Morocco 2020

I have returned to this country for the third time as if I forgot something here.
It seems to me that I have already travelled all over it from the north to the Sahara Desert and from the east to the Atlantic. But Morocco still attracts me.

Why?
It's a really outstanding colorful country with excellent roads, interesting people and a very diverse nature. Perhaps it can be described as a perfect country for travelling, especially by motorbike. You can find here everything! There're motorways, ground and rocky roads, mountain serpentines and sand dunes of the Sahara, which are great to race by light enduro. Or one can also ride a camel if he or she hasn't got a motorbike. :)
Today we have stayed the first overnight in the "blue city" Chefchaouen, which is located in the north-west of Morocco. The town was gorgeous! Especially medina (its old part) impressed us.

In this town almost all the houses are painted in blue hues and that looks very beautiful!
You can wander around the labyrinths of blue narrow streets and deadends all day, looking at the goods laid out right on the counters and walls. And don't forget to take pictures of everything, especially the numerous cats walking along the streets!

If you happen to travel to this part of the world, I recommend you to visit Chefchaouen one day. You won't regret it!

Lately I've been lucky to meet my friends-travellers by chance in different continents!
This time I ran upon Oleg Kharitonov, who had set off from Moscow a week before for his following adventure. This time he was going by exotic car across Africa.

He got to Morocco the day after we had crossed the Strait of Gibraltar and our meeting took place on the territory of a Russian Orthodox church in Rabat, the capital of the Kingdom.

Oleg has two months of adventure around Africa ahead, so his journey is just beginning!

And we continue our journey across Morocco. Today we left Rabat for Meknes, one of the largest and oldest cities in the country.

On our way we stopped at the flea market. That is the place where the local spirit is felt at its brilliance. Hundreds of sellers laid out their goods right on the ground or on the piece of cloth. I doubt there's anything in the world you wouldn't find here!

There are sheep, chickens, clothes and shoes (mostly used), spare parts for any device, broken push-button phones and rusty bicycle frames. I got the impression that some sellers had brought their "goods" directly from the trasher. However, somebody buys it, don't they?

"Where the road ends, the adventure begins" (c).
This morning we decided to go along the snow-covered Atlas mountain range, following a short, unexplored route marked on the map with a dotted line. At 10 a.m. we set off from the small town Midelt in the central part of Morocco.

First, the asphalt road turned to the grader one. Then the grader also imperceptibly turned to the ground road and it led us to an incredibly beautiful gorge.

And now we are already riding along the rocky dried-up river bed. Steep cliffs like huge giants are above us on both sides. The road has disappeared completely and the corridor between the rocks is getting narrower and narrower (in some places three or four metres wide).

It's not easy to ride along a stone-sand road as the motorbike gets stuck in the sand. We were carefully squeezing between large boulders and jumping over ditches. Having gone about 30 km along this path, we eventually came up to a huge rock, which was the size of a truck. Perhaps, it had broken away from the cliff.

We stopped. There was no further road. We could only turn around and go back through the sand, rocks and ditches for a couple more hours to get to the starting point of our journey today.
But the views around were stunning!
Having wandered along the riverbeds, we came to a house, which consisted of a couple of stone sheds covered with clay. There was a yard for sheep nearby, also hens and children were running around. A Berber family lived in that house. The Berbers are local nomadic tribes.

The housewife invited us into the house and treated us to tea with tortillas. The interior of the house was very simple. The floor was the ground, there was no furniture, no TV-set, and no communication link as well as electricity. The family sleeped on the floor, having laid some carpets and bedspreads below. They used a potbelly stove to cook.
No civilization at all!

After lunch we finally got back to the road, but the adventure did not end there…

The push on the front motorcycle fork was not severe but quite strong, and after three seconds a warning about a sharp drop in pressure in the front wheel lit up on the display. The motorbike hadn't stopped yet but I already realised that it was a serious problem. Actually, there was a large dent and a longitudinal crack of about 7 sm on the alloy wheel. After a small pit in the asphalt my motorbike conked out.

The problem was very serious and we couldn't fix it immediately, especially in the middle of nowhere, far from civilization.
I do not know how it works, but I am sure that there exist supernatural forces that help travellers in emergency situations. This time our salvation was a cyclist-traveller Omar and a tow truck that appeared from nowhere on a half-empty road a hundred kilometres from the border with Algiers.

Omar turned out to be a very sociable person and took the role of an interpreter-organisator. He negotiated with the driver of a tow truck and we loaded the motorbike and his bicycle onto the platform. An hour and a half later we arrived in a small town called Midlet, where we found a truck repair shop that had got equipment for argon welding, to my surprise and happiness. In two hours the alloy wheel was straightened and welded, the tire was mounted and I could continue my journey!

The motorbike evacuation cost 600 dirhams (4200 roubles). I also gave 300 dirhams (2100 roubles) for wheel repair and 40 dirhams (280 roubles) for tire service. Omar was giving us support, negotiating and translating the dialogues all this time but strongly refused to take any money for his service. Moreover, he paid at the café for our dinner in the evening. We said goodbye to each other the next day, having stayed overnight at the local hotel.

Omar was going to complete a circle around Morocco, having 2000 km left. We had to overcome approximately the same distance but in a different direction.

Two and a half thousand kilometres along the most beautiful roads of Morocco have been passed and our adventure has come to an end in the port of Tangier.

A comfortable ferry, which cost 85 euros per person with a motorbike, took us to Tarifa, Spain in one hour.

We went another 200 km along the mountain serpentines, by the fabulous town Ronda and finally got to Marbella.
Nine days are not enough to fully visit Morocco. We didn't have time to ride along the sand dunes of the Sahara by light enduro, didn't reach the amazing Legzira Arches and didn't have lunch at the outdoor terrace overlooking the huge Ouzoud Falls.

Although we didn't have time for a lot of things, the trip turned out to be very interesting! The weather was fine, there was no rain at all. Even high in the mountains it was quite warm: +18…+22°C on average during the day and +14…+16°C at night.

We have explored several new routes along the ground roads and gorges of the Atlas Mountains, walked around the fabulous pavilions of the Atlas Film studio, visited crazy Marrakech and tasted some delicious meat dishes on its main square Jemaa el-Fnaa. All in all, we have received a huge charge of positive energy and enjoyed the sunny days, which we lack so much at home in winter!

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