Norsk versjon.
From the most westward point of my route, north of Agadir.
Agadir - Ceuta - Estepona.
| Norsk versjon. From the most westward point of my route, north of Agadir. Agadir - Ceuta - Estepona. |
 |  Cap Ghir
February 28. |
 | I met Salva, a teacher from Spain. He was on the road to South Africa. He had a heavy bike and professional panniers. He filmed my equipment with his video camera. We had a lunch at a café. Later I received mail from him, from Senegal. His email address is: salva2africa@yahoo.es. |
 | A lot of hills! The sign on the picture tells it is far from Casablanca, for me the destination was Essaouria this day. |
 | I had an offer for "la maison" from a man roadside, seeing I was tired. Perhaps it was an offer for spending the night in his house. But it was too early to stop. I got several friendly offers, once a pickup stopped and the driver offered me a seat and the bike back on his lorry. I refused and tried to tell I preferred sporting on my bike. In Morocco cars are seldom empty; drivers take passengers for a substantial fee. Taxis are always filled up. |
 | From one of the many cafés I visited.
The area was sparsely populated and had stony, barren soil. |
 | I had a Cola-bottle for drinking water but
it was empty, it was warm and hilly. I stopped at a house having a Cola-sign. Usually that
would be for a little shop but this was closed. Four young boys looked at me; I pointed
at my bottle and the sign. One of them offered me water, he took the bottle to his house
and had it filled with fresh cold water. I offered some money but he refused. Such groups of friendly, unemployed youths could often be seen standing by the road or sitting at cafés.
I came to lower land having more vegetation; passed a hilltop and biked into Essaouria. After the wild camping it was fine to be in a house, this time at a cheap hotel.
|
 |
 | The hotel in Essaouria had the narrowest WC/shower I have seen. |
 | Visa 28.02 MAD 200,00 GAR CR ESSAOUIRA
NOK 149,68 Here I found a hotel, just MAD 100, and I bought food. The strawberries on the marked had much sand; they had to be rinsed in water.
SMS : 03/01/2006 08:27:57 PM |
| March 1. I did not realize that the road out of town was the same as the one I used when entering so I searched a lot before I found the coastal road to Safi. Under a picture from one of my many stops. |
 |
 | The place is called Kasba Hamidouch. I asked for dinner at a café and pointed at some meatballs. The owner got ground meat at the neighbour, the butcher. Then he made the meatballs, placed them in a gridiron and after the heating served it with tomatoes, onion and bread. With the green mint tea the price became 25 Mad or 20 NOK. |
 |  | From the road to Safi. The farmers worked on the barren fields, they lived in small cottages but some places there could be seen manor houses, |
 | The road was partly damaged by heavy
traffic. Before Safi there is a great mining factory. It was dark when I came to the town
and tried to find a camping. Instead I found a hotel, Assif. 133 km that day.
SMS :03/01/2006 09:10:01 PM
Visa 02.03 MAD 190,00 HOTEL ASSIF SAFI NOK 142,22 |
 | March 2. Safi. I bought a soup at a street café in the modern part of the town. |
 | Here I took an inland road, a bad navigation. I therefore did not come to El Jadida. As seen from the picture the road was acceptable if you consider the traffic volume. The road shoulder was just gravel. |
 | Here the soil was better for agriculture. |
 | ..... |
 | As seen from these village pictures sheds or stalls
are facing the street. In them there are engineering works, cafés, fruit shops, dentists,
pharmacies and so on. Sidi Smail is like this; I arrived there late in the evening. |
 | March 2. It was rather dark when I came to SidiSmail. The place is just a road crossing with houses and sheds on both sides of the road. I asked several people of "place de camping" or "chambre". At last I met an English-speaking manager of a petrol station. He allowed me to sleep on the floor in a room at the station for free. He even provided a mattress. Later I got an email from him. 101 km that day. SMS: 03/02/2006 06:29:46 PM |
I started before dawn from the petrol station, using bicycle light. The weather was fine with a little tailwind. When passing Casablanca southward I had seen a youth hostel in the harbour area but now it was difficult to find.
 | South of Casablanca. I passed Azemmour using a bumpy road R339. In Dar Beouaza I asked on two hotels, they were too expensive. A camping site was closed. |
 | I biked 170 km between Sidi Smail and
Mohammedia. The road before Casablanca was a coastal road having some small towns. Each town often had many mosques. At the time of prayer each of them send out a message using powerful loudspeakers. The combined sound was not pleasant for a western ear. Through Casablanca it was an easy ride in spite of the heavy traffic. I addressed a policeman asking for the road to Mohammedia and got help. After all I had used the road before but the youth hostel was not to be seen. It was dark when I entered Mohammedia. I had to take a hotel, unfortunately not a cheap one. |
 | March 3. Mohammedia. I might have found a less expensive hotel but it was dark and I had been biking 170 km that day. When hauling my panniers up the stairs I lost one pice of my camping mattress. I did not slept well due to music with heavy bass during the night. Visa 04.03 MAD 430,00 SABAH HOTEL NOK 320,60
SMS : 03/04/2006 08:02:14 PM |
 | From a café before Rabat. |
 | Along the coast you could see many buildings for vacating people. Some where for tourist like what could be seen in other Mediterranean towns but some had to be for wealthy Moroccans. A large area with military guards belonged to the king of Morocco. |
 Email: | Rabat has narrow streets but also broad avenues. I visited an internet café. I also found a bookstore almost hidden among carpenter-, fruit- and furniture-shops. There I bought a book in French showing Moroccan dishes. I mailed it home the next day. |
 |
 | March 5. Rabat is the capital of Morocco. |
 | I visited a Berber café and ordered a soup. |
 From the Berber café. |  |
 | Kenitra. March 4. Here I entered "La Chenaie", a camping site and restaurant. Kenitra have over 300000 inhabitans, they are growing vine in the district. At the restaurant they served beer and wine, I had not experienced that elsewhere in Morocco. |
 | Heavy wind and rain came during the night, the outer part of the tent was torn off. I had to mend it during the storm; the last picture is from the finished tent. |  |
 | March 5. Souk el Arbaa.
SMS : 03/05/2006 08:05:30 PM Visa 05.03 MAD 200,00 BMCE BANK/GABBMCE35301002 NOK 149,69 |
 | March 6. I started from the same hotel in Souk el Arbaa as I had used before, the room price was still MAD 50. |
 | Tea break. You often see people standing by the roadside selling vegetables, fruit and other things. In this district there were many stalls for selling pottery. |
 | Soup and bread. |
 |  Stop in Larache. The town had an Internet café. Email: |
 | From Larache.
SMS: 03/06/2006 07:42:27
PM |
 |
 | March 6. I entered a camping site in Asilah and
rented a camping room. The price was 100 MAD.
To the left: Outside the camping room before continuing north. |
 | First I had to reload my purse from a bank ATM. In the
background of the picture a church, the only church I saw in Morocco. Visa 06.03 MAD 200,00 BMCE BANK/GABBMCE35301002 NOK 149,69 |
 A stop at the place I had my first camping in Morocco. To the right: Cafe au lait. |  |
 | The map shows my 4 last nights in Morocco.
March 7. I met a young German couple on their way to South Africa, They had heavy loaded bicycles, even two spare tyres. Their email address: starbiketour@gmx.de; they started in 2005. I did not go to the harbour but tried to reach Sebta, the Moroccan town before the Spanish Ceuta. I did not take the coastal road but an inland route via Tetouan. It was in fact a navigation error and led to a lot of hills. |
 |
The last hill was long and ended in a pass. Here I bought a cheese in palm leaves. The
sellers were mother and daughter, the latter having a too large bra (bought for future
growth?). I passed the outskirts of Tetouan and asked among others a taxi driver if it was a camping site north of the town. They all said that I would find it 10 km from the town. But no camping site could be seen there, instead a pension. I took a room and bought food in nearby shops. |
 The pension. The only serving was tea and coffee. |  |
 |
 | My room was big and I had a separate bathroom. The mattress was damaged and the toilet paper missing but the price was only 100 MAD. SMS: 03/07/2006 06:28:50 PM |
 | March 8.
The last night in Morocco on this place 10 km north of Tetouan. It is called "Pension" but they only serve coffee or tea. The manager was a young boy, he was sorry when I showed him that my bed was damaged. But it was OK for me, the room was big and had a separate bathroom, the price was only 100 MAD. SMS: 03/07/2006 06:28:50 PM |
 | March 9. The weather was fine when I biked north on the flat, excellent road to Sebta. This is a typical Moroccan town with a mixture of broad streets and parks but also narrow streets crowded with people. I passed the border to the Spanish Ceuta without trouble. This part was a well-regulated Spanish town; I changed my last dirham to Euro and bought a ticket for a fast catamaran. The voyage to Algeciras went well, the price was less than on my first passing. |
 | Then the voyage over the Gibraltar-strait. |
 | The road from Algeciras to Sotogrande was over the hill I knew from my southward trip. I had a Wild camping at an abandoned house east of Sotogrande.
SMS : 03/08/2006 06:25:21 PM |
 | March 9. Found a camping site before Sabinillas and asked several real estate brokers. At last I signed a contract for renting a flat with one bedroom. The rent for March 10 - April 10 was 500 euro.
SMS: 03/09/2006 05:30:53 PM |
---------------------------------------
Resuming my Morocco visit:
I had been warned, there should be a lot of criminals and
the traffic was brutal. Nothing of that occurred to me, on the contrary, Moroccan people
were very friendly and helpful. At the same time they were frugal and tried in many ways to
earn some living. Along the roadside you could see people selling pottery, fruit and
whatever else. Some people cut the roadside grass with sickle and gave it to their animals.
Many were unemployed, especially young persons. You could of course find annoying salespersons
and beggars; children could be wicked and thieves. But most people were friendly and would
help foreigners. They tried to give "positive" and thereby incorrect information. The traffic
was not bad and the police was helpful when I wanted road information. You could not avoid
seeing the shepherds who tended their animals from dawn to dusk. They had to avoid that
the animals entered the cultivated fields (owned by rich people?).
The prices were low but the climate not so different from what you have in southern Spain. It is possible that February and March had more wind and rain than normal and the wind along the Atlantic coast can perhaps be stronger than the wind in the Mediterranean region.
