The smaller of Namibia’s only two permanent natural lakes, Lake Otjikoto, is a tourist attraction situated only 20 km north-west of Tsumeb and 100 m next to the B1 national road. The actual attraction is hidden from most visitors in an underwater museum, 55 m below the surface.
After having dived down to 157 m in the Dragon Breath Cave a few days earlier, a team of very experienced cave divers from Germany descended into Lake Otjikoto on 23 June 2024 to enjoy the silence and historic artefacts in this sinkhole measuring 100 x 150 m. At the bottom of the lake, allegedly eight field canons, two 3,7cm automatic machine guns, two 3,7cm revolver guns, four 7cm mountain guns and three 6cm mountain guns, as well as wooden boxes with ammunition have been lying in the water for more than a hundred years. In 1915, the retreating German army, the Schutztruppe, dumped weaponry and ammunition into the lake to prevent them from falling into the hands of the South African forces. Some of the weapons were salvaged a year later, but most of the items remained in the darkness in the shallow part of the lake. In 1970, divers discovered a Krupp ammunition wagon 41m below the surface and brought it up again. The wagon was restored and is on display at the Owela Museum in Windhoek. In 1977 and 1983, two more ammunition wagons were salvaged, as well as canons and machine guns which are now on display at the Tsumeb Museum. One British field gun, one British ammunition wagon, two German 3,7 cm automatic machine guns, two German 8cm light field guns and one German ammunition wagon are also on display in the Tsumeb Museum.
According to Namibians Chris Steekamp and Louw Greef who dived with the German group in Lake Oshikoto, they believe a lot of canons and wooden ammunition boxes are covered in mud. Lake Otjikoto is like an upside-down mushroom. It widens and deepens at the bottom and is said to be 100 m deep, but it is suspected that narrow caves go deeper and nobody knows if chambers open up further down.
A day earlier the group had dived at Lake Guinas, Namibia’s biggest permanent natural lake, and here too the German cave divers and their two Namibian companions took to the water, descending down to 113 m although the lake is much deeper. The lake, situated on private land, is 59 m wide and 120 m long and home to one of the rarest fish species in Namibia, the Otjikoto Tilapia (Tilapia guinasana). This species has been introduced to Lake Otjikoto, which is 21 km east of Lake Guinas. Tilapia guinasana is critically endangered and an endemic species. It is believed that Lake Otjikoto and Lake Guinas are connected via an underground cave system but so far this has not been confirmed.
“The colours of the unique fish in the lake are fascinating and the silver shine on the rocks as you go down is amazing”, Stefan Pape of the German diving team said. At the bottom the lake mushrooms out and it is exciting for the divers to explore the caves and items (such as bones) on the bottom.
Another highlight for the German cave divers was exploring the little-known Obab Cave on a farm on the southern border of Etosha National Park. Nobody has ever dived in and explored the cave before, even though the water is only five meters deep. Only Tom Baier and Stefan Pape went diving and explored the cave, moving 80 m into the cave. They could not reach the end because it was too difficult to get through narrow holes with the equipment they had. The rest of the team, including the two Namibians Greef and Steenkamp, were their support team. To this day, little is known about the size of the Obab Cave even though humans have known about its existence for more than one hundred years.
Text by Dirk Heinrich and photos by Stefan Pape, Oliver Schöll and Dirk Heinrich