Until then I did not know that Oktoberfest was celebrated outside Germany as well. Windhoek, the capital of what until relatively recently was the German colony of Namibia, also hosts this beer festival. A daytime flight from Frankfurt to the colonial capital makes the country relatively accessible to Europeans, although certainly not European-safe. Diamonds are what still lure the wealthy from the old lace lady of Europe to this third country. They are said to lie right on the sandy beaches, which is why the coast in the south of the country is completely closed to visitors. Democracy is something a country like this will simply never taste. Speeches about free people and the withdrawal of colonialists, the end of Apartheid and so on dry up here and disappear in the warm wind carrying the smell of the Atlantic across the Namib, the oldest desert in the world. An unforgettable flight in a light aircraft over the desert to the Skeleton Coast, where hot sand kisses the cold ocean, is an experience that no one who has made the effort to travel so far from home should miss. In just under three weeks we managed to navigate more than 2,000 km of completely empty gravel roads, which took us past the oldest paintings in the world, poverty difficult for us to imagine at home, seals feeding in rich cold seas, shipwrecks lost in the treacherous fogs of the Skeleton Coast, and dangerous towns where it is better to carry your handbag under your clothes.