The south

The south is big, and its towns are far apart. The B1 runs as the spine from Windhoek via Mariental and Keetmanshoop to the border, and at Seeheim the B4 branches west via Aus to Lüderitz. Both are tarred. Almost everything you come for lies off these roads, on gravel: the Fish River Canyon 159 kilometres from Keetmanshoop, Ai-Ais another 65 kilometres down the valley. Lüderitz is a dead end. You drive the same B4 there and back.

from Windhoek to Keetmanshoop

496 km

from Keetmanshoop to the Fish River Canyon

159 km

from the canyon to Aus

291 km

from Aus to Lüderitz

124 km

The first days are all tar. Mariental is 267 kilometres away, three to three and a half hours, and Keetmanshoop another 229. That gives you time to get used to the car and to driving on the left before the long gravel roads begin. The gravel starts at Seeheim, 31 kilometres west of Keetmanshoop, on the C12 to the canyon.

Fill up in Keetmanshoop. NWR lists no fuel station at Hobas; the nearest is at the Canyon Roadhouse on the C37. Ai-Ais ran dry several times in 2025, and NWR pointed drivers to Keetmanshoop and Karasburg. If you head on from Aus to the dunes, fill up in Aus, because 338 kilometres of gravel follow to Sesriem.

Which night goes where

Mariental is the first night out of Windhoek, at the Hardap Dam or on a lodge at the edge of the Kalahari. One night is enough in Keetmanshoop, with the Quiver Tree Forest some 15 kilometres northeast in the last light. At the canyon you sleep at Hobas or on the C37 and see the rim in the evening and again in the morning. Since April 2026 the park there has charged foreign adults N$ 280 a day, as of October 2026.

From the canyon to Lüderitz via Seeheim and Aus it is about 415 kilometres, a little over 100 of them gravel. Allow five and a half to six and a half hours at the wheel. Then stay two nights. Guided tours of Kolmanskop run in the morning, and the town itself fills another half day.

Aus is the junction between the coast, the canyon and the Namib. If you carry on from Lüderitz to the dunes, sleep here and stop for the wild horses at Garub the next day, 20 kilometres west according to Audley, 25 according to namibian.org. In 2016 a guide advised midday. Ai-Ais makes a good first night if you come in from South Africa via Noordoewer, 121 kilometres beyond the border. And you only need Karasburg on the B3 if you are heading via Ariamsvlei to Upington.

Heat, frost and floods

In summer the canyon gets hotter than 40 degrees, and more than 50 has been measured. That is why NWR opens the hiking trail only from 1 May to 15 September. Aus, by contrast, has the coldest winters recorded in Namibia. In 1963 it snowed there.

And when it rains, it pours. In February 2026 Mariental was flooded, and near Naute a cloudburst swept away a tourist's car. In April the C12 from Grünau was reported as 4x4 only, and NWR closed the canyon trail again in June, until 17 July 2026. In the rainy season, ask about conditions before every gravel stretch.

Our tipDo the south first and the Namib afterwards. Three days on the B1 give you time to settle into the car and the left-hand traffic before the D707 and the C12.

Places in the region

• SouthMariental and Kalahari

  The town on the B1 from which you head out to the Hardap Dam and the lodges on the edge of the Kalahari.

• SouthKeetmanshoop

  The town on the B1 where the roads to the Fish River Canyon, Lüderitz and South Africa part ways.

• SouthAus

  The small village on the B4 where the roads to Lüderitz, the Fish River Canyon and Sossusvlei cross.

• SouthLüderitz and Kolmanskop

  The harbour town at the end of the B4, with art nouveau houses, a cold Atlantic and the ghost town of Kolmanskop on its doorstep.

• SouthFish River Canyon

  Hobas and the lodges on the C37: the base for the main viewpoint and the hiking trail through the canyon.

• SouthAi-Ais

  The hot-spring resort in the Fish River valley, end point of the canyon trail and the first night after the Noordoewer border.

• SouthKarasburg

  The small town on the B3, last stop before the Ariamsvlei/Nakop border and the road to Upington.

Worth seeing: Quiver Tree Forest and Giant's Playground, Fish River Canyon, Kolmanskop, Wild horses at Garub

Stages in and through the region