A surprising collection of creatures survives in the hyper-arid region,
including snakes, geckos, unusual insects, hyenas, gems boks and
jackals. More moisture comes in as a fog off the Atlantic Ocean than
falls as rain, with the average 106 millimeters of rainfall per year
concentrated in the months of February and April.
The winds that
bring in the fog are also responsible for creating the park�s towering
sand dunes, whose burnt orange color is a sign of their age. The orange
color develops over time as iron in the sand is oxidized, like rusty
metal; the older the dune, the brighter the color.
These dunes are
the tallest in the world, in places rising more than 300 meters (almost
1000 feet) above the desert floor. The dunes taper off near the coast,
and lagoons, wetlands, and mudflats located along the shore attract
hundreds of thousands of birds.
�Namib� means open space and the
Namib Desert gave its name to form Namibia � �land of open spaces�. The
park was established in 1907 when the German Colonial Administration
proclaimed the area between the Swakop River and the Kuiseb River a game
reserve. The park's present boundaries were established in 1978 by the
merging of the Namib Desert Park, the Naukluft Mountain Zebra Park and
parts of Diamond Area 1 and some other bits of surrounding government
land.
The park has some of the most unusual wildlife and nature
reserves in the world, and covers an area of 49,768 km (19,216 sq mi).
It's an area larger than Switzerland (41,285 km2), roughly the size of
the US states New Hampshire and Vermont combined. The region is
characterised by high, isolated inselbergs and kopjes (the Afrikaans
term for rocky outcrops), made up of dramatic blood red granites, rich
in feldspars and sandstone. The easternmost part of the park covers the
Naukluft Mountains
