Well, another great day..! Lenny was intending to travel east as well so we decided to ride together. You dont need an alarm clock in this part of the world as morning-prayers is your alarm clock so we were up early, and while I was drinking a big mug of hot teain the cool morning, I watched the sun rise over the horizon. Some days it’s so good to be alive…!
Leaving camp quite early, we headed east and it was quite a challenging ride with bend after bend after bend, with many going up and many going down. After an hour I thought “Okay, this is great” but after two hours I was almost praying for a straight bit of road. Eventually we pulled into a gas station for fuel, toilets, a drink and had a rest. All the gas stations are great and you can always find a toilet and usually they sell coffee or cold drinks. Most sell sim-cards or data as well, so Lenny took the opportunity to buy more data for his card.
The temperature today was mostly 23 degrees but by lunchtime it had gone up to 27 degrees. By early afternoon we stopped at a supermarket in Al Hoceima as we both needed to stock up with food and water. Lenny wanted to stay in that area whereas I wanted to keep pushing east so we broke up the fellowship of the piston ring with a shake of hands and a firm promise to email…
Pushing east, the roads became progressively straighter with less twisties which I was quite thankful for. I had already looked for a campsite on iOverland so I knew where I was heading for. I arrived at the campsite a little after 1730 having rode about 375km (240 miles) from Ames (Azla) to Sidi el Makhti. I was staying at a lovely small campsite called Camping Riad Ocean View. I was a bit worried at first as the gate was closed and I wondered if the site was closed. After a while a man walked along and opened the gate…! All I had to do was slide the gate back. Doh…!!!!
The campsite is great. Its not a large site and is mainly for campervans but the owner let me put my tent on some of his precious grass near to the main house. The toilets and showers are immaculately clean, and the view over the coast to the sea is wonderful. And for 100 dms a night, its perfect. I’m the only tent here, as its all campervans, and everyone is either German or Swiss.
Tired is an understatement. Wales and Scotland have some excellent roads, as well as the Czech Republic, but the roads today were incredible; totally beyond my imagination, my expectations and utterly exhausting. If you like bendy bits, just head to the north coast of Morocco. I’m staying here now for three or four days to explore the local area, and after that I will start heading south. I’m also going to spend a whole day of doing nothing as my ankle is throbing a bit, so tomorrow I’m going to rest, read, and make use of the sunshine. There no Wi-Fi here and I’m running low on data, so althoug I have video to upload I will post it when I can find some wi-fi.
