The Namib Desert is crossed by a number of rivers draining from the highlands east of the Great Escarpment to the Atlantic. Apart from the Kunene and Orange, which have their sources in the humid highlands of Angola and Lesotho, all flow seasonally or ephemerally. Between the Kuiseb and Orange Rivers, there are no rivers which reach the coast, partly as a result of the increasing aridity of the highland parts of their catchments, and partly as a result of the existence of the Namib sand sea, between 23 and 25°S. Larger streams such as the Koichab, Tsauchab and Tsondab penetrate up to 50 km into the sand sea, to end in terminal playas (called vleis in SWA/Namibia). Keywords: Namibia, Namib Desert, Kuiseb River, Tsondab River, Quaternary, aeolian deposits, fluvial deposits, palaeoclimate, geomorphology, lacustrine sediments.