Kamanjab is a tiny village in the intersection between the C40 and the C35 roads, south of Opuwo and South East of Etosha, in Namibia. There you’ll find Maria Aebes, a local entrepreneur who owns this small guest house and also a catering business called ‘Anos Kitchen Catering’. The catering business was registered in 2008.

Maria Aebes, a no-nonsense business woman

There are two buildings where people are accommodated, and are located south of the centre of the village, along the C35 road. The best thing to do is to ask for directions in Anos Kitchen Catering, which is close to the village’s supermarket. Or you can ask in front of the gas station, in the Khâisemi Women’s Craft Centre.

Maria’s business is not oriented specifically to tourists at this point. Instead, she accommodates normally Namibian people, but she will be more than happy to accommodate you. We’ve heard of travellers being told literally ‘don’t sleep there, it’s only for black people‘. This is exactly the kind of mentality we want to eradicate. Sure, maybe the conditions in the guesthouse won’t be perfect, but that’s not the point and besides, the more people visit her, the more these conditions will be able to improve.

When we met Maria she was building an extra room and a toilet by the catering business. She also had an extra building behind the guesthouse and she was slowly saving the money to develop it. In September 2009 we received an email from her saying that rooms had been finished and that she was ready for tourists to come.

View Namia and Botswana. Baobab Guides in a larger map