Sossus Dune Lodge

home to the famous giant orange dunes

Sossus Dune Lodge is located in the Sossusvlei area of southwest Namibia.

This lodge is in a superb position just inside the Sesriem Gate into the Namib National Park, an area of sweeping desert landscapes and directly overlooking the main dune fields.

It provides immediate and preferential access into the remarkable red dunes of Sossusvlei, as well as the scenery and wildlife of the greater area, plus various activities in the area including some wonderful horse-riding, ballooning and quad-biking.

It is a comfortable and stylish permanent lodge, whose central areas have broad verandahs, lovely lounge areas and restaurant style dining, with a decent swimming pool tucked in behind.

Rooms

Guest accommodation at Sossus Dune Lodge is in 25 thatched chalets which are ranged either side of the main building and are accessed via long boardwalks. The rooms at either end are denoted as honeymoon chalets and feature an outside ‘sala’ or shaded seating area.

Activities

Sossus Dune Lodge provides access to the following guided activities, not all of which are necessarily included in the usual room rate …

• Visits to Sossusvlei and Dead Vlei
• Walking trails
• Balloon safari
• Quad-biking

Sossusvlei is a very popular location and tends to feature in a very high proportion of first time visits to Namibia.

The usual stay duration is 2-4 nights.

Seasonality

The climate in Sossusvlei is relatively stable and the area can be visited year round, although the most popular period is the long Apr-Dec dry season.

Getting there

There are three main ways to get around Namibia and visit Sossusvlei …

Self-drive

The first option is to self-drive, which is reasonably safe and easy to do. The upside is that it is by far the lowest cost way to get around. The downside is that, for safety reasons, you are obliged to stick to a relatively limited network of main roads locations.

Around 90% of the visitors to the Sossusvlei area arrive by self-drive, so the whole area is designed to cater for this kind of traffic.

Flying safari

The second option is to travel around by light aircraft. This is both a great deal easier and enables you to access some wonderfully remote locations. The downside is that it’s much more expensive, as much as three times the price of self-drive.

Less than 10% of guests into Sossusvlei arrive by light aircraft, almost all of whom stay on the upmarket Kulala Concession, which has an airstrip and is able to offer all the various guided activities and other services.

Guided overland expedition

The third option is guided overland expedition, which enables you to really explore the truly wild and wonderful parts of the country. The downsides are that this can be quite an arduous way to travel and can become quite costly.

Sossusvlei is virtually never included in this kind of trip, the overland guides prefer to head out to more remote areas, where they can be free to conduct their safari as they please.

Combinations

Many of the very best trips to Namibia combine two or three of these ways of travelling around.

a very popular stop in first time visits to Namibia