Sossusvlei at dawn: the sun by month, a dune's shadow and a balloon for the second morning

Dawn at Sossusvlei is not an hour but a month: the sun rises at about six in December and about 7.45 in July, and the gate at Sesriem opens with it. What you come for moves with it too — a low sun and long dune shadows. When the July sun is just rising, the December one is already twenty degrees above the horizon, so the rule of 'photographs by nine' holds in June and July, while in December nine is when the morning has already been spent.

GuideSossusvlei as a whole — the camp, the gate, when to go?Sossusvlei →

The sun by month

Local time; Namibia is on UTC+2 all year. Rounded to five minutes. At 20 degrees a shadow is almost three times as long as the dune casting it.

Why the shadow matters

From the ground a dune is read by its shadow: the lit side and the dark side of the ridge give it shape, and without a shadow it is a red slope with no depth. Dune 45, eighty metres high, throws a shadow of about 220 metres at twenty degrees. In December at nine the sun is already at 37 degrees and the shadow is half as long, and at noon the sun is almost overhead and the same dune's shadow shrinks to three metres. In July even noon does not erase the shape: the sun is at 42 degrees and the shadow still runs to some ninety metres.

The decision that follows: the window from sunrise to twenty degrees lasts an hour and a half to an hour and three-quarters in every month, but not at the same time — in December it closes at about 7.40, in July at about 9.30. Miss the dawn in December and you miss all of it, with nothing after, because the sun climbs towards overhead. In July you can sleep longer, and even a missed morning leaves shadows longer than the dune until noon.

The hour before the gate does not cost a lodge

The inner gate opens an hour before the outer one for every guest inside the fence — a tent at the Sesriem campsite as well as Sossus Dune Lodge. Its value changes with the month: in December it means leaving at about five and a dune in half-light, in July leaving at about 6.45 and the same result with no alarm at half past four. The dearer bed inside the fence buys a bed and dinner; the campsite buys the dawn too.

Namib Sky has been flying balloons over the dunes since 1991: the base is twenty kilometres south of Sesriem on the C27, you take off at dawn, the flight lasts about an hour, and breakfast in the desert follows. It costs €572 a head, reserve fees included. The balloon takes the same sunrise as Dune 45 and Deadvlei, so it can neither replace them nor share their morning: the first morning goes to the dunes, the second to the balloon. With two nights and one luxury in the plan, the balloon buys what no bed can — the dunes from above, as rows of parallel ridges — while the hour's start at the gate comes with the campsite too.

When to goWhich months have the best light and the least heat:The best time to visit Sossusvlei →

2 daysA full day at Sossusvlei, laid out hour by hour:Sossusvlei in 2 days →