On to Morocco
Trip Start
Dec 26, 2011
1
18
47
Trip End
Apr 17, 2012
Kenitra, Gharb-Chrarda-Beni Hssen, Morocco
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Well, here we are in north Africa! It seems much mor like the middle east however, than the Africa we experienced eight years ago in Kenya.
We weren't sure that we would cross over today, but we just went step by step, and here we are. The first step was driving in to Algecires from Tarifa to find he agency that sells tickets. I had printed some info about this agency being much cheaper than the ferry company office. It was supposed to be just near the Carrefour. The Carrefour was easy enough to find after a lovely and dramatic drive over a steep and winding coast from Tarifa, but it took a few minutes to find the office of Viajes Normandie in a commercial plot around back of the Carrefour. It was not much more than a hole in the wall office, and the youngish guy did not speak much English, but he was very efficient, knew exactly what we wanted, and printed off the tickets in about 15 minutes. It cost 180 Euro round trip from Algecires to Ceuta. It would likely have been 30 Euro more to buy direct from the ferry company. Not only did we get cheaper tickets, but he handed us a bottle of fizzy wine and a little packaged cake as we completed our business!
So, open tickets in hand, and then loading up at the Carrefour, we headed for the ferry port. All went quite well there, though there was certainly not total clarity as to which of the labyrinthine roads within the port complex. We had only about a 40 minute wait before being directed onto the smallish fast ferry. As is always the case with European ferries, the car deck crew seemed rather disorganized, as if this was the first ferry they have ever managed. One guy would direct us to park here, then another guy would direct us further on. As we crept into a narrow spot alongside a semi, he was still maneuvering back and forth having to avoid us carefully. BC Ferries workers seem like brain surgeons alongside these guys!
The crossing was interesting enough as we exited the harbour past the gret rock of Gibraltar, and then out to the straits to Africa. We were joined on the crossing by Albert from the Netherlands. I had met him at the Carrefour parking lot as he had a great 35 year old little campervan based on a Ford Transit van. Turns out he is a pretty expert chess player and has traveled to interesting tournaments around the western world. His business is making and distributing chess clocks… the fancy gizmos that time the player’s turns in different types of chess tourneys.
We disembarked in Ceuta, which is a Spanish city in North Africa, somewhat the same way that Gibraltar is a British enclave at the south of Spain. Immediately it felt more third world, with entrepreneurs guarding your parking spots, crazier driving and rougher feeling streets. It did have a bit of a waterfront decadence feel to it as well, with 1950s era hotels and apartment complexes along the harbour.
We decided to move on through the border. This was the same kind of hurly-burly, every man for himself kind of scene as we had experiences in Turkey and Syria, with men jostling at the booths, and cars parked helter-skelter as their drivers got their various stamps and papers.
Despite our guide book saying it was not necessary to pay and "agent", I decided to take on Mohammed’s assistance for a 5 Euro tip. He was one of dozens of shysters waiting at the border to offer his services. And he did well enough, steering me to the four different booths I had to go to, showing me which papers went to which authority. It was worth the 5 Euro.
The next step was to find a bank machine. We circled through the Morocco side city a bit before finding a machine, but eventually, no problem.
With money in our pocket, food in our pantry, and gas in our tank, we were ready to strike out, though we were mildly concerned about finsding a campground as it was approaching 5 pm. We knew of one from a map we were given, south of Tangier at Asilah. The first leg of the one hour drive was up and over some spectacular hills with panoramic views out over the Straits of Gibraltar. If we knew the country better we would have stopped and camped at one of the viewpoints, but we are still not familiar enough with Morocco to chance that yet.
The second leg of the drive was on a huge sweeping motorway with almost no traffic, bypassing Tangier and everything else until we reached Asilah.
At Asilah we pulled off the motorway, paid the toll of almost 4 Euro (no wonder the motorway was empty), and were directed toward town by the toll attendant. It is a delightful surprise to be using our French again, as limited as it is.
Entering the town, and approaching the waterfront, we did spot what appeared to be a defunct campground. A few hundred metres along we made a U-turn to check it out and discovered ourselves right at a beautiful beachfront parking lot with a dozen other campers, and an “attendant” directing us in. So, in we went, paid the “official government attendant” 30 DH (about 2 Euro), and here we are with a beautiful waterfront sunset view, guarded by Mohammed, drinking the wine from the ticket agent, watching the train to Marrakesh, and generally getting into the Morocco groove! Who knows when we will see electricity at a campground again, let alone wifi to send a posting, but I guess you will know the answer as you read this! Speaking of which I am down to 35% power left, so, beddy bye for me and my MacBook.
February 4, 2012 Kenitra
We awoke to the glorious view of the Atlantic beach just in front of our parking lot campground. After a relaxing breakfast, we set off down the oceanfront promenade toward the ramparts of the old town of Asilah which we could see from the campground. The rirst part of the ride was rather dull, with rundown or half completed derelict buildings and the odd beachside café closed for the season. Once we entered the gste for the old town, however, it was a delightful experience. It was still earlyish, around 9 am, and the small narrow streets were almost deserted, as if we had the whole little town to ourselves. Part of the ride was along a narrow waterfront alley and part of it was around residences and small shops. The town is noted for its white walls, blue or green doorways, and funky handpainted murals here and there, left by passing artists. Really quite a nice intor to Morocco.
We then headed off south in the direction of Rebat, choosing the N1secondary route over the huge expressway. It was a very interesting drive, and really gave us a good snapshot of rural Morocco. It is still a very primitive country, very similar to our experiences in rural Kenya, Syria and Jordan. The common dress of the women is bright colours, often a big colourful straw hat. The men are often dressed in a precise likeness of ObiWan Kenobe of StarWarss fame, with a caften type of cloak, and a pointed hood with a kind of collar. This is unique to Morocco, as we had not seen sanything similar in the middle east. Other men would be wearing sweaters, jackets and jeans.
What we particularly noted was that donkey carts and horse carts seemed to be much more abundant than anywhere we have been before. We have seen them frequently in Kyrgastan, Kenya and the Middle East, but they seemed much more abundant on the drive today, with 2 or 3 in view at any given time on the highway and off in the fields, and the dusty little towns were quite swarming with them.
The drive was green and picturesque for the first part with gently rolling hills and lush fields, but the second part of the drive was long and straight and somewhat boring.
By about 3 pm we were entering Kenrita with the intention of passing right through to the waterfront to find a campground. A mechanical problem developed with the van that we felt needed to be attended to as it was affecting the charging system. Fortunatelt we encountered a VW Golf with Netherland plates on it, so I approached the driver. It turned out he spoke English and French but was native Arabic, but even more fortunately, his cousin in the passenger seat happened to be a aprtner in a mechanical garage that specialized in electrical issues, and was just 2 blocks away. Rasheesh and his cousin then accompanied us to the shop, summoned the uncle by phone who was the diagnostician, and hung around for 2 hours while the alternator got taken out, rebuilt and stuck back in. It is a removal job I have done myself at home, but the rebuilding part we would never undertake at home… we would just buy a rebuilt alternator and whack it in. Amazing the ingenuity to rebuild it on the spot, but also a truly delightful experience to interact with the dozens of workers at the shop while the work was being done, including thirteen year old Younes, the owner’s son who I spent time chatting with in his little bit of French with my little bit of French. Also quite wondrous was the assistance of Rasheesh who stuck around to help translate the whole business, and then escorted us to the campground 2 kms away.
We are now holed up at the Campground. It was well into dusk by the time we arrived here, so we really are not familiar with where we are, but it has electricity and washrooms, so what more could we need?
We’ll check out where we are in the morning.
Comments
Pat your camper meal looks yummy! You certainly do luck out with help Bill. The beach camp site looks sooo inviting, do people walk the beaches the way we do here?