Tag Archives: Morocco

Just to be thorough.

February 28, 2008 – 6:47 am

Here in the Western Sahara semi-autonomous, free administered territory UN controlled Moroccan owned rebel occupied landmine danger zone surf resort area of the globe, it is really difficult to really tell what is going on.  No one really claims this as a country, many people occupy it, laws contradict themselves and roads are actually pretty good here, which would lead you to believe that it is well run.  The problem is that it is hard for us to really tell who is running this show.

All of the 8 checkpoints we went through on our way from Boudjour to Dahkla, a span of only 500kms, were managed by soldiers wearing Moroccan uniforms.  These men were all very nice and quite friendly, but regularly over the 4-5 hours of time we spent during that day stopped at checkpoints, I wondered how “independent” these checkpoints are.  Sometimes we would simply be waived through, other times stopped for as long as 45 minutes.  We tried everything from being short with the men to making friends, but overall nothing seemed to really expedite the stops.  Since nothing is computerized and many of the checkpoints don’t even have power it is hard to see how this makes anything more secure.  We were told recently that they have the checkpoints to make sure that you arrive at the next one.  It you do not arrive at the next one, they will search for you as many people have had problematic run-ins with the land mines here.  The problem is that I cannot see any search party being sent out, considering that a lot of people pull off to the side of the road to camp here, just like we did the first day.  Obviously you would be late arriving to the next checkpoint if you camped for two or three days between them.

Everything is handwritten, nothing is organized, and if these checkpoints are for security, it is hard to see why they waive so many other people by while spending so much time with us.  After talking to some of the locals here in Dahkla, we think we have a solution, if we have photocopies of our passports they will take those and send us on our way.  I will keep my fingers crossed that this works.  The other thing we learned is that being too friendly with the guards will only make your stay longer.  These guys are working 100s of kms away from anything in the middle of nowhere, so a little entertainment from the TWBR crew is just what they need to break up their day.

So at the end of the day, 3 Polaroids, 2 t-shirts, a Toyota gorilla, and a pack of cigarettes later we made it through one checkpoint in around an hour instead of a half an hour.  We learned our lesson, even if you speak French, you don’t at the checkpoints.  Even if you have t-shirts and jokes to tell, you don’t at checkpoints. It was a fun experience and we all had a good time, but from here on out, we are sorry to say, “Border guards, we cannot be friends with all of you.”

Oh and one more thing, thanks to the guard at the second to last stop at 10pm for giving us some fried fish as a gift at checkpoint #7.  We liked checkpoint 7:).

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For this picture, the extra hour was well worth it. Please note some sort of weapon tucked behind the picture of the king.

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8 times in one day…maybe a little excessive?

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30 more minutes of my life down the drain, checkpoint #6.

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By Steven Shoppman | Posted in Africa, Morocco | Also tagged , , , | Comments (4)

This is the Desert

February 27, 2008 – 12:09 pm

Well, we are in the thick of it now. The thick, blowing sand of the Western Sahara Desert. In fact, we are actually in a UN administered territory called Western Sahara. (The Moroccans like to claim it as their southern province and the rebel POLISARIO Front refers to the land as the “free zone.”) Whatever you want to call it, politics aside, it is definitely the desert. It is strange that a place so empty and so seemingly void of life can spark so much interest and arouse so much curiosity in people. On the surface, it does not seem like the desert has much to offer, but nothing can be farther from the truth, and when it comes to things to offer, the Sahara has a full plate to chose from.

Driving through Western Sahara is a bit odd. Obviously there are not too many people living here as daytime temperatures soar well above 40 degrees and plummet to next to nothing after the sun goes down, but signs of people seem to be everywhere. Signs of life come in the form of ramshackle tents distributed quite randomly amongst the rocks and sand dunes. Sings of life come in the form of blown-out tires scattered along the side of the lone road that meanders its way south to Mauritania… there are other tracks further inland, but the risk for exploration is high as landmines have been buried all over the place. Unfortunately, signs of life here in this part of the desert also come in the form of trash which seems to accumulate everywhere. Although the plastic bag may be practical, when you see “plastic bag bushes” hundreds of miles from any form of civilization it makes you wonder if they are really beneficial at all.

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Navigating the trash and hopefully the landmines

Signs of non-human life are even more evident in the desert. Snakes and critters of all types reside here and although they are extremely difficult to spot due to both their camouflage and calculated movements, their tracks can been seen throughout the sand. Underground rivers wind their way through the dunes, completely hidden from view and the only indication that there is water around is the occasional patch of green grass or the even less frequent oasis. No mirages just yet.

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Desert Oasis

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Mark scouts out a shipwreck we spotted from the road

It is a bit cliche, but camels are also part of the desert and the Sahara is no exception. I am not sure if they are completely wild, but camels here freely graze wherever they chose and sometimes that tends to be in the middle of the road. When you come to a place like the Sahara, you hope that you can catch a glimpse of a camel outside of a typical tourist attraction. For us, this glimpse started in the form of concrete structures which gave way to road signs alerting you to their presence to finally seeing live camels roaming about the desert plains in giant herds. I have to admit, camels are a strange breed of animal. There is nothing quite like a camel and there is no other animal I am aware of that communicates by using what sounds like deep, prolonged belching. In any regard, seeing the silhouette of a camel herd grazing against the backdrop of a setting sun in the Sahara desert is up there with one of the coolest things I have seen in my life.

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First sign of camels in the desert

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Second sign, literally, of camels in the desert

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Almost hitting camels in the desert

We have only been in the desert for a few days and the peace and tranquility that you find here can sometimes blind you to the fact that although beautiful in countless ways, the desert can also be a very dangerous and inhospitable place. So far, the desert has been good to us and we can only hope that the trend continues because we still have a long way to drive before the sands of the Sahara start to give way to the lush vegetation of equatorial Africa.


By Steve Bouey | Posted in Africa, Environment, Morocco, Observations, Wanderings | Also tagged , , , , | Comments (1)

You have got to try this once in your life.

February 26, 2008 – 6:14 am

Have you ever done something that was completely unnecessary and totally necessary at the same time? Instances like these can only really be understood in retrospect, but I suppose that is how one might define some of the most memorable experiences in a lifetime. After recently crossing the straights of Gibraltar and officially starting what may prove to be the most intense part of the whole expedition, Morocco has proven to be a place full of color and excitement. The markets, touts, ancient cities and delicious food are enough to keep you occupied for months here and the citizens of this country, although intense at times, are always helping to make each moment more interesting than you planned it to be.

In Fes, the city that Lonely Planet notes at the “Soul of Morocco”, the first impression of walking through the narrow streets of the Medina is something reminiscent of an Indiana Jones like epic, searching for a lost antiquity or mythic scroll that has the answers to all of your questions about life. These narrow streets are far to slender to accommodate a smart car in places, let alone two oversized American trucks. As the Medina’s narrow streets begin widen closer to the city walls, the locals take it upon themselves to fill this extra space with vegetables, car parts, coffee makers, and tons of other goods in a winding loop of a marketplace. Here, although the streets are considerably wider than the streets in the center, they are by no means a thoroughfare to get from one side of the Medina to the other.

The first night that we spent in Fes, we were led to a hotel near the bottom of the Medina by a tout. We were tired when we arrived, so the first night we stayed at the hotel the tout had delivered us to, even though it was booked for the rest of the weekend. The next morning the owner offered to take us to another area of town where we could find another hotel. This was the necessary part of the day. Tasks like these are the makings of a normal day, getting the things done that need to get accomplished that day.

The twist that made this more than just a transfer from one hotel to another was the ingenious idea of our friendly hotel owner to have us take the not so direct route. This route was actually so indirect that it caused us to go in a complete circle from a point we had already passed on the way to the other part of town. Looking back on this incredible experience, it now seems hard to decide whether the necessary part of this incredible day was moving to the new hotel or driving on this longcut. Have a look at this clip and decide for yourself, and then at some point give this a try…


 
icon for podpress  Fes Markets [1:47m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1100)
By Steven Shoppman | Posted in Africa, Morocco, New Videos | Also tagged , , , , , | Comments (0)

How not to get a free hotel.

February 25, 2008 – 6:21 am

Here at The World by Road, we have many different ways of saving money. From the full service kitchen we can setup out of the back of the truck or even sometimes bring with us into the hotel room for late night snacks to the faring we are working on to increase gas mileage, we have many ways to cuts costs across the board. The floorspace in hotel rooms many times is a sea of foam pads and sleeping bags filled with crew members and in some cases like our latest room in Agadir, Morocco, a 4 little bears setup keeps the four of us just an arms reach away all night long in our $22 per night room. We eat local food and sometimes just don’t eat at all. Coca Cola has enough calories to count as a meal, right?

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At the end of the day we are still struggling for money and sometimes it is nice to treat ourselves to a top notch hotel to break up the monotony of our streamlined budgeting techniques. At place like the Hyatt or the Hilton, everything is taken care of, and there is something to be said for that. All of the backpackers and self-proclaimed hardcore travelers out there are probably scoffing as they read this, but from time to time it is nice to check into a hotel and when we ask the question of where we can park the cars the immediate answer is, “Where would you like the valet to park them, sir?” The truth is that I prefer to camp over staying in a hotel at all, but in a city where there are security concerns about the cars, a ton of work to do and enough grime caking everything you own to raise concerns with the local health department, a couple of nights on the other side of the tracks is welcome.

Since the beginning of the trip we have been honing our skills on getting everything discounted or free when possible. In Casablanca we may have gotten a little too confident in our skills of persuasion when we approached the Hyatt in the center of downtown with the grandiose idea of getting accommodation for the entire crew at a moments notice, but hey, how do you get better if you do not try for bigger fish?


 
icon for podpress  How not to get a free hotel [1:49m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (813)
By Steven Shoppman | Posted in Africa, For some laughs, Morocco, New Videos | Also tagged , , , , | Comments (0)

TWBRDR Pushes On!

February 18, 2008 – 10:37 am

As the The World by Road Dakar Rally (TWBRDR) enters its second week the route has us now in country number three on the way to Senegal. To be exact, we are currently in Fes, Morocco. We actually made it as far south as Casablanca, but have backtracked northeast through Rabat to get some more onward visas (Mali only took two hours - whoot, whoot!) and decided to drive further east to Fes to celebrate Shoppman’s 29th birthday on the 17th in true Moroccan style. Technically, in a rally of this nature you are forced to backtrack a bit in order to ensure that you take the best route possible and to keep the competition guessing and the last time we checked, we are still in the lead.

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Fes is a pretty awesome place and the winding alleys of the Medina are a great place to get lost among spice vendors, vegetable stands and tanneries. Unfortunately, I do not think that you are allowed to drive through the Medina itself, but yesterday we somehow managed to do just that. In looking for a place to stay, we soon found ourselves in an alleyway that continued to get narrower and narrower the deeper we drove. We soon found ourselves past the point of no return. It would have been extremely difficult to back out given how far we had come and although the path in front of us looked impassable, the friendly local Moroccan, Abdul, who joined us for the ride reassured us that we would be able to make it through. As it turns out, Abdul knows quite a few people inside the Medina and one of them was kind enough to run point for the trucks as we drove through vegetable stands and fruit vendors. This guy was amazing. With a single swoop he cleared small children and the elderly from the path of the massive Toyotas rumbling down the Medina and made sure that not even one zucchini or stray mint leaf bushel was smashed under our tires. The whole event was kind of like watching Charlton Heston part the Red Sea in the Ten Commandments but in this case, we had a front row seat.

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Are you sure we can drive through here?

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This guy seems to think that otherwise

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Little Pepe winds through the fruit stalls

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People stand and stare in amazement… or disapproval

After about half and hour and another five to stop and buy a kilo of strawberries from the rear passenger window of Little Pepe, we made it out of the Medina and into wider streets. It was quite an experience and surprisingly enough, we did not manage to piss anybody off. In fact, we received a lot of complements about the trucks and even a few shouts of “viva le Paris-Dakar” after which we replied back “viva le TWBRDR (twiber-dee-are)!” We wound our way around the Medina once again and found out where we were headed but not before convincing Abdul that we were all truly nuts because we wanted to run the gauntlet of street stalls again. Some people in the Dakar Rally get bogged down in the sand… we got bogged down in people and vegetables. It just goes to show you that the TWBRDR requires just as much, if not more, skill behind the wheel. Next up on the rally, back to Rabat for some more visas, back to Casablanca to drop a few passengers off and then the wide open expanses of the western Sahara Desert.

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Brook tries to film amid the chaos while business continues after we pass

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Stopping to buy strawberries as the light at the end of the tunnel gets brighter


By Steve Bouey | Posted in For some laughs, Morocco, Uncategorized, Updates, World News | Also tagged , , , , , | Comments (1)