Moroccan Mayhem 23rd Nov 09
Date: Monday 23rd November, 2009 | Country: Morocco | No Comments »The ferry took just under a couple of hours from Algeciras to arrive in Tangier, and as we were lucky enough to be one of the first vehicles to leave the ferry, the assumption was we would be one of the first to leave the port…Wrong! As all the vehicles queued up, a number of officials in blue suits were being asked by various drivers and alleged ‘Helpers’ to attend their vehicles first. The system seemed to revolve around who has paid the official the most as they filled in a green fiche with the vehicle details and the maybe checked the contents of the vehicles although some vehicles would have taken hours to look into considering how stuffed they were with random items!
After waiting what seemed a couple of hours we were finally given the magical green paper that had our date of entry and an official stamp (keep this paper with you as along the south of morocco you will be stopped to show this along with other information about where you are heading to).
The waiting game begins!
As soon as we left the port we diced to take a tour of the city in Maggie, this was a bad idea, the traffic on the streets was absolutely manic, people were walking along the sidewalks as well as the main road, taxis weaved in and out with very little indication of what direction they were going, bikes zoomed in and out and we didn’t have a clue where we were. In the lonely planet guidebook it said that the Kasbah (a place for the local leader to live and as a defence when the city was under attack, it usually has no windows. Sometimes, they were built on the top of hill to make them easier to defend) in Tangier was a nice place to start so we drove through some narrow streets, tangier is very hilly so expect many hill starts along the way, not ideal for a land rover with spongy breaks! On many street crossings or roundabouts there are traffic policemen that are surround by absolute chaos and are trying their best to ensure that everyone gets a fair chance of entering and leaving certain exits, they are also very good guides when you need to ask for directions to certain places, and as we do not have a GPS and are relying on some very good Michelin maps they are great for guides but not for the finer details in cities the traffic policemen came in handy.
When we eventually found a parking spot, the second we got out, we were greeted by a few hawkers, guys looking to be our guide and earn a few dirham in the process. What was annoying for me was that one guy kept following us no matter what direction we walked in. We obviously parked in the wrong place and decided to leave the hawkers for dust by driving a little more through the city. As we drove we decided to leave Tangier and move to somewhere a little more chilled and saw that Tétouan on the map wasn’t to far away.
Sheeptastic
We then drove to a place called Chefchaouen which is situated in the Riff mountains, along the way we passed some amazing sights, one in particular a market dedicated to selling sheep, it was absolute chaos with people bidding for their sheep which we later discovered was part of the Islamic festival Eid al-Adha. People were carrying sheep on their backs, in taxis and on motorbikes.
Bread..check…eggs…check…sheep…
The Riff Mountains
The drive through this region was spectacular, the scenery was lovely and the people along the way were so friendly and welcoming. We decided to check out the various roads detailed on our map, and took one that was meant to be scenic but also slightly ‘dangerous’ (Mum close your eyes now!). The road started to become less tarmac and more narrower and rocky, Maggie was dealing with this without many problems, the problem was oncoming traffic in the forms of giant trucks travelling at mind boggling speeds round steep bends and it meant for a slow journey more often than not, letting most of the larger vehicles through rather than play chicken and see who moves off the road first!
Found a great coffee house that the owner also pressed oils from various nuts and served our coffees with some almonds, forget Starbucks!!
It was getting late and I didn’t fancy driving these roads in the dark so we hit a small village called Sidi Bousber and parked outside a small school, I asked a local newsagent if it were ok to camp outside his place and the school and he was cool about it although he didn’t have a clue what I was saying in my pigeon French. A few people introduced themselves to Reka and I which was nice and we also had a number of children curious as to who these strangers were and they watched us setup our tents and stove for some soup. A few hours later the owner of the newsagent and a guy called Rashid came and introduced themselves. Rashid was a great guy, he told us about himself coming from Meknes (a few million pop.) settling in this village of about 1000 people teaching in the local school. He then left and within an hour or so came back with a fully loaded chicken tagine, on near empty stomachs, it was the food of gods, one of the best meals I have eaten in along time.
Getting some real Tagine Action – Cheers Rashid
Haggling Central
Rabat
Having spoken to many people along the way it was clear that to get in Mauritania we would need a visa and to get it we would have to travel to Rabat. There we met Axel a fascinating guy who is a farmer for 7-8 months of the year in the south of France and in winter he spends his time with his wife in Mali. He told us about his journeys into the Saharan wilderness many years ago where he and his wife discovered ancient rock art in the south of Libya. His knowledge was so good he wrote a number of various routes that we could take or has taken that were not on our Michelin maps, what a cool guy. We also met a guy called Vincent who is biking through Africa by himself, I hope to meet up with him for a cold beer at some point in the future.
Axel the adventurer.
The night we stayed in Rabat, we tried to get some food around 9pm but discovered that the city closes around 10pm for all food joints, one busy cafe we walked into looked promising and when I entered they offered to make a couple of sandwiches, as soon as Reka walked into the place full of men I might add, the cook said that they could only make one sandwich as they were closing, this is an uncommon thing to happen as we have both been treated very well in the majority of cafes and restaurants but it still is a male oriented country and these things still occur unfortunately.
Marrakesh, Ouarzazate, Tata, Tan-Tan
Not much to write about Marrakesh, it seemed very touristy and I suppose for many people that visit Morocco, this is one of the major cities that will be on their itinerary for short visit. Also although in general Morocco seems to be very safe from crime, when walking through the main markets in Marrakesh watch out from all angles for speeding motorbikes that whizz in and out of the crowded streets! There are many food stalls that cater for tourists only and tend to be quite expensive, if you look for where the locals eat you can get some great inexpensive food for a £1.
Crispin, Wesley & Fi Travelling the world by sailboat
We met Crispin, Fi and their son Wesley in a camping site in Ouarzazate, these crazy cats have jacked in their life in Cambridge and have bought a 11 metre boat to sail the world for as long as they can! Their son Wes is an amazing guy, obviously his education now is more about the culture and history of each country that they visit along the way, they can be seen on www.sy-revolution.co.uk to follow their own adventures.
Before After
We had a slight accident along a narrow road where the oncoming vehicle didn’t move an inch off the road so we could both pass through, his mirror came off entirely whereas ours only lost the glass, in the next town we went to a local mechanic went to his sisters place and found a face mirror that was a good temporary replacement!
Reka: I was really excited to arrive to Tata, because that’s the name of the town were I was born in Hungary. Well, it seemed like the people in Tata were also excited to see me, especially one of them… We sat down for a BEER (yes, in Morocco, it was a miracle), a local police man, Rashid joined us with his bottle of wine (yes, a true Muslim). First we both thought that we are lucky having bumped into another Rashid who told us about his Bedouin origin and his camels… that’s when the conversation turned into negotiation as to how many camels I would worth to become his fifth wife. But it was a joke! (so I thought and Noel seemed to have fun as well). Rashid then invited us to his family house for dinner, but after being introduced to them, he took us to his own place where he drunk some more wine. I started feeling uneasy when he said that I should stay in Morocco, then he wanted Noel to go with him to town whilst he locks me in the house… We managed to get out of the situation, promising him to catch up the next day. Yes, you guessed it right, we left Tata in the early hours and the last thing I heard from Rashid was a short voice message to call him. As if!
We were off to Tan Tan, heading to the Plage, but the local police had a different idea. We were stopped, because we didn’t stop at the sign (on an empty roundabout). The chief officer sat in his vehicle drinking tea and smoking cigarettes while all the offenders stood outside bargaining with the fine so we could leave. One local tried several times to give the chief some money but it clearly wasn’t enough as he continued to not give eye contact to the local. After 60 minutes of negotiation we got away giving them a pack of cigarettes, instead of the original fine of 1400 DH (£140 euros). In a way it was lucky we were stopped, because we met Rene and Carmel who we already bumped into in a local shop earlier that day. Rene (from Switzerland) has been in the Sahara a few times before, so we followed them and spent the night in the middle of the desert ready for some dune driving the next day…
Ready? Dune driving? I don’t think so…
Noel: This was Reka’s first experience of dune driving and most people that try it for the first time normally get stuck no matter what the size of the dune, she traversed some rocky climbs earlier without any problem and when we reached this dune the scary thing about it is not knowing the drop after you come off the main rise of the sand, once you loose the speed and come off the accelerator the 4×4 is likely to sink in the sand and boy did it sink at a strange angle! It was a great experience getting out all the sand boards and waffle boards to create some stability for the wheels and with the use of Rene & Carmel’s tow rope we (after a few hours) got outski…it was a relief!
The vehicle was as you can imagine, full of lovely sand but that’s part of the fun and the dirt road back to civilisation was like a rally drive, beats driving on tarmac anyday! At the end of all that we then tried to fix a locals car which wouldnt turnover, after using our extensive knowledge of motor mechanics, Rene towed the chap back into the nearest town, it was a fun but exhausting day! A big thanks to Rene and Carmel for spending time with them, maybe we’ll bump into each other in the future.
Laayoune, Boujder, Dhakla and Reka’s introduction into becoming an Islamic woman
Heading to the border of Morocco and Mauritania the police and army controls start to become more often and having to explain where you are from and where you are going to every few km can get a bit tiresome but hey its the only the way to get to where you are going. Anyone considering doing this route might as well bring hundreds of a5 papers which show the details of yourself (passport no, issuing office, expiry date, birthday, address at home, vehicle details, entry into the country, profession etc) otherwise like Reka and I, you get to write out plenty of them along the way. Most gate controls want to see this and your passport, and being friendly goes along way no matter what the breakdown in communication maybe.
Jeno a hungarian UN peacekeeper from Laayoune
Reka met Jeno in a hotel we stayed in and he explained the situation that exists between Morocco and Mauritania near the Saharan occidental, a place rich with oil and thus the problems between both countries with where the borders really lie.
Reka – HUN: koszonom a rengeteg hasznos informaciot es az erdekes torteneteket Jenonek. Szomoru, hogy 5 evet kellett varnia, hogy reszt vehessen a misszioban, amire mar olyan regen vagyott, de hat ez a nagy budos magyar burokracia…
Tropic of Cancer (sign making isn’t a specialist skill here)
Unbelievably, the only other language on the board is Hungarian… hihetetlen, hogy magyar az egyetlen nyelv az angolon kivul!!!
We stopped off in a town called Boujder which was just before the last major town Dhaklar before we crossed the border, we found a nice friendly hotel a km from the beach which was being run by Said (pronounced Saiyeed). It was cheap and clean and he and his friends family that also ran the place were very nice so you go with gut feelings and this was good. Said took us to see the beach which was very peaceful and then asked if we wanted to visit his family for dinner, it was an easy answer and he then took us to his mothers place.
Said Banabyd (second to left) and his lovely family (Reka is in the pink)
Said’s family were so welcoming, their house was made up of 3 or 4 areas for their family to have their own sleeping arrangements, one large kitchen and in the above photos a large sitting area decked out in Moroccan carpets and cushions, it seemed a very social place to sit down to eat and drink and we all exchanged information about our own cultures and family. Reka was invited by Said’s mother to wear a local dress very similar to a sari and that gave Said’s mother and her daughters a nice thing to do with Reka, while us men sat and drank Saharan tea (The process of pouring very hot tea with a lot of sugar into several cups, then pouring it back into the silver poring jug several times before it is finally drunk). After a few hours of drinking tea and eating some lovely dates and peanuts a huge plate of roasted lamb was brought to the table where the elders and us then ate. It was a lot of meat and the more we ate, the more we were asked to eat more (the scene from the meaning of life in the restaurant comes to mind),Said’s mother kept asking Reka to eat more and she was surprised that Reka could not eat more of the lamb, Said, if you read this, I can assure you, we were well fed and it was great to meet your family and be invited like that, you are welcome anytime in London, I’ll make sure my mum overfeeds you too!
Reka – HUN: Hat igen, ez az igazi marokkoi vendegszeretet… eloszor beoltoztettek a helyi lepedo meretu stolaba, ami persze folyamatosan leesett a fejemrol, majd szo szerint lelocsoltak egy liter rozsavizzel, amit meg a masodik hajmosas utan is erzek magamon, majd ugy bezabaltattak baranyhussal, hogy majd szetrepesztettem a stolat 
Es amint latjatok, meg a teve is rohogne, ha latott volna abban a maskaraban…
After checking out Dhakla we drove to the borders and after a few hours in the scorching Saharan sun and entered several offices all writing the same information into their books, we eventually crossed into Mauritania, as a start to the African adventure, this was a pretty good one. Hope you enjoyed reading this and look forward to hearing from you, take care.
