Originally Posted by
Michele De Acetis
I suppose that self-drive is not recommended there, due to road conditions and safety concerns (but correct me if I'm wrong), therefore I need a driver AND a guide (maybe the same person can be both).
M.
Another vote for self-drive if that's your thing. I was there (all too briefly!!) in December 2018 and the driving was fine. The roads are well-marked and my Garmin GPS with Southern Africa maps worked perfectly. The main B-series roads are paved and normal as can be. The more extensive C roads are gravel and can get kinda bumpy at times. The lesser-maintained D roads are bumpier still but easily avoidable if you pay attention (unlike me!). Because the C roads are gravel, you are limited to generally less than 100 km/h. In fact, driving 70 to 90 km/h is a somewhat better strategy from a general safety perspective but there are bits when you can speed up, as there are bits where you should slow down too.
As others have pointed out, there's really no traffic in Namibia. Even in downtown Windhoek, there's no traffic to speak of. I rented a 4x4 from
AfriCars. The rates were reasonable and I felt well taken care of. I asked for, and received, 2 spare tires. I didn't need both of them, but it was nice to know they were there. (I only burst one tire once. A replacement was easily purchased for about $100 USD at a service station and I was reimbursed for that by AfriCars.) I originally rented a Toyota RAV4 but when I arrived I was told that one RAV4 was out and the other was unfortunately broken. So I was instead upgraded (same price obviously) to a Toyota HiLux truck. Initially I wasn't entirely pleased as I'm a car guy and not a truck person. But in retrospect, the HiLux is an ideal vehicle for Namibia because of the higher ground clearance which makes it well-suited for the many C roads we were driving. And in the end, driving the truck wasn't hard at all particularly since there was never any traffic anywhere.
Driving at night in Namibia is a no-no; it's far too dark to see what's around you. Even with high beams, you'll only really see what's in front of you and not to your sides. Though I never saw any animals on the road, I'm sure they wander around freely so collisions at night are likely. Much better to stay in your lodge / tent / whatever and just enjoy the peace and quiet of the desert sky.