Fish River Canyon
The Fish River Canyon ( Afrikaans: Visrivier Canyon or Visrivier Afgronde, English Fish River Canyon ) in the | Ai- | Ais Richtersveld Transfrontier Park [ Khi 1] is located in southern Namibia and is about 160 km long, up to 27 km wide and up to 550 meters depth from the Fish River washed out riverbed of the largest canyon in Africa and applies only to the Grand Canyon the second largest canyon in the world. According to the Namibian Weather Bureau MeteoNA here record temperatures exceeding 50 ° C were measured.
The Fish River, with a length of 650 km the longest river in Namibia. It lies in the eastern Naukluft, but leads only to a very strong rain times below its congestion at Hardap dam water. The Fish River Canyon flows through essentially the Huns Mountains and starts near Seeheim in the north and the south ends at Ai- Ais, while the river only a few kilometers later flows into the Orange River, the border river to the Republic of South Africa. Due to the reduced water flow below the Hardap Dam not only the future leaching of the riverbed is minimized, but it will also change the vegetation along the river over time. Nevertheless, can be found even in times of low rainfall individual ponds that are likely fed by groundwater throughout the year in the river bed. The water points be used by several species of antelope and leopard.
The canyon is not least declared a nature reserve and partly belongs to the inter-state | Ai- | Ais Richtersveld Transfrontier Park and partly to the private nature reserves Canyon Nature Park (45 km ²) and Vogelstrausskluft (26 km ²). The two main camps of the park are Hobas near the main lookout point with the information center at the north end and | Ai- | Ais in the river - valley with its hot springs in the south.
For tourists, multi-day guided hikes are offered through the canyon from May to August; however, a descent off the access gravel road without a guide is extremely dangerous and therefore prohibited.