Over the past two weeks we have travelled through the south of Spain. We visited John and Gill, a danish/english couple we met near Laayoune. They have a exotic fruit farm between Algeciras and Ronda. It was an amazing experience. In 30 years John and Gill have built a small paradise inside a national park. They grow among other things 14 varieties of avocado’s, lemon cumquats, macadamia nuts and so on… The buildings that they converted into their home(s) originally belonged charcoal burners; The local government tried to get rid of all inhabitants when they started the nature reserve, but John and Gill resisted. And they are still there. Living off the grid, and off the fruits of their land. We had the feeling we found the garden of Eden. They are looking for someone to come over to Spain and live in one of their houses, and share the work and the fruits of their labour. If this idea appeals to you, send us a mail and we can pass your details on to them.

Next stop was with Nol and Maruska who live outside Alora. We were invited there on our way out, and had to promise another visit on our way back. We gladly accepted and enjoyed their hospitality for another couple of days.

Since about a week we’re back at Sil and Jo’s house on the beach in Sagunto, just north of Valencia. We are cleaning the car, doing the laundry, and generally preparing to go back home. The weather is still crap by the way. So not a lot of sunbathing going on here. Our friends and families in Holland seem to be suffering from heatstrokes, as they have had the warmest Easter weekend of the last century…

Over the last 2 months in Morocco we have only had reasonable weather around Zagora. Even when we were camping in the sand dunes of Erg Chebbi near Merzouga we had some rain. All this time we have been thinking that it would improve as we approached spring. Now it seems only to be getting worse. We drive most of the day in the clouds and under rain showers. Not able to enjoy the landscapes a lot. We arrive on a beautiful camping in cherry orchard between Azrou and Ifrane. All the fruit trees are flowering, but that is about the only sign of sping. We have to sleep inside the Syncro, as it is freezing cold here, even inside the car I wake up at night because of the cold. The next morning at 7 o’clock I wade through ankle deep mud on the camping and walk the dog (who has spent the night outside in the freezing rain) in a snow storm. It’s getting hard to cope with this shit.

We leave early, and carry on towards Chefchouen. We hope for some sun, but it doesn’t happen. The Rif mountains are very pretty. We would love to hang around here for a couple of days, but th eweather doesn’t permit it.

So we decide to carry on. Instead of visiting Chefchouen, we carry on to Tanger. Because we were on th eroad early we make it to Tanger by 16:00. On the road to the port, we stop at a traffic light. A guy comes up to the car, carrying a child and an astma-medication-vaporiser. He says he’s unemployed and asks for some money to by medicine for his son. I say that I am really sorry, but that I cannot help him. He looks at me and says: “Your sorry?” I say “I am sorry that I cannot help you.” He replies “You are not sorry, you don’t want to help me because you’re a racist” I am amazed, and I tell him that I think he’s a racist, after all he’s the one approaching foreigners for money… The light turns green and I leave the poor basterd behind. I have to add that I have given quite a lot of money to poor people, not just on this trip, but I like to be able to decide for myself who I give to, and that’s generally not the people asking.

We manage to get on the 17:00 ferry to Tarifa. The formalities at the customs are hassle free but chaotic, we get through without problems though. We arrive in Tarifa at sunset after a 35 minute crossing, unaware that daylight saving time has begun the night before. So we live happily, one hour behind the rest of the continent, for a couple of days.

All our friends in Zagora were pleasantly surprised to see us again. We met Alan and Tess and exchanged photo’s and adresses with them. After a couple of days we say goodbye to everybody again and leave Zagora via the piste to Agdz via the Palmeraie.

It is very difficult to follow the piste, at every village it splits into several tracks which all join up again. It is a bit of a hit and miss game, but the scenery is very pretty. We pick up a hitchhiker and have a hard time refusing to come to his home for a meal. But we have just ahd a picknick and intend to arrive in Agdz that evening…

The campsite in Agdz “Jardin de Palmeraie” is very nice. There are lots of crumbling old kashbah’s around here. We take a long walk with Arka. Unfortunately its raining, so after one night we carry on towards Marrakech.

The road through the High Atlas is really beautiful. There is still snow on the peaks, but we see blue skies now and again, and at other moments it’s almost snowing… The descend towards Marrakech is extraordinary. We see a lot of rallye cars returning after the Rallye des Gazelles. This rallye is only open for female drivers, and sure enough we are stuck behind some of them descending at 30 km/h…

We arrive in Marrakech, staying at the Relais de Marrakech camping, which is very nice and comfortable. Just as well because one night here costs the same as a full week in Zagora…

We leave the next day, because of climatological reasons. Marrakech is a very nice city, but having seen it once is enough for us. We intend to drive through the Rif mountains and slowly make our way back to Tanger from where we’ll take the ferry to Spain some time next week.

After saying goodbye to Tristan and Krizzy we drove to the Todra Gorge. The plan was to drive up the gorge and than descend into the Dades gorge, via a piste. This piste would take us acros a mountain pass at 2400 meters.
By the time we reached the plateau at the end of the Todra gorge it was around 16:00 a little late to start an offroad adventure in the mountains. The weather was once again playing tricks on us too. We saw fresh snow on the mountains ahead of us. After about 10 kilometers up the piste the decision wether or not to carry on was made easy for us. Huge piles of rock and some Caterpillar’s blocked our passage. We turned around and spent the night at a campsite. As we were still at well over 1500 meters altitude the night was cold. The next day we drove down the Todra gorge and continued down the Dades valley. We know this area from our previous trip in 2007. Unfortunately the roses are not flowering yet.

It’s funny but in the Todra gorge the campsites are lined up from the bottom right up to the top of the gorge, but in the Dades Valley there are hardly any at all. Since the weather is still not very good, we appreciate the extra comfort of a hot shower in the morning. Partly because of this we push on towards Ouarzazate.

We arrive on the municipal campsite, and once more immerse ourselves in the mobilhomes…

After arriving in Merzouga we have somehow lost our “guide” Alan and his wife. Because of this we have not had the opportunity to exchange our photos. At the same time we wonder what has happened to them, and are sorry not to have been able to say good bye to them or even exchange addresses. We decide to drive back to Zagora and see if they have returned safely to the campsite Oasis Palmier.

Another reason for returning to Zagora is that we had planned to drive from Zagora to Agdz through the Palmeraie. This plan has been abandoned in favor of driving the Zagora - Merzouga piste. So we get a second chance at that too.

Around 9:30 on wednesday we left Zagora and took the piste to Merzouga. Our team consisted of a Jeep Cherokee a LandRover Defender 90 and our Syncro. It seemed obvious to Alan and (to a lesser extend) Tristan that we would probably need to be towed through most of the difficult sections, but we decided there’s only one way to find out. We’re also getting a little bit fed up with all the stories from “real 4×4” owners that have heard (from other sceptics) that the Syncro is not all that good off the road. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, so there we go. In addition to this we’re not too worried if Tristan has to rescue us, as we spent a whole afternoon digging him and his Cherokee out of a saltlake north of Laayoune, a few weeks ago…hahaha

The first section of the 240 kilometer piste, just outside of Zagora is actually not so bad, a bit rocky at times but not nearly as rough as the Foum Zguid - Zagora piste. The landscapes are very pretty, and more varied. We leave the piste just before Remlia and drive to the Oasis el Mharech, where we enjoy our dinner, and get a hands on course in puncture repair. Both Alan and Tristan have suffered a puncture the first day.

The next day is going to be the most difficult, we have to cross the Oued Rheris. This dry riverbed is known for its feshfesh (the finest of powdery dusts available in the desert) and sand dunes on both ends of the riverbed. Al together its about 3 to 5 kilometers of severe offpiste driving, normally reserved only for proper 4×4’s like landrovers and -cruisers. On day one I got stuck once trying to drive up a sand dune, to catch a nice view, so we feared the worst. For the coming dunes… Very exiting!

Somehow, miraculously, we made it. I still find it hard to believe. Even at the moments where I could have sworn that I’d never make it across a section of some deep soft sand, it all worked. Deflated tires to 1,5 bar, stay in second gear and keep pushing untill you reach the hard surface again.
OK I needed one other short pull from Tristan after I stalled the engine once and couldn’t get going after that, but that was all. The scenery round this part of the desert is stunning. The best I have seen sofar. We stopped for lunch at the lost city. Even here it’s very green and loads of flowers around. We cross another salt lake. Than were all of a sudden on black rock, and after that you drive through a riverbed with round pebbles. The dunes are somehow the most fantastic sight. The texture and the ever changing colors are undiscribeable. The color of the sand dunes at Erg Chebbi is fantastic, more reddish than the paler yellow of Chegaga. However the region of Iriki and Chegaga is much more desolate. Erg Chebbi is pretty much run over by tourists, which spoils the experience a little in my view.

If you like to see satellite images of the area or download our GPS tracks of the Foum Zguid - Zagora or Zagora Merzouga pistes, please have a look at the Google Earth page of this site.

When we got to Merzouga and Rissani, we were asked several times where we had come from and we enjoyed the surprised faces of the Moroccans when we told them we came from Zagora.
Question: “You mean to say, you came from Zagora over the piste, in that vehicle???”
Answer: “Yes, we did!!!”

What was supposed to be a short break in Zagora turned out to be a two week holiday. We found L’Oasis Palmier in Amzrou to be the best camping in Morocco so far and we enjoyed the hospitality of Yussef and Brahim, and also Pixa and his team of the campsite so much we just couldn’t bring ourselves to leave.The weather is great, around 35 degrees in the afternoon. Zagora has Souq (market) on wednesdays and sundays. We talked to Alan, a British LandRover 90 owner and our ne-ighbor on the campsite. He had bought an extra solarpanel on the Souq for a good price. I went to have a look there and found a second hand 65 Watt panel for 1400 Dirhams. An interesting observation is that the seller of the solar stuff, didn’t speak any French. In these cases you are immediately surrounded by other Morcoocans that will do the translation from Berber to French. They will also drive up the price, and demand a portion of the profit from the seller after the deal. I find this annoying, being Dutch I hate paying too much, so I am trying to make a habit of refusing any help from outsiders in my purchases. I dont want to be inpolite, but just ask if the helpfull 3rd person that keeps popping up everywhere is the seller, of if the berber guy I was talking to before is actually the one i’m dealing with. Even though I don’t speak any berber, I manage to make myself understood, with hands and feet and calculators and so on. No need for touts driving up the prices, and strangling both me and the shopowner. Getting rid of them without getting angry is the art. I am also not a very hard bargainer, I just like to knock a little of the asking price. That way both me and the seller have a nice deal.

Back on the campsite I got an almost new solar regulator batterycharger from Alan and I installed it on the Syncro. The first thing I found out was that my 2nd battery was not taking any charge anymore, even after 12 hours on the 220 volt battery charger it barely reached 12 volts. So the next investment was a new auxilary battery. After some driving around Zagora enquiring about prices I got a good offer for a reinforced 100 Ah battery. I bought it on condition that it would fit the limited space under the drivers seat. It turned out that this was not as straight forward as the seller had hoped and his mechanic spent about an hour raising the chair to make room for the slightly larger battery. In the end Moroccan inginuity prevaled and we were all set up for 1200 DH.

Another effect of staying a little longer in one place is that we got a closer look at the way things work here. Brahim and Youssef have given us an look inside there family and they way they live, during several meals we got invited too. They have also been a great source of information for all things Moroccan. Good places for shopping and also what a decent price is for many everyday goods, because sometimes the Moroccan bargaining system can get a little bit of a drag and after two months you end up with the constant impression of being ripped off. I have refused to pay 8 dirhams for a kilo of onions because I had the feeling that was very expesive. Tomatos cost 4 DH per kilo for instance. On our first visit to Morocco in 2007 I got to the point where I preferred to walk for half an hour to get to Jeema el Fnaa square in Marrakech with a heavy backpack rather than paying an extra 10 DH on top of what I thought was a fair price. LOL But honestly we normally have no idea how things really work in a new country untill you spent a certain amount of time there. And Morocco is not one of the most transparant places in the world, as far as I know it…

The Palmeraies of Zagora and Amzrou are surrounding the Oasis Palmier campsite. We go there a lot walking with Arka. It’s wonderful seeing all the people working in their gardens, watching the irrigation process. After the heavy rainfall of this winter, there is too much water in the Ouarzazate lake and the authorities have opened the dam, and the Draa river bed has filled up all the way down to Mhamid. When the water reached Mhamid all the Palmeraies are allowed to open up the irrigation systems and use as much water as they like. It looks like its gonna be a good crop this season.

After about 10 days in Zagora, we spotted a familiar looking car, it was the Jeep Cherokee of Tristan and Krissi, an english/german couple we met before on the Roi Bedouin campsite near Laayoune. They were off for a couple of days to Erg Chegaga, but would return to Zagora before we left. We both wanted to drive the piste from Zagora to Merzouga, but were not entirely confident on our own. It turned out that Alan had already done this piste several times and he proposed that he’d guide us, provided we could talk his wife into it. She doesn’t like spending days in a LandRover on a bumpy piste. Thanks to some womanly intervention of Krissi, Tess changed her mind and on wednesday the 18th of march we all setting off on this next challenge.

Our Michelin map (472) shows a piste leading through the verges of the Sahara along lake Iriki toward Mhamid and Tagounite. At Fort Bou jerif we met a two bikers who had actually driven this piste and according to them we should be able to do this piste with our Syncro, providing we took the northern circuit to Tagounite. The first 100 kms are the same. Than the southern track heads south for Mhamid along the banks of the river Draa, through some sand dunes. The northern alternative follows the mountain range and joins the tarmac at Tagounite it is mostly hamada.

When we arrived in Foum Zguid we bumped into some Spanish people we had seen before in Tata. They wanted to take the same piste, but would prefer to do it together with another vehicle. We made some enquiries in the town, about the condition of the piste. This is common practice before heading into the desert, and recommended by overland experts. Especially after the heavy rains, there might be washouts or other problems making the piste impassable. Everybody we asked told us that it would not be possible to drive this track with our vehicle. According to the locals we would need a 4X4. telling them the Syncro is 4X4 they said that we would need lots more ground clearance like a LandRover or -Cruiser. It occurred to me that there quite a lot of these vehicles parked idle in front of the numerous travelagencies along the Foum Zguids main street. Somehow I got the idea that people were trying to discourage us to do the piste, and take a guided tour with one of the agencies. When we got back to the campsite, Sergio, the Spanish guy told us that he’d been told that he could maybe do it with his Mercedes van if he would hire a local guide. It made us wonder, what is going to make the difference, the vehicle or the guide…

The next morning Sergio was ill and having a fever. He decided he would go to the hospital rather than head for the desert, probably a wise decision. So we were once again faced with the choice. Go for it or take the tarmac and drive along with the campervans to Agdz and than south to Zagora. We choose the adventure.

Filled the Syncro to the brim with fuel, food and water, and off we went.

We had some copied pages of Chris Scots book Sahara Overland with 6 waypoints but it described the piste to Mhamid. Because we were afraid that the sand dunes on that piste might be to much of a challenge for our vehicle, we had to work out the last 60kms to Tagounite ourselves. It all went very well. The piste was quite rough, loads of rock and bad corrugation most of the distance. Everything went well the car kept going, and we took a wrong turn only twice. Once we got stuck in the sand. But deflating the tires was all it took to reverse out of the sand and find a way around. At midway we visited a little school for nomad children. And we were invited for tea at a desert cafe on the “shore” of lake Iriki. The staff told us that since 3 days they were covered by the GSM mobile phone network, this put an end to their isolation. Still a bit weird to be in a place some 100 kilometres from the nearest tarmac road, with no running water, no electricity but still being able to make telephone calls, at least till your battery runs out…
After a night at an oasis in the desert, once again amazed by the number of stars visible, we are now enjoying the warm welcome and hospitality of Brahim and Youssef of Caravanes Cimes et Dunes in Zagora. A small family business specialised in organising All kinds of excursions in the Sahara desert. We did a 5 day hike around the Erg Lihoudi near Mhamid in oktober 2007 and have been friends with the family ever since.

We are camping at Oasis Palmier in the Palmeraie of Amzrou, it is hot and dry, the skies are cloudless and blue, the beer is cold. It almost feels like a holiday.

I don’t know how long the names Tata and Foum Zguid have been in my mind, but they almost feel like a childhood memory. And now we are finally here!

Sunday was the Souq in Tata, and believe it or not, but after 10 months of traveling covering over 30.000 kilometers, we have finally found the ideal table, it’s even a Tatable! For the healthy sum of 20 Dirham (<2 euro) we can call ourselves the owners of this fine Berberstyle table:

In front of the table you see our new tajine, the “old” one broke when we put it on our petrol stove to heat it up a little after the fire had gone out…

The desert is in much ways a dry version of an ocean, at first sight you’d be inclined to think that there is no living creature around you, but give it some time and you find out that there is actually much more going on than you’d ever imagined.

From Foum Zguid we will head for Tagounite tomorrow, a 160 km piste, through part of the desert where we have been walking okt 2007. Some enquiries with local people learned us that it is not possible to do this piste with our car, we seem to need a LandRover like the ones lined up along the main street. We think they just want to scare us, and sell us a precooked 4X4 trip into the desert with a local agency. Sorry guys, we’re dutch, “kijken, kijken, kijken, niet kopen.”

We got a tip to visit the Naila Lagoon, part of the Khnifiss Nature Reserve. With a permit issued by the local authorities one can spend up to 3 night camping on the shore of this 6500 hectare lagoon. Local fisherman pass by in the morning and sell their catch. 3 cans of beer buy you 1,5 kilos of fresh fish, mostly Lotte, Squid, and Sole, some small Dorades.

It is a very quiet beautifull spot but we leave on the 3rd day, because of a chilly northern wind, and a total lack of shelter.

We move on to Tarfaya, and enter the dutyfree zone of Morocco. This is occupied territory, the former Spanish colony of Western Sahara. Since 1975 when the Spanish moved out, it has been devided between Mauretania and Morocco, leaving the orginal inhabitants the Saharawi’s in refugee camps around Laayoune and on the border with Algeria and Mauretania. Despite a UN resolution and the ceasefire with the Polisario, the Saharawi people are still waiting for justice. Where have we heard that before?

Our next camp is again in the middle of the desert, just north of Laayoune, on the border of a saltlake. Luc and Martine, a belgian couple, have come here after leaving Rwanda in 1994 when the genocide started, and have built this little autonomous paradise in the desert. Great place to stay! Good walking and 4X4 trips through the dunes to the saltlake and sea. We helped a couple of young surfers to get their Jeep Cherokee out of the mud after wandering oof the beaten track and breaking through the saltcrust. The were sunken, axle deep in the soft salt mud… Good for an afternoon of mud wrestling and free beers in the evening.

We also met a couple of retired Germans, who travel the way we do (something of a rarety, these days) and the next day a Danish/English couple. Both of these couples have been in and out of Africa several times, always a great opportunity to exchange information. And a definitive inspiration to carry on the way we do.

The 3rd day at Le Roi Bedouin we were surprised by a sudden sand storm, it started just as we wanted to leave, and soon everything was flying, chairs, astroturf, and sattelite dishes.

We drove through the worst of the sand storm and reached Laayoune for some much needed shopping. Drinking water and electricity have become a rarety the last two weeks. Most of the time you are lucky to get saltwater showers, and 220volt from a generator a couple of hours in the evening. After shopping in Laayoune we drove to the beach at Foum el Oued. There is a campsite with drinking water and regular electrity, we’ll wait for the sandstorm to settle down over there.

Once that happens we’ll head inland towards Smara, and than via Assa, Akka Tata, Foum Zguid and hope to arrive at Tagounite between Zagora and Mhamid via some interesting streches of piste. Most of this route is tarmaced these days and runs through the northern edge of the Sahara desert. A desolate and unvaried landscape to some but for us it represents the ultimate feeling of freedom and adventurous traveling.

See you on the other side.

After leaving Fort Bou Jerif, we took the road to Guelmim, once famous for it’s weekly Camel market. The only remaining camel is now retired and only performs once a week to entertain some tourists from Agadir, who have booked a trip to the desert in their package holiday.

Guelmim is still an interesting place to visit though. In some strange way it has an almost metropolitan liveliness, I think it’s thanks to it’s remote location. Most people from the region come here to buy and sell all they need to sustain their way of live.

We also did our shopping in Guelmim. Many tiny little “supermarkets” sell water, bread, sugar and some other essentials. There are some donkey carts, loaded with vegetables, the vegetable waste goes straight to the donkey, a great way to recycle. After a few stops, we had all we needed for the next few days, except some kind of meat. Pork is obviously not an option, so in come the obligatory lamb, beef and chicken. Since both lamb and beef are killed and sold on the same day, without any curing, it’s always quite chewy, so most of the time we prefer chicken. We saw a steel door with a crude chicken shape drawn on it, and a tiled counter in front. I asked for a chicken, the owner asks me if I mean a WHOLE chicken, which I confirm, he opens a fridge, gets out a huge chicken, slams it on the scale, 2 kilos. I ask for a smaller one, he walks to the back of the shop, and only then I realise that there is an area with about 50 chickens running around. He selects one of the smaller ones, slams it on another scale, 1,5 kilos alive, he tells me. The chicken sits on the scale, paralised with fear. I say its OK.

After about 10 minutes I get a plucked, gutted and washed chicken, I pay 30 dirhams and leave, the chicken still feel warm inside the shopping bag.

We drive through TanTan, get a 400 dirham fine for not completely stopping at a stop sign. A fact with which several Moroccan drivers get away unpunished, as my receipt is filled out. I don’t get offered to pay 100 without a receipt though.

We carry on to El Ouatia, and find a great sheltered spot to spend the night, between the fishermans cabins.