Episode Information

A sea of slowly shifting sand on the Skeleton coast of south west Africa: Namib. A word thought to mean 'endless expanse'. The dunes of the Namib desert, the oldest desert on earth, extend inland for about 60 miles and stretch for 300 miles along the coastline. Among the deserts of the world Namib is unique. It is an African desert as hot and inhospitable as any other, but in this seemingly barren wasteland, an extraordinary community of creatures has evolved. Almost everything that lives here has developed in some unusual way, adapting to the unique conditions and producing some of the most extraordinary patterns of behaviour in the animal world. No other dunes on earth support life in this way. The problems of survival in so hostile an environment have intrigued scientists for years. David Hughes lived for a year at a research station with scientists studying the Namib. This incredible story is the outcome of his stay.