Namibia September 2026: self drive or drive with guide?

Hi everyone, My husband and I are looking to go on our honeymoon to Namibia next year. We will be going in September of 2026 for 12 days. He has traveled once internationally to Spain and I’ve traveled a bit, but never to anywhere in Africa. We were talking to some travel companies and most of the example itineraries spoke about self driving tours, which sounds really cool. We are both a bit nervous to drive ourselves only because we see online that Namibia ranks high for car related incidents, the dirt roads can be somewhat tricky to navigate if unfamiliar and they drive opposite side than where we live (US). Can anyone that has traveled to Namibia/lives there speak to this? One of the companies I’ve spoken to does offer a private guided tour but the accommodations are not as nice as if we did self drive/include less in terms of daily excursions included in that price. Our route would be Windhoek- Sossusvlei - Swakopmund - Damaraland - Etosha. Would also love to hear any and all recommendations for Namibia travel and must sees/where to stay. Our budget is 7-8k USD for the both of us, but we would be willing to adjust that a little bit. Thank you.