#1022 Gaub pass

On our journey from Svakopmund to Solitaire in Namibia, we drove through inhospitable salt and stone deserts. From the Atlantic, i.e. from Svakopmund, you drive about 200 km over tarred roads that resemble motorways, past mining areas and mineral industrial plants with nothing but sand and salt desert far and wide. It's reminiscent of Saudi Arabia - until you get to the first edge of the mountains. It seems to rain here now and then when clouds rain down from the sea. Farms accompany us, but they are more like scree gardens with some vegetation. Real farmhouses here and there - but at most every 20 kilometers. Well hidden at the foot of a mountain where a spring probably provided the reason for building a farm. You advance further into the mountains, along a valley characterized by wild rock formations, with high walls rising to the right and left of the path. We passed the carp cliff and took the Kuseb pass. It's stony gravel paths that are a bit easier to drive here and there because they are sandy and without stone gravel.

And suddenly, after many hours of driving, we are again in front of a natural wonder. At the foot of the Gaub Pass, the Gaub River breaks through two rock formations. On the left red, crumbling sandstone, on the right a meteorite-like giant stone, more of a mountain that doesn't really fit into the picture with its dark brown color. As if he were lying there: motionless and monstrous like a star cruiser that had just shattered. Under the rock, in the shadow of the brown mountain colossus, a curved bridge, whose shape is supposed to withstand the flooding of the Gaub River. Whitewashed, historically shaped and adapted to the few available means, more Romanesque than modern, it stands like a toy in the much too large landscape. A picture like from another planet. The cool-giving river forms a basin just in front of the brown giant stone, which gives the bridge the charm of a resting place. One would like to linger here, but the fight for survival is raging around it, shaped by the heat of the day and the barrenness of the country. Anyone who knows that another 120 km will follow through dust and red scree will stay and linger for a long time at the idyllic Gaub Pass.

Original 20x12 cm

Frame: Nimes III antique black stained, approx. 90 mm
ash-grey-black, perfectly historically patinated, matt.
Ibis x1060-862

External format of the frame: 48 x 40 cm
Glass format/passepartout format: 32 x 24 cm

Passepartout 3375 soft white smooth museum quality, 3 mm, acid-free