Hopefully this should give you an idea of just how twisty it was today. No worries about squaring the tyres off.
As expected Marrakech was madness this evening but we had a great meal. The only trouble is when I’m on a bike I’m not really burning any calories so as a result I find it hard to digest anything. I usually give it to Laughing Boy to finish but I think they beat him this evening as well. On Mike’s eldest daughter’s recommendation we went down busy streets, followed by narrowing streets where various beaten up versions of Honda 90’s threaded their way past us. Followed by dark alley’s and strange gesturing men saying; ‘Le Tobsil, Le Topsil’. Followed by ever narrowing alley’s where we eventually came upon the correct ancient studded door. We banged the knocker and eventually it swung open revealing the most magnificent little restaurant. Well done Sophie, we had a magnificent evening.
Here come the Sun Being awoken before daybreak in Marrakech by the call to prayer followed by cocks crowing was truly atmospheric. Anticipating the sunrise and the heat and dust of the day as the climbing mercury peaks in the mid-afternoon between 2 to 5pm. Although absolutely nothing disturbs my room mate, The Laughing German’s circadian rhythm, nothing. The build-up of heat is usually rapid due to the dry desert air and clear skies. Certainly yesterday as we dropped down from the mountains into mid afternoon Marrakech it was hot, properly hot. 32 degrees hot and we were suddenly sweating in our gear as we trundled through the outskirts at 60 and 80kph. Slowing further and therefore sweating more at the frequent Police checkpoints and roundabouts. Only today is different, we have to leave early, rain is forecast. Something that hasn’t happened here since April. Apparently there’s a word for this; Phuckour-luc.
Great photos supporting your well written posts Sam. that last one of the sunrise is awesome. Could have been from National Geographic.
Ha, I thought of you when I wrote it too. I knew you’d appreciate it For some reason I woke up with a full dose of creative verbosity. You know how it goes, some days you feel like it, some days you don’t.
Hard Rain It’s safe to say it rained today. Then after that it rained some more. We saddled up and took the péage. The rain had found its way through my outer gear long before we reached Casablanca. Only my Goretex boots had done the job they were supposed to, keeping my feet dry. I’ll have to get a Goretex oversuit. This evening we decided against yet another Tagine and went for an Italian which was good. Followed by the obligatory visit to Ricks bar, which was well worth the visit.
How were the roads in the pouring rain? In Mex, when the skies opened, the lack of drainage becomes clear to everyone as the cars aquaplane into the barriers!
Say it again Sam More rain was scheduled for today so we decided the only smart thing to do was dash 300km up the péage. My god it was boring but we managed to get to the hotel in Tangier without taking an external bath. If we’d taken a twisty route and been caught in the rain not only would it have taken many more hours but wet roads after months of summer heat make it more like ice skating. Combine that with drivers devoid of deductive reasoning and you’re in great danger of substantially shortening your life expectancy. I’m quite enjoying it at the moment so there was no requirement. The highlights of the whole ride up were; a cow nonchalantly munching away next to the Armco. A dog attacking a plastic bag in the central reservation and a stray Turkey which I didn’t actually see. Apparently it looked nervous but we don’t know if that was due to traffic or the time of year. Tomorrow the forecast is not good, so there’s a high likelihood of the rain soaking through to the crotch again despite the rain gear. However it’s forecast for a dry spell for about 3 hours in the afternoon, which is when we’re due to land in Tarifa. With any luck, if we’re not held up too long at the port, we can make it back to base in about 3 hours. Oh shit. Bang on cue. Just received a text from the ferry company saying due to bad weather they’re delaying the ferry and we won’t arrive in Tarifa until 18.00. Which means we’ll get soaked. Once again, phuckour-luc.
Well if it’s any consolation, its pissing down here and has been all day. Forecast to continue until tomorrow morning. Gales too. It’s all the same storm that is delaying your ferry.
This is the end I should have written this before but hey, I’ve been busy. Because the of the ferry delay we decided to head up to the port of Tangier Med and try to get on an earlier ferry. Even if it was a case of ‘Pay it again Sam’. The weather wasn’t as bad as expected and as luck would have it, yes there was a ferry, yes we could get on it and no we didn’t have to pay again. I had to translate into French for everyone and the Moroccan guy behind the counter took so long bashing his keyboard for each and every ticket not only was there a massive queue but I severely needed a coffee and a sit down. No matter what country you’re in there’s always men at a port that love to wave or stop you from proceeding. They certainly did this at the relatively new Port of Tangier Med. We had to get off our bikes and stand to one side while they drove a massive x-ray truck slowly past the line of bikes and cars. Never seen that before but it gave me time to count thirty enormous container cranes which lined the dock. It was a truly impressive sight and I watched for a while as they picked up the containers and deftly distributed them and stacked them on the dockside like matchboxes. They looked light as a feather, not as heavy as Jenga pieces, more like matchboxes. They must have a system for stacking them in order ready to be removed without having to remove all the other containers to get to the bottom ones. I wondered what the system was but at some point there’s always containers at the bottom. I dunno. Time has different importance in differing countries and at this particular dockside if one man could do a job, six non uniformed jeans wearing men we’re certainly having a great time loading Artic lorries backwards onto the ferry with millimetres to spare each side. It took a lot of shouting and waving to achieve such precision. Eventually we got onto the boat whereupon it sat there doing nothing for another excruciating hour. This meant we’d hit the band of rain coming in early evening. As it turned out the crossing was pretty steady and we also had the benefit, if you can call it that, of arriving in Al Jazeera. No, no, I mean Algeceras, it was Spain not an Arabic country, not Qatar. Algeceras, Algeceras. I digress as Ronnie Corbett used to say. The benefit was, it was half an hour or so closer than Tarifa. We were loaded almost last but unloaded almost first, except for Lawrence of Aprilia. He’d gone ahead at the port and loaded earlier than the rest of us. He had a plane to catch from Malaga and the delayed ferry meant he was up against it. He thought he’d be first on first off but it didn’t work that way. It often doesn’t on a ferry. As I’m a ‘Last minute Larry’ I’ve come across this before. As a result he was off a vital 20 mins later than the rest of us. In order to try and make up time once we’d cleared Algerwotsit he took off like a scalded cat. To no avail, he missed his flight by …….20 minutes, had to check into an hotel and book another flight the next day. Should have been on a Ducati, we all know they’re faster when needs be. We stopped and togged up with rain gear and headed up the most dangerous motorway in Europe. At least it used to be. I hate it but on a grey wet Saturday evening there wasn’t much traffic and we steadily built the speed up as we reached the safer stretch around Malaga. El Nico suggested that faster bikes crack on, Pedro stayed with him although he could have kept up. When we reached the final road up the mountain it was dry with damp patches, we took it easy. It’s winding and can be slippery at the best of times. It’s good to go away but it was great to be back. Dulcenea was pleased to see me because we all thought we’d have to do an extra night in Tarifa. And that was the last time I’d kick the panniers on this trip. It was a great trip, Nobody broke down, nobody came off and miraculously nobody was knocked off. Nobody ran out of fuel, not even Lawrence of Aprilia, amazing. I love motorbike touring. I think I’ll have to do some more.
The ride over the central Atlas Mountains toward Marakech was phaaantastic! It was one of those roads where you really get to open it up and you can’t believe the grip of the tyres. It’s was a knee out hurl it around job and when you stop you’re all grinning and laughing like hyenas on a stag night. It’s certainly a road that’s worth going back for.
The great thing about writing this nonsense down is occasionally, when it’s pissing with rain in the winter, like it is now, I re-read my drivel and it all comes back. Otherwise it would be lost in the deepest depths of my memory never to surface again. It’s a free tour of drivel which alleviates the drizzle. Eventually I’ll get around to printing them and leave them on my coffee table to bore people with. Eventually.
Yeah, totally get the same, there is a real value to extracting photos and maps etc out of the "digital space" and printing them. I did the GR20 hike across the length of Corsica with my two boys in 2022 and made sure that a xmas present to each of them was a glossy printed book of the trip. It's exactly as you say, open the book and you are instantly transported back to the moment...it's a real uplift when you are in the "real world" grind...
