Tok Tokkie Trails: Hike in Namibia’s Incredible NamibRand Nature Reserve

After warming up on Trans Kalahari Walk, we had a spring in our step and the bush in our hearts. Yup, we were ready for some more Namibia hiking, and set off to hike the (slightly) more serious Tok Tokkie Trails in Namibia’s stunning NambiRand Nature Reserve.

Spoiler alert: You don’t need to read this review. Just trust me and go ahead and book. The Tok Tokkie Trail was one of the two highlights of our Namibia itinerary, along with Etosha National Park, and has to be one of the best hiking trails in Namibia. 

However, if you want to know what you’re in for or get almost as much joy out of travel planning as the trip itself, then continue on dear reader…

Tok Tokkie Trail In A Nutshell

The Tok Tokkie Trek is totally the shiz if you love hiking (aka trekking or ‘tramping’ as we call it in NZ) and the great wilderness, but don’t love lugging around gear or setting up camp. The Tok Tokkie Trails is a three day / two night hike through the stunning NamibRand Nature Reserve in the Namib Desert.

Believe it or not, at Tok Tokkie you sleep under the stars but with eco-luxe comforts and good food. Think: an outdoor stretcher bed where you can gaze at one of the darkest night skies in the world while being wrapped up warm, delicious three course dinners with drinks, and a hot bucket shower and bush toilet complete with views of the rolling desert.

The hike is fully-guided and fully-catered. Just bring your usual hiking gear and decent walking shoes. You only need to carry your day pack with a camera, water and any spare clothes you want. The guides will deliver any larger bags to the camp each night. Too easy!

Where Is Tok Tokkie Trails + How Long Does It Take To Drive There?

Tok Tokkie Trail is in the NamibRand Nature Reserve. The trail is around 6 hours’ drive from Windhoek, 4 hours’ drive from the Kalahari Desert or only 1-2 hours’ drive from Sossusvlei.

We followed Google Maps to Tok Tokkie Trails which was strangely accurate. Make sure you look out for the turn-off when you’re getting close, as we overshot this thinking it was private property due to the locked gate. The road is mainly well-maintained gravel and driving in Namibia is fairly easy, but be prepared for some bumps and slower driving conditions than elsewhere in Namibia. 

Aim to arrive at the Tok Tokkie Trails Farmhouse by 2pm. This leaves enough time to hand your luggage over and do the pre-trip briefing, or earlier if you’ve pre-organized lunch for the first day.

The trip sets off at around 2:30pm. After a short drive in the lodge’s jeep, the first stop is the conservation center. To be honest, while the center does good work, I found this a leeeeetle boring. They literally show you EVERYTHING school kids do at the center, down to sleeping and showering facilities. I personallly would have preferred to spend an extra hour hiking. (Sorry kids!)

Tok Tokkie Hiking Conditions + Difficulty 

Distance + Difficulty

The Tok Tokkie Trail hike is around 22km, covering roughly 4km on day 1, 12km on day 2 and 6km on day 3. The hike is suitable for anyone with a reasonable level of fitness. You don’t need to be able to run (or even walk) a marathon, but you’re probably tempting fate if your idea of exercise is a stroll to the local café. If you can handle a decent 10km hike around a reserve with some inclines, then I reckon you’re good to go.

The walking pace is solid but not fast. There’s plenty of breaks to learn about the landscape and all creatures big and small. (As an aside, the breaks were a little too long for my liking, mostly because the guide’s descriptions were veeeeery slow and long-winded. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he was catering for non-native English speakers.)

The Tok Tokkie hike has a mix of flat plains, small hills over hard and soft dunes and one larger hill over rocky terrain. The rocky hill was a bit more challenging and required concentration due to the uneven surface. However, it was still only a few hundred meters ascent so definitely doable for most people.

Surroundings

Hiking Namibia is an absolute visual feast. The thing that surprised me the most about Tok Tokkie Trails was how varied the NamibRand Nature Reserve desert landscape was in a relatively short hike. I was expecting barren and endless desert, and maybe even a bit of a monotonous hike. I was happy to be proven wrong.

Instead, we were treated to grassy plains with a dramatic mountain backdrop one moment, followed by rocky mountains the next, through to undulating sand dunes and mysterious fairy circles dotted across the plains below.

Without a doubt, the NamibRand Nature Reserve has to be one of the most beautiful places in Namibia. The Tok Tokkie landscape was eerily similar to the landscape in Jordan’s Dana Biosphere Reserve, which is also home to some of the best hiking I’ve ever done.

The hike is definitely more about the landscape and vivid scenery, and less about the wildlife. That said, we did see plenty of oryx, a few zebras, and small creatures like the eponymous tok tokkie beetle. It was also pretty awesome to wake up to little fox paw prints all through our camp (why didn’t he come to snuggle meeeeee in the night?!) and spot leopard prints on our hike.

Group Size 

The group size is small. We had the maximum 8 guests and a guide, plus 1 Tok Tokkie representative who was trying the hike as part of her job (better job benefits than the corporate life I tell ya!). We also had three people working behind the scenes, including a chef and camp manager to set everything up.

Weather + Climate

The Tok Tokkie walk operates most of the year except for a couple of the hottest summer months. We went in May and the late autumn weather made for pleasant hiking conditions. We experienced warm dry days (mid to late 20 degrees Celsius), cool nights (maybe 8-15 degrees) and very little humidity, all of which makes a nice change from the Singapore tropics.

Make sure you pack something warm if you go around winter. The desert can get pretty chilly and you won’t have a lodge to protect you from the elements. Although you will have a comfy and warm swag to stay snug in at night!

Camping Conditions 

What is the Tok Tokkie camp like? 

Tok Tokkie Trails does an exceptional job of setting up a low environmental impact but super comfortable camp. They have two camps set up along the trail, one for each night, and a canopy for lunch on the middle day. There’s no permanent structures, and yet they can whip up three course dinners in the makeshift wooden kitchen and deliver hot bucket showers on demand.

Yup, you’ll be sleeping under the stars, as in no lodge, no tent, just you and Mother Nature. (And maybe the odd nighttime fox visitor, which is a plus in my books). Sleeping sans room not your thing? Try the Trans-Kalahari Hike instead.

Nervous about sleeping outside? No need to be!

I was pretty blown away when we reached the camp on the first night. The staff had set up separate ‘bedrooms’ for each couple. Each couple had stretchers together in a dip in the dunes and were a good 20-30m from the next ‘bedroom’.

The stretchers are army style and raised off the ground to keep the creepy crawlies out. The stretchers come equipped with a super warm comforter / duvet / doona (and hot water bottle!) surrounded by canvas to keep the cold out.

Check me out above! Not sure what this is called in your neck of the woods, but my Aussie neighbors call it a swag.

Your room also has a solar light (handy if you can’t last an entire night without a bathroom trip, ahem, me), towels and a couple of benches for your luggage and gear. Luggage is magically transported to the camp, even if you’re lugging around a rather large suitcase …

It’s a pretty awesome feeling sleeping outside, especially under one of the darkest night skies in the world. Seriously, we get like maybe 10 stars in Singapore if we’re lucky. It was pretty surreal to see the Namibian sky absolutely chockers with stars and see where the Milky Way gets its name from.

Can’t live without a bathroom? Me neither!

Never fear, the Tok Tokkie Trails camps and lunch spot have a long drop toilet! The toilet has three closed sides for privacy and one open side to soak up the views while doing your business. Ever so civilized, the toilet even has a sign post that you flick to red when it’s occupied.

Hiking through the Namib desert does get pretty dusty, so I was stoked to have a hot shower after a day’s hiking. Like the toilet, the shower has three closed sides and one open side, and is set away from the camp for privacy. It even comes equipped with essential toiletries (soap, shampoo, conditioner, and moisturizer) and even a small mirror.

The guide will mix the shower water temperature in a bucket to your liking (hotter, hotter … still hotter please). He then strings the bucket up with a shower head out the bottom and a lever to adjust the flow. Just like home (well, kind of)!

The desert cools down quickly after dark. Try to shower before sunset or it will be a tad unpleasant if you’re in the rudie nudie once the hot water stops and the cool air comes in.

Scared of living on huhu grubs and other bush tucker? Forget that!

You’ve probably guessed by now that you won’t be dining on tinned food and scroggin mix at Tok Tokkie Trails. Each night we enjoyed sundowner drinks and snacks at the camp against the background of the beautiful African sunset.

The chef whipped up beautiful three course dinners, consisting of a plated starter, a buffet of meats and vegetables and a plated dessert. Pretty impressive given that we were literally in the middle of nowhere and the chef was operating out of a wooden hut.

The camp had a chilly bin as us kiwis call it, aka a cooler or esky. This was stocked with plenty of drinks including beer, wine, the odd spirit (G&T anyone?) and non-alcoholic drinks.

Dinner was definitely the culinary highlight, but we certainly didn’t go hungry for other meals. The chef made a large breakfast to get us going each day, including hot porridge to warm up. We arrived at the lunch hut on the middle day to a basic but tasty lunch.

There was more than enough food to keep us going, but if you’re a snacker then maybe pack some nuts. Don’t forget to pre-order if you want lunch at the main farm house on the first or last day.

The AF’s Verdict On Tok Tokkie Trails

Do I recommend the Tok Tokkie Trails? Absoloodle! It’s an A+ from me, both for the desert luxury and the captivating landscapes of the NamibRand Nature Reserve.

Exploring on foot allows you to immerse yourself in the desert in a way that you can’t quite manage in a vehicle, and to really escape daily life. Definitely good for the soul, especially this corporate big city soul.

Ready to book? Check out the Tok Tokkie Trails website here.

Read More: Love hiking in desert landscapes? Then don’t miss hiking in the Dana Biosphere Reserve in Jordan!

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