Highlights of Namibia Self-Drive

Your holiday begins with premium UK airport lounge access before your overnight flight to Windhoek.

Arriving into Namibia’s compact capital, you’ll collect your 4WD at the airport to make the scenic drive into town. Checking into your boutique accommodation you'll have time to relax before heading out to explore the city. While Windhoek’s relaxed café culture and century-old neo-Gothic architecture may remind you of the European influence here, palm-tree-lined streets, lush parks and restaurants serving rich, gamey delicacies site you firmly in Africa.

Meanwhile, back at your hotel, you'll find locally inspired dining and a fine selection of South Africa wines.

As you head north, break up your journey with a stop at Okahandja, a woodcarving co-operative where northern tribes showcase their skills passed down through the millennia. You’ll then arrive at the home of the Africat Foundation – Okonjima. This non-profit organisation is dedicated to the conservation and protection of Namibia’s wild cats, including leopards and cheetah.

Relax tonight in a luxury thatched chalet on the edge of the foundation's wilderness area, where bushman trails and safari drives bring you close enough to Namibia’s largest carnivores that you may well be able to catch a glimpse of these quick-footed creatures – and even snap a photograph.

Continue north past dusty red plains to reach Ongava, one of Namibia’s premier lodges. Set on a 125-square-mile private nature reserve that borders Etosha National Park, Ongava features a floodlit watering hole and stone-and-thatch chalets with commanding views over the bushland, where elephants and lions roam free. Track white rhinos on foot during a walking safari, and enjoy expert-led game drives as you seek everything from leopards to rhinoceros.

Watch as families of giraffe stalk the salt flats and whole herds of zebra congregate around spiky bushes as vultures hide in stick trees. You’ll return each night to pampered lodge living, including a private viewing deck.

Leave the rugged plains behind as you wend upwards into the mountains of Damaraland, a landscape where improbable oasis valleys intersperse jagged crags and dramatic red-rock formations. Set atop giant ochre boulders, your luxury mountain camp overlooks the Huab River Valley, where mountain-framed desert plains constitute what is arguably Namibia’s most pristine wilderness area.

Witness the beginning of civilisation in Twyfelfontein’s 6,000-year-old rock carvings, and discover nature’s very foundations in the Petrified Forest, host to 280-million-year-old fossilised trees. It’s all home to desert-adapted lions and endangered black rhinos, uncovered on early morning game drives and sundowner safaris.

Head west to the Atlantic Ocean and the legendary Skeleton Coast National Park, so called for the wild, windswept shores that have claimed the lives of hundreds of Portuguese sailors. Take in the historic shipwrecks in this otherworldly desert as you travel to your attractive Cape Dutch accommodation, based on a quintessential Namibian fishing village. Here, meals are served in true frontier fashion – around a roaring open fire.

It’s just a walk away, along a private beach front, from the region’s biggest attraction, the Cape Cross Seal Reserve. The colony of up to 100,000 cape fur seals makes for a truly impressive sight when all the animals are awake and slinking across the sand.

Continue down the Atlantic Coast to arrive at idyllic Swakopmund, where half-timbered homes, red-and-white lighthouse and historic art nouveau architecture overlook palm-tree-fringed sands. A town known as much for its proximity to adventure – the Namib Desert, the Skeleton Coast, the Atlantic Ocean – as for its Germanic architecture and hospitality, Swakopmund tends to charm visitors with its relaxed attitude and resort atmosphere.

It's also an ideal base from which to launch boat trips in search of the dolphins, pelicans, seals and whales that inhabit nearby Walvis Bay.

Head back inland to drive through vast gravel plains and deep, wind-sculpted canyons to reach the Namib Desert – the world’s oldest. Hike the ridges of its giant apricot-coloured dunes to be greeted by endless horizons, where bright white salt flats and lone twisted trees are the only marks on an undulating desertscape. Explore it all, along with the region's desert-adapted wildlife, on everything from guided nature walks to optional horseback rides and hot air balloon safaris departing from your luxury desert lodge.

Overlooking the dunes, the lodge is perfectly placed for visits to Sossusvlei and the skeleton trees of its Deadvlei neighbour, while the striking geography of Sesriem Canyon is also close at hand. And, by night, Sossuslvei is one of the world’s best places for stargazing, with the Milky Way often visible from your very own rooftop star bed.

Stay: Little Kulala, Sossusvlei

After a delicious breakfast, return to Windhoek to board your overnight flight, arriving on day 13.