She Says – Party time!

21 September
Yay, Ramadan is over! Not that it has changed much mind you, today everything was closed and it would have been just as hard to get lunch as any other day! We had a really good run from Ouarzazate towards Agadir, turning south before we reached the big city to stop in a smaller town called Tiznit. The route over was brilliant, not too curvy through three mountain passes (a few hairpins on one), and some amazing mountain scenery once again - more contour-patterned mountains, plus a few ksar ruins and small villages, lots of goat and sheep herds, lots of smiles and waves today and not so many kids with hands out for money. Lots of happy people in shiny new clothes, as Eid-el-fitr is like Christmas day for Muslims – everyone gets new clothes and money. It was quite cold through the passes and we spent most of our time above 1500m - that’s higher than Tasmania’s highest mountain and it was all desert! I’ve realised that the main scenery/landscape things I like to see involve good geology, whether an impressive jagged snow peak or a desert badland hill or plain, a rugged coastline or impressive valley, it’s all to do with geology (apart from my love of cold wet rainforests and waterfalls, it all fits!). We even got to see the famous goats-up-trees, just a handful and impossible to photograph (especially as they left when we arrived), but there they were, climbing the argan trees to eat the nuts! It’s a strange thing that occurs only in this region because this is where the trees are grown.

We had lunch not far from Agadir, bought a cold drink and sat out front of a shop to eat to eat the breads we bought yesterday. Once again, a begging man hassled us; I was not facing him, but Xander said he had new clothes on and was asking for everything from money to cigarettes to food and back round again. Maybe the new clothes were for Ramadan, but who knows. Suddenly the shop closed up, the guy disappeared, and the shopkeeper gave us a large bottle of water as he left! Now we’re really confused – was it a random act of generosity? Was it something to do with Ramadan? I had read that they give things away at this time, but Xander thinks maybe it was his way for apologising for the man begging. Who knows, but it leaves us confused, as sometimes we have to be so rude to people hassling us, and other times people just do these nice things out of the blue and don’t want anything in return.

We are camping again tonight, but due to tiredness and being camped right in middle of town we had a restaurant meal for dinner. I can hear loud music nearby, maybe there is an end-of-Ramadan festival going on? Xander is not feeling well and is in bed quite early; it’s his turn for a dose of the Marrakech express, although he has it for real (I wasn’t too bad). We were in bed early last night too, and both had a great night of sleep, although I seem to have been attacked by bed bugs! I don’t understand why last night, it makes more much more sense from place we stayed in Zagora - in fact it was my one big concern there! Maybe they got into our sleeping bag liners.

Now we have reached the west coast and have properly worked out how far we have to travel each day to get to Mauritania, we realised we can spare a few days to try and salvage some part of our trip, and will go to see some of the towns and rock carvings that I wanted to reach yesterday. I’m feeling very disappointed about our trip to Morocco, that 1 month has not been enough to really see anything, that we couldn’t spend time in small villages or go exploring anywhere, that it has mostly been about cities and driving, and it has really frustrated me. I’m very concerned that the few weeks we will be able to spend in each country from now on are just not going to do anything justice, especially when we have to waste time waiting for visas in each country. I’m feeling that it’s just all going to be work, that it really isn’t enjoyable and right now I can’t recommend long-term independent travel to anyone!!!