Waking up to the soft glow of morning light, cool and gentle as the occasional passing of cars grow, zoom and fade into the distant blue mountains. We are situated amidst the low, hidden tangle of the thorny grey and bright green trees, some of these in shades of spring green, others darker and older, or browning in autumn colours. Encircling this valley of veinlike thorns, are the deep, jagged, soft blue of mountainous rocky outcrops that close us in calming cold blue coolness. As Africa is turned to day once more, the brilliant blinding orange-white glow of the sun replaces the low-hanging ring of deep corral pink that frames the rock-formed horizon and complements and warms their proud blue outlines. Rapidly the sun rises higher, surpassing the uneven horizontal that obscured its strength, and moves closer to 7am to begin its warming of the cool, dry earth – another day of clear, heady blue sky awaits this stretch of southern Angola.
It now becomes more obvious, as we drive closer to Lubango, merging into the horizon of the morning, that the ragged outline of mountain range that earlier encircled us encapsulates the “dental” variety of Angola. Looking similar to the jumble of canines, molars and incisors of a shark’s gum line, the blue-grey hue and smoothed jagged angles of these mountains are similar to those of the ancient fossils on the beach at N’Zeto. Below the gum line and joining their roots with those of the mountains of teeth, sits in the valley, thousands of trees in colours of autumn, their oranges, browns, greens and golds glowing in the fresh morning light of the bright sun. Above, the endless blue sky spreads out in completion of the early autumnal-coloured shades and lies high over the strong, refreshing breeze that blows down the straight of faded black tar and highlights the glittering flicker of small glass-like leaves.
Again, we rise up and out of the valley, ears popping beneath cliffs of towering rock face — the flattened, broken roots of the ancient teeth. The transparent white glow of the three quarter full moon hangs isolated in the atmosphere’s blue abyss, keeping a soft watchful eye over the flat, sunken plains of the lowveld that is swathed in the pale dry of evergreen trees. Moisture-less dust patches intersperse this monotony and fade into the hazy blue distance, serving as a backdrop to the serpentine snake of broken, white-lined tar as it follows us around the curvature of the mountains. About 20km outside of Lubango, this serpentine increased the tightness of its bends, winding snugly up to the top of the plateau like that of a snake in the tightest reptilian slumber. Jørn, Kiwi and I sat out front, on top, and experienced the stomach-clenching loops from the most magnificent spot. Goosebumps consumed my exposed skin as we swerved smoothly around bend after bend, our lives unrealistically falling steeply away down to the left, then right, to the bottom of the breathtaking rocky gullies that joined the endlessly stunning flat plains of the valley below. Performing as a sheer vertical backdrop of multicolour-streaked rocks, the face of the cliff puts the iconic tree of the continent— the acacia — into diminutive perspective, yet compliments it’s solitary beauty. The colours of the cliffs drip down in oranges, greys, blues and greens like that of the newly painted piece of art, streaked and unfinished, but a work of strong beauty in its incompleteness.
The Serra da Leba →
Tomorrow → Day 76: 25th.June.2016 — Part 2: The Rest of Yesterday | LUBANGO
*Check out Jørn and Lukas’ 3 videos created from the first couple of months of videography from the trip down below, before further footage was either lost or stolen:
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— Thank you for reading! —
♥,
Shani
