It’s Tuesday morning now and, at last, we are heading off to Morocco
All up ‘dark and early’ and we make our way down to the ferry and as the sun comes up so we find ourselves waiting to get on the ferry surrounded by French, German and Dutch camper van things
and one very strange truck thing, reminded me of Space 1999 or summit
One more quick shot of the crew and we are called onto the ferry
Bikes are parked up and we make our way upstairs. Forms are filled in, stamps obtained and then there’s just time to sit and watch Tanger from outside the port as we sit there waiting for a berth.
The second you roll off the boat the difference that Morocco is hits you. People and dogs everywhere and a guy waving you off to the right with no obvious route through the melee. Eventually you see a chaotic queue of vehicles ahead and join in
trying to find the shortest lane and every time a vehicle inches ahead it’s back on the bikes and try and claim the new found gap
We were in the queue quite some time, but nothing compared to how long we’d be hanging around sorting the ‘paper work’
Moroccan customs are an experience and a half; eventually we got to the head of the queue and despite not really wanting to have to make use of a ‘helper’, of course, we eventually did – unless you are very strong willed and really know what you are doing the chaos all around you can be quite overwhelming and it’s all too easy to let somebody else ‘take the strain’. Having said that, our ‘helper’ was pretty crap, needing constant reminding that he was supposed to be looking after our documents as he’d disappear into the throng with our passports etc
A right comedy of errors followed with some of us disappearing up some stairs into, I think
, a Police area only to be escorted back out, having to move bikes whilst this was all going on, trying to sort insurance and all the while Crapaud did a sterling job hassling at one of the booths and eventually got us all the stamps and sigs we needed
So, that was it, we were, at last, after two and a half hours sorting paperwork, in Morocco, in Africa no less
We would head to Rabat for the first night, ready to start sorting Mauritanian visas the next day at the Mauritanian embassy there. It was decided we should break into two groups to make negotiating Rabat traffic more easily and meet up again in Rabat so I found myself with a new set of riding partners; Paintman, Milk Tray Man and Crapaud.
The relatively easy traffic of Tanger was easily dealt with and we soon found ourselves on Morocco’s one M-Way heading south (yet more soddin’ M-Way
). Lunch time beckoned and we pulled off at the services to fill the bikes and our tummies
We hit Rabat bang on rush hour and what fun we had, after the monotony of the M-Way this was what I needed to wake me up. Crapaud had a wee run-in with a Merc driver who tried to run him off the road which looked quite scary from behind but this was certainly more like it, more fun ………….. looking for the Embassy in order to get our bearings we failed miserably and with Milk Tray Man’s 1150 starting to get a bit over hot we decided to find a hotel, except, all the ones we tried were full
Coming out of yet another hotel Paintman called across to say it was full, thinking he’d seen another other nearby hotel I sped off towards it, literally just around the corner. Milk Tray Man followed, Paintman and Crapaud didn’t
All my fault and I was pissed off that after not one incident of loosing anybody thus far I’d managed to be such a twat and loose them in Rabat. Any way, the hotel had rooms; we booked rooms for all the others and eventually Paintman and Crapaud found us after several texts and phone calls.
In the mean time I’d been texting our position to bhud and and when they turned up a wee bit later there was not great surprise to see them – only thing being, he hadn’t received the texts and they had found us and the hotel purely by chance. In a place the size of Rabat what was the chance of that
Now, when I previously rode to Morocco with Amanda a couple of years ago I actually didn’t enjoy it as much as I’d hoped I would. I didn’t ‘get it’, My expectations had been raised to such a level from all the reports I’d read on here. There were several things that contrived to make me think of the place as a ‘shit hole’ – a term I used, and immediately regretted, when talking to some of the crew on the way down after a bit too much vin rouge – but one thing I’d found hard to deal with was how ‘in your face’ peeps could be and the, at times, almost constant hassle you can get.
So, when we went down to the bar and a local ‘big wig’ started chatting to me and buying us beers my immediate reaction was to think ‘what’s he after’.
I’d had a good talk to myself before coming on this trip and was determined that I wasn’t gonna let the same things piss me off this time so it was interesting to see the reaction of a couple of English guys that we were sat talking to. I was determined to go with the flow, to suspend any suspicions. One of the English guys, in particular, was actually quite rude to the Moroccan guy, refusing any of his offers of a drink and just generally ignoring him and when, after the Moroccan guy had left and Crapaud added up our bar bill wrong this English guy immediately jumped to the wrong conclusion and assumed we’d been stung by the guy that had just left. Thankfully, this wasn’t the case and having had stick from the English guy for being so trusting I felt smugly vindicated.
Crapaud, Paintman, the two English guys and I then went in search of food, having found the others in an Irish bar we didn’t stay and found a great little ‘kebab’ joint where we had a some good, cheep and cheerful grub
19/01/2010
“Well here I am, about to go to bed, what a bonkers day. Finally crossed into Morocco on the 8.30 ferry and got into Tanger for 10ish. Took two and a half hours to get through customs, shear chaos! The busiest border crossing I’ve yet to experience, running hither and dither sorting paper work. Finally through we split into 2 groups, I’m with Sid, John and Glen. Hit Rabat ‘cos they need to get Mauri visas. Traffic, when we got there, was hilarious, full on Moroccon madness, really good fun. Lots of full hotels, eventually found a place with room, I managed to loose John and Sid who eventually found us by following some lads on scooters. The others also found us and even bumped into 2 English guys we’d met earlier at the services. Stuffed on salad and chips from a kebab shop. Not a bad hotel and the bar is full of hookers and pimps, really rather surreal. Shattered so early night and sorting visas tomorrow. So far I’m enjoying Morocco, loads, have met some really friendly and helpful peeps here – what a great place!”
Andres