Can we please leave now?
Trip Start
Feb 22, 2005
1
23
35
Trip End
Ongoing
Tangier, Morocco
Saturday, October 1, 2005
ferry back to mainland Spain. After missing the first two buses because we were waiting for a chemist to open (DON'T eat the seafood down by the port in Essouria - the funky squid has done damage).So, eventually we got to the bus station at 2pm to find two rickety, dirty, old-school buses. The first one had a TANGIER sign on the windscreen, so we walked around the side to put our bags in the luggage compartment, which unforuntalely didn´t have much room left because old Nomad mate decided to squeeze his two GOATS in
there!!! Luckily for our backpacks, this wasn't our bus, unlucky for us our bus was even more rickety than the first and completely chockers full of people. So after squeezing into the bus and getting a whiff of the lingering BO, the bus finally began to
leave. It was at this point that you could hear the first massive CLUNK, and then every rotation of the wheels after that resulted in more CLUNKING. After a couple of breakdowns and some fiery arguments at the back of the bus, the driver decided to seek proffesionals to fix the bus, a few local teenagers with hammers...
Meanwhile I (Nadja) had been wanting to get of the stupid metal thing on wheels a long time ago. Actually I didnt even want to get on it in the first place. When Jamie told me he thought he heard the rear axle dragging along the road and when he explained to me
what a rear axle was I was about ready to jump out the window. Then there were the repair kids...they came at the bus with a flimsy piece of metal which they were trying to squeeze in between the two back wheels. This was my breaking point and Jamie happily followed me to a taxi. (Im not sure if he did this because he was worried about the bus or if he was worried about what i would do to him if he wanted to stay on the bus). Just a few other things - the ride was going to be a three hour ride through the MOUNTAINS and before the bus broke down the bus driver was constantly getting out and banging on the back wheel to put it back in place.
So there we were, somewhere in the Rif mountains, a couple of Moroccons having a go at each other to my right, Nadja still frowning to my left and a bus that was probably about to blow up. So, we got out and found a taxi. At this point, the smile on Nads
face came back and we jumped into the taxi with the other 5 people.Ummmm...7 people in a taxi is normal in Morocco, 4 in the back and 3 in the front. I dreadingly asked the driver how much it would cost to get to the next town 50 kms away but I was stoked to
find out that it was only 10 dirhams, 1 EURO.
The two guys sitting together in the front seat looked like siamese twins from the back! We had to swap taxis in another town and this time Jamie and I where the Siamese twins in the front. When we arrived the taxi driver said he would take us the further 2kms to the port for the same amount it costed for him to drive us 60kms.(20 dirhims). We walked. We bought our tickets for the 5.30pm ferry back to Tariffa, got our passports stamped, asked if we were in the right depature lounge and waited. We waited a while longer and waited some more... At 9pm we got on the ferry(keep in mind we bought the tickets for 5.30pm). Turns out that the people working in the Morrocan port dont know where the ferry to Tariffa departs from, I dont know if they know what a ferry is. Once on the ferry we asked ´is this ferry going to Tariffa?´ The reply from the captain... ´Sometimes it goes to Tariffa...sometimes it doesnt´. This night the mysterious ferry decided it would not go to Tariffa.
So there we were on a ferry to nowhere, well to a place called Algeciras, which is only 20kms away from Tariffa. We met a nice Portguese couple in the line to board the ferry who were in the same boat as us...quite literally I guess. I mean, they also wanted
to get to Tariffa. While on the boat, I was having a chat with a guy from London who had been stuffed around a fair bit in the port as well. Him and his friend loaded our empty, sick stomachs up with booze....so around midnight, we finally touched down in Algeciras. We were the last to stumble of the boat, and Nads was...WELL AND TRUELY PISSED. We ended up sharing a taxi with our new Portugese friends back to Tariffa where we decided that it was too late to pay 30 Euros for accomodation when we were just going to leave at 6
in the morning for Portugal.
I asked where we could get some food because we hadnt eaten for ages. There were no more places open to get food so we settled for beer instead. We met a few Germans and I amused them with my Allemanish (German) accent.We also met a Spanish guy who was sittning in form of the bar sellling some jewelery. Due to my naivity I didn't realise he was selling the jewelery and rudely asked him if he thought I could get some for free! opps. Well, he helped us out a lot...called his friend on his mobile to ask for the best way to get to Seville (which Jamie thought he would forget te next day!), and then invited us to stay with him on the beach in his tent. His tent was a 2-4Km walk and we were too lazy. BUT then, more generosity... the german dude had seretly asked all his German dude friends if we could stay in their apartment for the night. When we got their their filled our tummies with more alcohol and even cooked us dinner.
Turns out that the whole night was a waste because one of us (and I don't even have to say who because you all know) had the worst hangover in his life and needed to stay in a hotel till the next day...
Anyways, a HUGE thankyou to all the people who helped us out that night.
