好英语网地球尽头与冷酷废土：探访纳米比亚骷髅海岸
We had been driving for four hours and had yet to see another soul. No people. No cars. Just eerie, lunar nothingness stretching south to the horizon. To the left, desert; to the right, ocean. A packed salt road sewed a tight seam between the two. Under an overcast sky, the three surfaces faded into a single indistinguishable gray-brown smear.
我们已经开了四个小时的车，一个人影也没见着。没人。没车。只有一片向南延伸到地平线的诡异、微亮的空旷。左边是荒漠，右边是大海。一条压实的盐路，是两者之间的一条细密的缝隙。在灰暗的天空下，三者的表面渐渐消失，化为一团难以分辨的灰褐色。
We were traveling along Namibia’s Skeleton Coast, a region often referred to as the end of the Earth.
我们正在纳米比亚的骷髅海岸旅行，这里被很多人称为地球的尽头。
沿着纳米比亚海岸的C34高速公路与周围的沙漠几乎没有区别。
Given the view through the dusty windshield, the title felt apt. The untamed Skeleton Coast begins at Namibia’s northern border with Angola and continues 300 miles south to the former German colonial town of Swakopmund, where strudel-filled bakeries and beer gardens still line the streets — and where, a century ago, thousands of Africans from two ethnic groups, the Herero and the Nama, were killed by German soldiers.
透过覆满灰尘的前挡玻璃往外看，感觉这个称呼是恰当的。未加修饰的骷髅海岸始于北部的纳米比亚-安哥拉边境，南下500公里，直至前德国殖民城镇斯瓦科普蒙德，那里的街边至今仍有许多售卖果馅卷的面包店和啤酒花园——一个世纪前，成千上万的赫雷罗和纳玛族非洲人就是在这里被德国士兵杀死。
The region contains a combination of cultures, landscapes and species unlike anywhere else on Earth, at times evoking a post-apocalyptic wasteland.
这是一个结合多种文化、地貌和物种的地区，在地球上找不到第二处，有时，它让人觉得就像一片末日废土。
My partner and I found ourselves driving the C34 highway along this stretch of remote, treacherous land midway through a three-week road trip across Namibia in early 2021. A year earlier, we had packed up our lives and left our home and jobs in Seattle with plans to travel around the world, only to be abruptly halted by the global shutdown mere weeks into our trip. In what turned out as perhaps one of the more unique pandemic experiences, we ended up locked down in our first destination, Portugal, for seven months.
2021年初，为期三周的纳米比亚全境游进行到一半的时候，我和我的伴侣沿着这片偏远、险恶的土地，行驶在C34高速公路上。一年前，我们开始了全新的生活，我们离开在西雅图的家和工作，准备周游世界，结果我们的旅程开始才几周就被全球大封锁突然截断了，于是我们就在旅行的第一个目的地葡萄牙过了七个月的封锁生活。
As things slowly opened back up in late 2020, we decided we could cautiously begin to revisit our original itinerary. Then came the task of answering a few key questions: Which countries were currently letting in U.S. citizens? (Very few.) Where did we feel safe going based on current Covid-19 case numbers, testing and masking requirements? (Even fewer.) And most importantly, where would we not be a burden on the country’s health care system if we did happen to get sick?
2020年底，一切开始慢慢重新开放，我们决定试试继续原定的行程。然而这样一来我们就需要回答几个关键问题：哪些国家目前允许美国公民入境？（少之又少。）根据目前的新冠病例、检测和口罩要求，去哪些地方会比较安全？（更少了。）尤其重要的是，万一我们得病了，去哪里才不会给那个国家的医疗系统造成负担？
Namibia quickly rose to the top of the list. Among the least densely populated countries in the world, and a place where we could travel entirely independently, it seemed like a good choice. Little did we know how awe-struck we would be by its vast and varied landscapes.
纳米比亚很快就升到了候选名单的第一位。这里是世界上人口密度最低的国家之一，可以允许我们完全独立地旅行，看上去是个不错的选择。然而我们没想到的是，这里的辽阔而多元的地貌会如此震撼人心。
I knew little about the country before we set our sights on it and immediately dug into researching its history and geography. The minute I learned about the Skeleton Coast, reading tales of shipwrecks, stark panoramas and 20th-century diamond rushes, I felt the pull of it. The wildness, the desolation, the inaccessible mystery of it all — it lit up my imagination, and I knew I had to experience and photograph it.
在将目光投向这个国家之前，我对它知之甚少，于是立即深入研究了它的历史和地理。研究骷髅海岸的时候，我读到关于沉船的故事，荒凉的风光和20世纪的钻石开采，我感受到它的魅力。它的野性、荒芜、它的神秘莫测——它启发了我的想象力，我知道我一定要去体验和拍摄一下。
The gates through which we entered Skeleton Coast National Park, near the Ugab River, were guarded by twin skull and crossbones and towering whale ribs. The objects served as a warning: “Abandon hope all ye who enter.”
我们进入乌加布河附近的骷髅海岸国家公园的大门，门口由两个带交叉腿骨的骷髅头和高耸的鲸鱼肋骨把守。这些东西仿佛一个警告：“所有进入者，请放弃一切希望。”
Before crossing into the 6,300-square-mile area of protected coastline, we were obliged to give our names and information — lest we didn’t make it out before nightfall — in exchange for a transit permit and a healthy dose of apprehension. We crossed our fingers and held our breath as we drove through the gates, praying that we wouldn’t blow a tire on the rented, tent-topped Toyota Hilux that had been our home in recent weeks, or get eaten by beach lions in the no man’s land ahead.
在进入1.6万平方公里的受保护海岸线之前。我们必须提供自己的姓名和信息——这是为防万一我们在夜幕降临前无法离开——以换取过境许可证以及适当程度的忧虑。开车通过大门时，我们屏住呼吸，合起双手，祈祷租来的丰田海拉克斯车不会爆胎，也祈祷我们不会在前方的无人地带被海滩上的狮子吃掉。
This arid desert, which dead-ends into violent Atlantic swells, has caused many unfortunate sailors, ships, aircrafts and animals their untimely deaths. Their carcasses — rusting vessels, sun-bleached bones — are now visible reminders of the park’s hostile conditions. It is an inhospitable place where almost nothing grows, and where dangers, from wild rip curls to thick coastal fog, abound.
这片干旱沙漠的尽头延伸至波涛汹涌的大西洋海浪，许多水手、船只、飞机和动物都不幸葬身于此。生锈的船体、晒褪色的骨头——它们的残骸现在提醒着我们，这个公园的自然条件何其恶劣。这是一个无法居住的地方，寸草不生，从汹涌的离岸流到海岸浓雾，危险比比皆是。
Visitors are often drawn to the park’s shipwreck-dotted coastline. Though only a few are still visible, hundreds of vessels have met their fates along this span of shore and were slowly devoured by the elements. Some can only be reached by plane or four-wheel drive.
公园的海岸线上分布着零星的沉船残骸，吸引着游客。虽然只有少数几艘仍然可见，但数百艘船只在这片海岸上走到了尽头，并被大自然慢慢吞噬。有些残骸所在地只能通过飞机或四轮驱动车到达。
To the far north, traces of the Dunedin Star remain. The British Blue Star liner foundered ashore in 1942, stranding its 106 passengers and crew. A plane and a tugboat, including several of its crew members, were also lost during the rescue effort. To the south, the Eduard Bohlen cargo ship ran aground in 1909 and now can be seen from above, a quarter mile inland, as a ghostly ship surrounded by desert.
在遥远的北部，但尼丁之星(Dunedin Star)的痕迹仍然存在。这艘英国蓝星班轮于1942年在岸上搁浅，导致106名乘客和船员被困。一架飞机和一艘拖船以及几名船员也在救援行动中失踪。在南部，爱德华·博伦货船于1909年搁浅，现在可以从内陆距离四分之一的地方向下看到，就像一艘被沙漠包围的幽灵船。
We were able to see the remnants of the South West Seal, a vessel that crashed ashore in 1976, now just a scattering of wood and rusted metal peeking out of the sand, and the Zeila, a fishing trawler stranded in 2008 near Henties Bay, that remains a deteriorating but still largely intact and visible presence, now home to dozens of black cormorants, just offshore.
我们能够看到1976年撞毁在岸上的“西南海豹”(South West Seal)的残骸。它现在只剩一些从沙子里露出来的木头和生锈的金属残片。还有2008年搁浅在亨蒂斯湾附近的拖网渔船“泽拉”(Zeila)，就在近海，它在逐渐被腐蚀，但轮廓可见且基本完好，现在是数十只黑鸬鹚的家园。
The few man-made traces here are all in a state of decay: Road signs are faded and decomposing, an abandoned oil rig is little more than a pile of rust, eaten away by time, sand and sea air. I pulled over every few minutes to capture these details with my camera, stretching what should have been a six-hour journey into one that lasted 11 hours.
这里为数不多的人造痕迹都处于衰败状态：路标褪色腐坏，废弃的石油钻井平台只不过是一堆被时间、沙子和海风侵蚀的锈铁。我每隔几分钟就停下来用相机捕捉这些细节，将原本应该是六小时的旅程延长到了11个小时。
Along the road we passed by other oddities, including the Cape Cross Seal Reserve, home to over 200,000 foul-smelling fur seals, and the Walvis Bay Salt Works, where massive salt pans are colored bright pink by the presence of Dunaliella salina microorganisms. Matching flamingoes stalked prawns in the nearby wetlands. Makeshift tables lined the road north of Swakopmund; resting on them were dozens of light pink halite salt crystals, often accompanied by rusted money boxes, lying in wait for honest passers-by to leave a few bucks in exchange for a treasure.
沿着这条路，我们经过了其他奇景，包括十字角的海豹保护区，这里有超过20万只散发臭味的海豹，还有沃尔维斯湾盐厂，那里的大型盐田因杜氏盐藻微生物的存在而呈现出亮粉色。同样是粉色的火烈鸟在附近的湿地中觅食虾子。斯瓦科普蒙德以北的道路两旁排列着临时桌子；上面放着几十个淡粉色的石盐晶体，通常附近还有一个生锈的钱箱，等待诚实的路人留下几块钱来换取宝贝。
The barren landscape felt otherworldly, raw and powerful. Both exhilarating and terrifying. The coastline and colors slowly changed, the sand reddening, as we headed further south and entered the Namib-Naukluft National Park, home to the world’s oldest desert: the Namib.
贫瘠的土地给人一种异度世界的感觉，原始而强大。既刺激又恐怖。海岸线和颜色在缓慢改变，沙子变红了，我们继续往南走，进入纳米比-诺克卢夫特国家公园，这里是世界上最古老的沙漠——纳米比沙漠的所在地。
Now the young country’s namesake (Namibia gained independence in 1990), the Namib has existed for at least 55 million years, its towering dunes plunging for eons into the churning sea.
纳米比沙漠至少存在了5500万年，与这个年轻的国家同名（纳米比亚于1990年获得独立）。千万年来，它高耸的沙丘沉入翻腾的大海。
The solitude and apartness we were chasing when we sought out this lonely part of the world — escaping from human-borne disease, yes, but also from the slog of our daily lives — awaited us in spades. Namibia made us feel small and insignificant in the best of ways — a perspective that I often crave in a world overwhelmed by instant gratification and never-ending battles for my attention. And in the end, the Skeleton Coast was a strange and beautiful reminder that we humans are powerless against time, and that in a war between man and nature, nature always wins.
当我们选择了世界的这个孤寂之地时，它正以极大的孤独和疏离等待我们。这是我们所追求的——是的，逃离人类传播的疾病，但也逃离我们日常生活的艰辛。纳米比亚以最好的方式让我们感到渺小和微不足道——在一个充斥着即时满足和不断吸引我的注意力的世界中，我经常渴望这种感觉。最后，骷髅海岸是一个奇怪而美丽的提醒，我们人类在时间面前无能为力，在人与自然的战争中，胜利的永远是自然。