Places I Remember with Lea Lane
On this monthly award-winning travel podcast, host Lea Lane shares travel memories and travel tips with passionate travelers, travel experts, and savvy locals around the world. Lea has traveled to over 100 countries, is the author of nine books, a blogger at forbes.com, and a contributor to dozens of guidebooks. Smart. Fun! Over 100 episodes!
Places I Remember with Lea Lane
Namibia, Africa: Skeleton Coast, Towering Dunes, Endangered Cheetahs
Dr. Laurie Marker, the founder of the Cheetah Conservation Fund, shares her mission to save one of the world's most endangered big cats. Dr. Marker offers insights into the delicate balance of arid grassland ecosystems and the critical role these majestic creatures play. In a world where cheetah populations are declining, learn how innovative models in Namibia are empowering communities to live in harmony with their natural surroundings and actively participate in conservation efforts.
We also embark on a sensory journey through Namibia's unique culinary scene and awe-inspiring landscapes, indulging in the country's fresh seafood, including famous oysters, or experiencing the traditional Mahongo soup. We feel the rugged beauty of the Skeleton Coast where towering dunes meet the ocean, and the vibrant wildlife in Swakopmund and Etosha National Park.
Immerse yourself in the haunting beauty of Kolmanskop’s ghost town and the grandeur of Fish River Canyon, the continent's largest. Throughout, Dr. Marker calls for global action, urging us all to play a role in preserving these irreplaceable natural wonders.
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Dr. Laurie Marker is the founder of the Cheetah Conservation Fund. Go to cheetah.org.
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Podcast host Lea Lane has traveled to over 100 countries, and has written nine books, including the award-winning Places I Remember (Kirkus Reviews star rating, and 'one of the top 100 Indie books of the year'). She has contributed to many guidebooks and has written thousands of travel articles.
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Our award-winning travel podcast, Places I Remember with Lea Lane, has dropped over 100 travel episodes! New podcast episodes drop on the first Tuesday of the month, on Apple, Spotify, and wherever you listen.
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If you're a regular listener of Places I Remember, you'll know that we have over 100 episodes. New ones drop the first Tuesday of every month. You'll also know that, as a longtime travel writer, I've been lucky enough to visit all continents and over 100 countries, and in doing so I've grown more and more concerned about caring for our planet and the creatures that inhabit it. So today we'll be talking first about saving one of the most beautiful animals in the world, and then we'll talk about the country that has the largest population of that animal Namibia. Overall, the International Union for Conservation of Nature estimates that half the globe's over 5,000 known mammals are declining in population and a fifth are clearly at risk of disappearing forever, with over 1,000 mammals across the globe classified as endangered, threatened or vulnerable, And specifically in the last 100 years, we've lost 90% of the world's fastest land animal, the spotted, agile, elegant big cat called the cheetah. Our guest on this episode is doing more than just about anyone to stop this loss.
Lea Lane:After establishing North America's most successful captive cheetah breeding program at Oregon's Wildlife Safari in 1990, Dr Lori Marker founded the Cheetah Conservation Fund and moved to the African country of Namibia to develop a permanent international research and education center on a 156,000-acre private wildlife reserve. Welcome, Lori, to Places I Remember. [Thank you Lovely to be with you. Well, it's a pleasure to have you join us. We'll first discuss your work in saving these beautiful threatened big cats and then we'll talk about the country where you now live, Namibia. I've been there once, and next month I'll be traveling there again. We'll cover some of what you think makes Namibia a special travel destination, but tell us first how you got interested in working with cheetahs.
Dr. Laurie Marker:Well, I didn't know I was going to be working with cheetahs, but that's where my life led me and I started working with cheetahs back in the early 1970s and that was in Oregon, where I developed a wildlife park and we were one of the few places in the world that had cheetahs. So we started breeding them and that became my passion to learn more about cheetahs, because there were very few of them in the world in captivity. They didn't breed well and we knew that there were not that many out in the wild anymore, but nobody knew that much. So by the middle of 1970s I ended up in Namibia Africa --then it was called Southwest Africa, it hadn't gotten its independence yet from South Africa nd in Namibia I actually took a cheetah that I raised and taught her how to hunt. And that's really how I got involved in cheetahs and Namibia and why I live in Namibia today.
Lea Lane:That's wonderful. I'm a cat lady. I guess you say when you taught her to hunt, I've taught my cat to do things too. I guess they're all the same in some ways right. We can identify. Very very similar.
Dr. Laurie Marker:Across the board, there's about 42 species of cats. The cheetah is the most unique of all the cats. They are the fastest land animal and can go up to 70 miles an hour, but they're also trying to outrun extinction. There's only about 7,500 cheetahs left in the world today, and Namibia is the cheetah capital of the world, and I have helped make it that way. We have about a thousand cheetahs and I've been working there since I moved there in 1990, where I set up the foundation to help save the wild cheetahs.
Lea Lane:What would happen to the entire ecosystem of our world if the cheetahs became extinct?
Dr. Laurie Marker:Well, that's always a hard thing. On a global scale, I mean, every species plays a key role. The cheetah in the systems actually helps manage, control the grassland ecosystems, and so what they do is they help with the overgrazing of the land. They actually feed all the other wildlife species because a cheetah, when it makes a kill, it eats rapidly and then leaves food for the rest of the other small mammals insects, birds, and so they actually help create greater biodiversity. So when you lose a top predator like the cheetah, it actually reduces the biodiversity within an ecosystem. So cheetahs play a really important role, especially in an arid land grassland system. So the cheetah is actually a very important part of keeping the systems healthy.
Lea Lane:Well, you work in conjunction with the people on whose land the cheetah lives. How do you involve the local Namibians? Uplift the people who live alongside these animals?
Dr. Laurie Marker:Well, it's interesting because cheetahs are one species that is actually not known to live in protected areas. 95% of all of our cheetahs in Namibia are found outside of protected areas. The remaining small areas where cheetahs are found throughout their ranges, 80% of them are found outside of protected areas. So in Namibia, working with communities is very critical.
Dr. Laurie Marker:Namibia is famous for what are called conservancies Actually, we work very closely with conservancies, with the Ministry of Environment, to actually empower them so that they manage their natural resources. And so, with 90% of all the cheetahs and 80% of our wildlife living outside of protected areas, the communities play a key role in making sure that there's enough grasslands. The wildlife numbers are high enough that an animal like the predators, like cheetahs, are not causing problems for their livestock. And then we work with communities to help understand how to manage their livestock better. We do a program called Future Farmers of Africa, which is actually an integration of if you have good grazing land and good wildlife and good livestock management, then predators and all the other wildlife species can live within this whole system. And that's what conservancies are an integrated system that allows the communities to actually have better livelihoods.
Lea Lane:Well, I've learned that Namibia is one of the most aware countries in the world about ecology. It's one of the things I like best.
Dr. Laurie Marker:We're leading the way in, I think, Africa conservation. Being an American, I also see that we're helping and can share things back here in America with the systems that we've helped put in place. But within our communities, conservancies play a very key role. But that leads into that of ecotourism, where the communities actually benefit from having tourists come into their area and that benefits them by being tour guides, by actually we've got livelihood aspects, the Cheetah Conservation Fund. We do a huge amount of integration like using our livestock which we have. We're a model farm and we teach communities how to farm in harmony with nature. We have a goat dairy and we now are teaching communities that you can milk your goats and make cheeses and maybe soap and those are also alternative livelihoods, but also for your family. You can make cheeses for protein and not just have to carry your livestock numbers, a large number of them, and have them only for your food. You can actually utilize animals differently as well.
Lea Lane:Can a person visit your cheetah research center as a tourist?
Dr. Laurie Marker:Yeah, the Cheetah Conservation Fund in Namibia. We're outside of the town called Ochivarango, if that means a beautiful place, and in Ochivarango we're about 45 minutes out of town. We have an open to the public research and education facility. So we are open every day of the year except Christmas. Visitors can come in and learn all about the cheetah. We do have orphan cheetahs there that we care for and the public loves to see them and learn more about why they're there. But we have a big museum with our model farm, have livestock guarding dogs, which are a large breed of dog to protect livestock. Our livestock guarding dog program is very integrated into communities and public visitors coming and learning more about the things it takes to work and save Africa's wildlife.
Dr. Laurie Marker:How does conservation really work? We have a genetics lab. We've got a veterinary clinic. Visitors are quite engaged when they come and learn. We also have an overnight area where people can stay. We've got a veterinary clinic. Visitors are quite engaged when they come and learn. We also have an overnight area where people can stay. We've got the Babson House, which is an exclusive guest house, and then we have our Sheet of View Lodge, which is lovely.
Lea Lane:Sounds like a wonderful addition to the other beautiful things about Namibia. Namibia is on the northwest border, north of South Africa. The landscape includes lots of open spaces with thorn bushes, scattered farms and towns. It's one of the least occupied countries in the world, I read, but it also has astounding beauty. It's known mostly for the Nabi Desert coming down to the Atlantic Ocean coast, but it also has mountains and canyons and savannas. Stunning. It was colonized as German Southwest Africa, as you know, from 1884 until 1915. And since gaining independence from South Africa in 1990, it's enjoyed decades of political stability. How would you describe your country in general, Laurie?
Dr. Laurie Marker:Oh, open landscapes, breathtaking views, amazing people and cultures.
Lea Lane:Tell us about some of the ethnic groups. I know there's a wonderful tribe in the north called the Himba that many people miss. They're beautiful people.
Dr. Laurie Marker:Well, we have about 13 different cultures, all mixed together and living in harmony. Namibia is also one of the safest places and most peaceful places on earth, which I'm very, very proud of. The ethnic groups that people will see in many places would be maybe the Damra speaking people, and Damra are well known because they have a click Aroob. That means cheetah. Are you clicking right?
Lea Lane:Now clicking. Yes, I didn't hear it. Can you click again?
Dr. Laurie Marker:A rube. It's a very low. I mean, you know I'm not a good clicker, but there are the Herrero speaking people, and the Herrero are characterized, I think, by the women wearing these very big, long dresses, these colonial dresses. They're beautiful in these dresses and they're in the eastern part of the areas and then their relatives are very, very far up north, which are the Himba speaking, the Himba being the most rural of the communities.
Dr. Laurie Marker:Namibia is hot, so I'll also say that we're hot, arid, dry. We would love rain but we don't get very much of it. Where the Himba are, they live in fomas, where their cattle are with them. They move where there might be some grasses, but they are a beautiful culture of people. The other culture that we have in Namibia that's also very rural would be the Sand Bushmen, and they are over in the east as well and they're amazing. You can go tracking with them and telling stories about the wildlife and the wildlife they see and where the wildlife's gone and why it's gone there. You can travel into all these areas when you come to Namibia.
Dr. Laurie Marker:Another very special group are the Avambu, and that is the main tribe. At Independence, Namibia just took the role of saying you know, we're not tribal, we are all Namibian. So we're Namibian first and then, with that, we do have the white tribes. So there's German, there's Afrikaans, there's English, and that is very interesting, that everybody blends together, and I love the blending of everybody. English is the spoken language because there are so many different languages. At independence, Namibia said we're going to speak English, which?
Dr. Laurie Marker:When I got there, everybody wanted to learn English from me, and so I always say well, they now have California slang English that they speak.
Lea Lane:You're changing the world one word at a time, right? Well, it's a gorgeous country as well, and I'll just start off with the part that I think is the most beautiful. It's the highest sand dunes in the world, located in and around Sousa lay, the southern part of the Namib Desert. It's the oldest desert on earth. It also may be the most beautiful. For centuries, the wind has sculpted sharp ridges of sand into arcs that rise from valley floors maybe a thousand feet. Each dune is different and it's constantly reshaped by the wind. It shifts color throughout the day.
Lea Lane:I remember having to get up early in the morning and it wasn't easy because I was tired, but we went to see the shadows on the dunes. So sometimes you can see half the dune in dark shadow and half in rust red. Photographer's delight. You've got the pans of sand and salt. It's white against the red. It's just gorgeous. The Dune 7 is the highest dune in Namibia. I believe it's over 1,000 feet. Call Dune 7 because it's the seventh one you come across when you cross the river. Other famous dunes are Dune 45 and two that I love. Big Daddy and Big Mama, have you climbed any of these?
Dr. Laurie Marker:I have many times yeah, [what's it like?] It's Climbing sand up, up, up.
Lea Lane:I got a little way up. It's not so easy. I got partway up, but it's very, very difficult after a while.
Dr. Laurie Marker:That's why you get there so early in the morning, Right, Because it is hot. But we are also a high desert and so we can be in the summer. American summers we can be quite cold and so that is also something to be aware of.
Lea Lane:Right, it's a challenge. I don't know if there's any place in the world quite like it [There isn't.
Dr. Laurie Marker:If you go on more to the coast, you end up seeing the dunes right on the water as well, which is just amazing.
Lea Lane:Amazing, remembering my trip. We took a five-hour drive from Sousa Flay to the capital city of Windhoek in Namibia's central highlands, and I remember a troop of baboons sitting in the road maybe 75 of them, and herds of oryx on the side. These are large pale antelope with dark markings and straight horns. Just the trip itself was something because it was on very empty roads. There was almost no one, very basic roads. What do you recommend seeing and doing in Windhoek?
Dr. Laurie Marker:Well, Windhoek's our capital. This is a joke. Is that when you get off of the sand dunes and into the city, of course you're going to go to one of the nice hotels and take a shower, but that sounds like a good idea, because we do have a lot of dust and dirt, but beyond that, lovely shops with local community craft objects.
Dr. Laurie Marker:We have great restaurants. The seafood comes from the ocean fresh daily. We have the best oysters, I think, in the world. I'm very partial to our oysters. Yes, Of course we are a meat-eating country as well. Our beef is incredible and actually our beef comes to America. We're the only country in all of Africa that actually sends our beef here. Namibia is a very high standard country. I think we need to also point out absolutely. Now.
Lea Lane:I had Mahongo soup. Can you explain what's in that?
Dr. Laurie Marker:A soup made out of Mahongo. It's a millet. How was it?
Lea Lane:It was good. It was made with fish and, I think, goat meat, but I think you can have it with lamb. I like to eat something typical, not just beautiful oysters, which I also like to eat, and I had very good green asparagus. I remember that.
Dr. Laurie Marker:The asparagus comes from the coast. Remember we have a very long coast. It has to be about 1,500 miles.
Lea Lane:You can drive along and see nobody for hours and hours. And the sand, the packed sand road, is the same color sort of in an overcast day as the ocean, and they call it the end of the earth because it feels like that. It's a good feeling if you've got lots of gas in your tank and let's go onto the skeleton coast if you've got lots of gas in your tank. Yes, let's go onto the Skeleton Coast.
Dr. Laurie Marker:It's called the Skeleton Coast primarily because boats used to run into it. It's a rocky coast, it's not a gentle, soft coast. Apparently there had been a number of boats that had gone askew. Yeah, there's some. Did you see them ever? There's a couple along the road that you stop in and take pictures of and abandon for a long time. But the stories go way back when harsh harsh lands.
Lea Lane:Harsh, harsh land, and if you're with someone or with a group, I think you wouldn't want to do this one solo. I'm a solo traveler, but this one's pushing it.
Dr. Laurie Marker:You can go into Namibia, get a car and drive anywhere and you're perfectly safe, and there's not very many places in the world you can say that you're safe for sure.
Lea Lane:Just get that gas tank full. That would be my one thing. What about the coastal city of Swakopmund? It has sandy beaches, it faces the Atlantic, it was established by German colonists in 1892 and has a lot of colonial landmarks. What are a few of them that you would recommend?
Dr. Laurie Marker:Those also are wildlife areas. We've got Walvis Bay, which is south a little bit. It is where we now have Big Wharf and if you move north you can go up and see the sea lions, which are very famous. These are some of the first places the explorers landed. Huge, lovely lighthouse there, Pelican Point.
Lea Lane:Lighthouse Right and loads and loads of fur seals, I remember you know the smell of them and the sound of them. You have to get used to it. But there are over 100,000 birds counted in the lagoon. They're mostly flamingos and pelicans, so it's a beautiful sight to see that pink against the gray coast. It's very delicate coloring. Lots of lots of marine life, very wonderful contrast to the desert.
Dr. Laurie Marker:Yeah, Isn't it?
Lea Lane:Amazing and they're so close to each other. I took a plane from Walvis Bay Area to dunes. A lot of people do it that way, With time as a problem. It's a long way to drive, so you fly in these tiny planes and you get to see below you these red red dunes. You see how red they are. Besides a significant cheetah population, Namibia is home to diverse wildlife. The most famous national park, Atosha, is in northwestern Namibia, one of the largest national parks in Africa, and it was proclaimed a game reserve in 1907. What animals will you find at Atosha?
Dr. Laurie Marker:Oh, Atosha is just so beautiful. Again, it's a very arid landscape and so the animals are covering very vast areas, but we have huge herds of elephants. Our elephants also go into areas near the coast, which are called desert elephants, so again we've got some very specialized species. Within the park you can see rhinos and giraffe, all the wildlife species from oryx and hardy, bees, springbok, everywhere that are bouncing everywhere, Lions, of course, hyena, very few cheetahs, [Two kinds of zebra I read ] Mountain zebra and their plain zebras. Most people see the plain zebra. The mountain zebra are much more rare and they're also very shy in many areas that are not necessarily open to the public, and but they're mountainous. Atosha is just incredible for the amount of wildlife. You go to these water points. It's a very arid land and so the water points the wildlife congregates in. It's amazing the kinds of species, the numbers of species all living there together, and then the predators, and of course everybody likes those as well.
Lea Lane:Right. There are many other attractions to visit. I would just include two that I think are special. Fish River Canyon it's the largest canyon in Africa and the world's second largest canyon. It's about 60 million years old. It was formed when South America and Africa separated. It's 100 miles long. A challenging hike, have you done it.
Dr. Laurie Marker:I have not done it. I've been to the rim and I've looked over.
Lea Lane:It's a very challenging hike. Actually, it is very challenging.
Dr. Laurie Marker:People who have that kind of adventure definitely.
Lea Lane:Good for them. Then there's Colmanscope Ghost Town, and this ghost town is different from what you usually think of because it's filled with sand. The desert has taken it over since about 1956, when it was abandoned as a former diamond mining town. Have you been there? I've been there.
Dr. Laurie Marker:And you know what? There's a lot of hyenas that like to live in and out of there too, and jackals. They're more nocturnal, but it is. It's just an amazing place to take pictures. Of course, when you come to Namibia, bring your camera, but Namibia is a huge country. An area that you've missed and I'm not sure if you've been there has been Damreland yeah where the rock etchings are Trifolfonte, one of my favorite places in the entire world.
Dr. Laurie Marker:It's a World Heritage Site, so it's been developed with walkways, fortunately, to protect these amazing rock etchings that are at least 5,000 years old. But they're etched in and within there. There's also areas where there are rock paintings, but this area is etched and they are just incredible, from ostriches and elephants and rhinos and giraffe, cheetah, kudu, antelope. They're all on these rocks that are amazing. It's like going to a wildlife church. I'm going to say outdoor, incredible art that's there.
Lea Lane:What a magnificent picture you're painting. There are so many things to go and view and visit. I suggest reading up some more and maybe adding Namibia, if you're already flying to South Africa. I think a lot of people don't think of it as being so close to South Africa. I know many listeners travel to Botswana and so forth. It's so close. Please, if it isn't number one, at least add in a week, if you can, and be prepared for one of the most exhilarating trips of your life. Well, the name of the podcast is Places I Remember. So, Dr. Laurie Marker, would you please share a special memory either of your work with the Cheetahs or of your travels in Namibia, or both.
Dr. Laurie Marker:I love Namibia. It's my favorite place in the world and people ask me when I travel all the time. I like where I live, which is the Cheetah Conservation Fund's land at the base of the Waterberg, which is a national park, but we've got the most beautiful spectacular view of the Waterberg and this area. We've got an area that we call the little Serengeti on our land and we obviously take people on game drives and you can see all kinds of wildlife but with this spectacular water bird plateau as our background is just breathtaking and this is where we do all of our cheetah work and it's just amazing to see the cheetahs out in this landscape as well. We also see leopards quite often, the giraffe and the rhinos. I mean, they're just it's incredible. So I think that's maybe my vision.
Dr. Laurie Marker:I travel all the time and I'm sharing with people the stories about how to go about saving cheetahs and with that I always have this vision of the Waterberg in the back of my mind and all the thoughts that I have. So it's been a lovely country that I welcome people to come to, and working with cheetahs and trying to save them has been an amazing voyage and journey that I've been on for so many years 35 years based in Namibia and with that, being able to see the cheetah survive for the future as one of the world's most endangered big cats is a job not only for myself but for everybody who I think meets a cheetah and sees the work that needs to be done to try to get involved in it. So I welcome people to come visit also to learn more about what we do on our website, which is cheetah. org, to learn all the different aspects of community work, education work, the beauty of the biology and the ecology of the cheetah, and understanding more about how we can live in harmony together, if we just try.
Lea Lane:Well, beautiful thoughts. Thank you so much, Dr. Laurie Marker, for sharing your insights about Namibia and for the outstanding work you do there for cheetahs. You are changing the world. Our planet now faces a global extinction crisis never witnessed by humankind. Scientists predict that more than a million species are on track for extinction in the coming decades. If you want to help, we'll have more info in the episode show notes. Thanks again, it was a pleasure. [Thank you, that was very nice, thank you.
