Solitaire is hardly a place at all, which is exactly why riders remember it. A petrol station, a general store, a small campsite, a scatter of rusted car wrecks half buried in sand and a bakery whose apple pie is spoken of from Windhoek to Walvis Bay: that is the whole settlement, planted on the gravel plains where the Namib meets the foot of the escarpment. Everything around it is space, pale grass, red dunes in the west and the long blue line of the mountains in the east.
The fuel is the reason many people turn off the road. This is one of the few reliable pumps in a very large stretch of country, with Sesriem and the Sossusvlei dunes to the south-west and the Kuiseb canyon to the north, and the sensible habit is to top up every time you pass. Fill the tank and any spare can, buy water, and then, because you are a human being, eat a slice of the pie. The bakery was started by a man known as Moose, who has become something of a local legend among overlanders.
The riding here is gravel, and the roads around Solitaire are graded but unsurfaced. The C14 and C19 run through open plains where the surface can be hard and fast or soft and corrugated, depending on grading and recent traffic. Wind is constant, and sand drifts across the track, so keep your speed measured and your eyes well ahead. Afternoon heat can be severe, so start early and plan your stops. Night riding is not wise, because oryx, springbok and the occasional zebra wander near the road.
The landscape is old and strange. The Namib is thought to be the oldest desert in the world, and the mountains to the east are part of the Great Escarpment that runs along the coast of southern Africa. From here the Spreetshoogte Pass climbs onto the highlands, one of the steepest and most dramatic roads in Namibia, and riders who know the country treat Solitaire as the place to prepare for it.
Water, shade and a chance to check tyre pressures and luggage straps are what Solitaire offers, and they are worth more than they sound. Carry cash, because card machines are not always working, and be ready for dust, which finds its way into everything. Evenings here are beautiful, with the sunset turning the mountains red and the stars coming out in a sky of quite extraordinary depth.