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Skeleton Coast National Park |
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Once upon a time the entire coastline of Namibia was called The Skeleton Coast. Today, the moniker mostly refers to the Skeleton Coast National Park, which stretches over one-third of Namibia’s northern shore. The landscape in the park ranges from wind swept dunes to rugged canyons with walls of richly colored volcanic rock and extensive mountain ranges.
The park’s ominous name is well earned given the scores of shipwrecks littering the beaches – the work of the Benguella Current, dense fog and rough surf. Bleached whale and seal bones also are visible back from days when the whaling industry was still active. But despite its appearance, the Skeleton Coast National Park houses a great variety of species with its borders – big cats, desert-adapted elephant, black rhino and many more.
The landscape includes sand dunes, canyons and mountain ranges all of which are synonymous with Namibia. The climatic conditions are not necessarily what you would expect in a desert country like Namibia - dense fog and cold sea breezes – and this is caused by the cold Benguela Current which flows offshore, meeting with the extreme heat of the Namib Desert.
The Skeleton Coast is normally associated with famous shipwrecks, and stories abound of sailors walking for hundreds of kilometers through this barren Namibian landscape in search of food and water. The name came from the bones that lined the beaches from whaling operations and seal hunts, but more than a few of the skeletons were human. The Bushmen called it The Land God Made in Anger and the Portuguese knew it as The Gates of Hell. Ever since European navigators first discovered it, ships have wrecked on its off-shore rocks, or run aground in the blinding fog. While small boats could land, the strong surf made it impossible to launch, hence the stories of sailors walking through the murderous terrain.
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