and full bathroom with Victorian bath and separate shower. The epitome of luxury with handsome wood panelling and period Edwardian features, the air-conditioned suites accommodate two people offering the option of side-by-side twin or spacious double beds.
Please note:
Prices are for one way journey per person and includes accommodation, meals, all alcoholic and other beverages, 24-hour full room service and limited laundry while on board the train, as well as excursions accompanied by a qualified tour guide (where applicable) and government tax.
Excursions may be changed according to schedule achieved.
Please note:
Prices are for one way journey per person and includes accommodation, meals, all alcoholic and other beverages, 24-hour full room service and limited laundry while on board the train, as well as excursions accompanied by a qualified tour guide (where applicable) and government tax.
Excursions may be changed according to schedule achieved.
Times are approximate and cannot be guaranteed.
Departure dates are specific.
Departure dates are specific.
Book this Luxury Rail journey on board This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. now.