It's time to get moving again. 

We'll make our way to Meknes, Morocco.

Wednesday 27/2/13

We enjoyed another Moroccan breakfast then set about packing up our gear. I spent some time talking to two Spanish couples who were touring on bikes similar to ours and decided that motorcyclists really are the nicest people you could ever meet.

Then I had a chat with two guys who were riding 1987 Yamaha Teneres. One was Austrian, and the other was German. Clemont asked me if I had been to the dunes (The Sahara). When I told him no, and explained we were concerned about kidnapping etc, he laughed. He told me that Morocco is very keen on increasing tourism in the country and the border security here is incredibly secure. He assured me we were safe going to Merzouga, which was two hundred and fifty ks away, and visiting the dunes. He also told me there are some very good hotels there.

I really did consider it. I wanted to visit the dunes. A quick look at a map showed Merzouga was only about twenty kilometres from the Algerian border. That, and the fact that I'd promised someone (who I won't name) I'd look after his daughter (Can you guess who?) put paid to the idea. We're going north to Meknes.

I jumped on the bike and rode into town in search of a headlight bulb. The BM has an unusual bulb, so what are the chances of getting one in Morocco? It turns out they are pretty good. I had my grubby hands on a new Phillips bulb from the first shop I went to, for about five dollars. The same thing at home would be at least forty I reckon. 

With a nice, bright headlight on the front of the bike again, we loaded up and set off down the road to where we thought would be a reasonable destination for the night. Meknes.

 

Exit. Stage right.

Before we knew it we were climbing mountains again.

I sometimes have trouble coping with the fact that our bike cost about the same as an apartment in Morocco, and a lot of people have nothing. There is a huge chasm between the haves and the have nots here, and no one appears to be in between. 

I wish the world was an equal place for all. I hope it will be one day. But until religion is wiped from the face of the earth, I doubt it.

The road continued winding up the mountain and then we saw a dog, then another, and another, and another. They were all sitting on the side of the road as if they were waiting for someone, or something.

Then we saw something fly out of the window of the truck in front of us. A few seconds later the dog sitting there had a sandwich. This continued all the way up the mountain. Obviously the done thing is to take food for the dogs if you're going up the mountain.

Dog beggars. They all looked pretty healthy.

Kids everywhere love bikes. They run out and slap your hand as you ride past.

Then it was back above the snow line again.
I could feel Suzanne getting nervous.

More beggar dogs.

This is the top of the mountain we climbed.

We saw the odd donkey, or three.

You can tour on anything. We saw these two guys on scooters going the other way. Maybe next time...

Then we blinked, and we were

in the middle of a cedar forest.

On the way back down the mountain we were treated to this view...

This country is just FULL of mountains.

Not a bad view eh?

And some interesting houses...

It took us about four hours to get to Meknes. What a disappointment. Imagine too many people, too many cars, too much of everything, then multiply it by ten. Maybe I've been away from cities too long, but my immediate impression was Meknes is a hole. A bloody, big, hole. We parked at a cafe, ordered a juice, and looked at each other. Suzanne said "This place is awful" so it wasn't just me. We couldn't get out of here fast enough. 

In fact, we couldn't get out of there at all. We must have spent an hour trying to find the road to Tangier, with no success. In the end I decided to settle for Rabat in the west, then we could ride up the coast to Tangier. Off we go.

I couldn't have been happier seeing Meknes in my mirrors.

On the road to Rabat I saw a sign pointing to Kenitra, which is further north from Rabat. Fantastic. We'll go there. We turned off onto the side road and we were on our way. It was a little back road and was a very pleasant ride. Unfortunately It was getting late, and dark, and we were tired, but I was determined to get to Kenitra. In my old age my night vision is pretty poor, so it was hard work.

Sun set on the mountain road to Kenitra.

After another hour and a half ride in the dark through a couple of small villages where we didn't see any hotels, we finally arrived in Kenitra.

We rode into town, found a reasonable hotel, and checked in. Now getting old is something you can't change, but sometimes things happen that wake you up and realise just how old you are getting. Recently we've had a few hotels with twin beds and it turns out that we both sleep much better than when we're in a double. We walked into the room and both dispiritedly said "Oh, it's a double." How sad is that?

Once we were over our disappointment of having to share a bed, I fixed the shower bracket with my Leatherman (Another big thanks to Mike and Laura) and we enjoyed a hot shower. (Separately!) Then went down stairs for dinner. The bar wasn't serving alcohol, but we were assured that we could get a bottle of wine with dinner in the restaurant. Oh no we couldn't. It's OK, the Coke was fine.

After a long ride we were ready for another early night. Curse this getting old caper!

Tomorrow we'll be in Tangier. It's hard when you've heard and read so much about a place to get there and be unbiased, or not be disappointed. I wonder what Tangier will bring?

Rest, recovery, warmth, and comfort in Midelt, Morocco.

Tuesday 26/2/13

We both slept like babies last night, but I still woke up at about six am. I went downstairs to grab some breakfast and realised that my body was aching all over. Every one of my muscles had decided to inflict pain upon me. I guess yesterday I was fighting the bike more than I realised at the time. I think I've pulled a muscle, or nerve, or something in my leg because my right foot is a bit floppy and slaps the ground as I walk. I must look a real sight.

I sat and spent some time catching up with the blog, then had breakfast with Olivier. Thierry was still in bed asleep. Suzanne was still stacking up Zs as well, so I went and checked out the bikes headlight. Sure enough it was a blown bulb. A slow walk to the service station stretched my muscles but proved fruitless as far as a bulb was concerned. It also proved that my muscles were really sore and I should have ridden there instead.

The rest of the morning was spent sitting by the open fire and blogging until Olivier and Thierry came down to check out. Suzanne was up and we saw them off on the next leg of their trip.

Olivier, Suzanne, and Thierry. It was nice meeting you guys.

Hopefully our paths will cross again further down the road.

With what remained of he day we just relaxed, spent some more time blogging, and lazed around the hotel until dinner. We backed up dinner with another early night. It was a pretty uneventful day. Which suited us fine.

Tomorrow we'll take a relaxing ride north, sticking to the sealed roads all the way. We're not too sure where we are going yet. We want to end up in Tangier to catch a ferry back to Spain, so we'll just mosey along, take a few days to get there I think.

Stranded in the snow in the middle of nowhere.

That was a bloody long, cold night.

Monday 25/2/13

It was a very long cold night camped in the snow.

We hardly slept all night, it was bloody cold. We'd snuggle up one way, swap sides, roll over, snuggle up the other way, swap sides again, but it didn't matter what we did, we were still freezing cold. At least we were out of the wind tucked away inside our little tent, and we stayed there till about eight in the morning.

8 am. It looks quite pretty when you're not stuck there.

It doesn't look like it would be hard to get out does it?

We couldn't do it.

Yesterday was probably the most difficult riding experience I've ever had in all my many years of riding. Lugging a huge bike with the wrong tyres, overloaded with gear, and with two people on board, through mud and snow, along the edge of huge drop offs was both mentally and physically exhausting. I was wrecked. Totally. (Of course, being the unbelievably fantastic husband that I am I didn't tell Suzanne any of this.) On top of already being exhausted, being cold all night, and not sleeping, I felt like I couldn't get enough air into my lungs. I don't know how athletes compete at high altitudes. So when I got up in the morning I was ready to tackle the world. Not!

But we had to do something, so we discussed our options...

• We could dig the bike out and continue along the road. - We weren't capable of doing that in these conditions.

• We could wait for some one to come along and help get us out. - That could be in five minutes, or five days...

• We could walk and get help. - How far away would help be? I estimated that the next village was about twenty kilometres away. - Possibly an option if I went alone.
• Use Spot.

There was a sign lying on the ground where we had stopped...

Working on the hope that there was indeed a camp ground three kilometres away, and there would be someone there, we decided that I would walk to the camp ground and try and get help. If not, I would return, and we would "push the button" on our Spot tracker.

I went through the Spot operation with Suzanne and told her where the spare batteries were. We worked out signals with our whistles so we could communicate, and, at about nine am I put on all my riding gear, loaded up with some water and lollies, gave Suzanne my last two instructions, "If I'm not back by one pm, push the button" and "Don't eat the yellow snow", and headed off on my little hike.

Here are Suzanne's instructions to herself:

• Do a Lisbeth Salander (Girl with the Dragon Tattoo).
• Smoke three cigarettes in a row.
• Think about the situation.
• Thaw out Camelbak in the sun.
• Eat snow and a small part of one tin of food.
• Take photos for evidence. (Simon had downloaded the full memory card to the computer last night.)
• S.O.S. bike horn and whistle every few minutes.
• Gather whatever weapons available.
• Ration food and water.
• Put sunscreen on.
• Find somewhere to go to the loo.

Not far down the track I came across two sections that I knew I couldn't get he bike through, even if we did get it out of the mud. The first section was about one hundred metres of ice that was four or five inches thick. I tried breaking the edge of it with my boot to make a path through. I didn't even crack it. I struggled to walk across it. Talk about slick. The second section was greasy mud for about fifty metres. I walked it OK, but on the bike? I don't know.

Along the tack was the odd earth hut. I blew my signal whistle with Morse code S.O.S. thinking that if there was anyone there, even if they didn't know Morse they'd come out to see who was making the noise. I mean, it's not as if they get hundreds of tourists along this road. No response.

When I finally got to about three kilometres, there was nothing there except a small clay hut and a similar sign to the one at our camp saying "Camping - sixteen kilometres." I can't tell you what I said.

I looked at the hut, blew the S.O.S. on my whistle a few times and saw nothing. Then I heard some goats and thought "If there are goats penned up there, someone must be around." I decided to go up to see if there was anyone there and have a look inside to see if there was anything that we might need if we were stuck for a bit longer, or even if we could spend a night in the hut if need be. At the very least I could get some warm milk.You can't believe how relived I was when I saw a young guy come out of the hut. His name was Hussain.

Hussain was a shepherd, and only spoke French, but with some sign language he understood that I was on a big moto and stuck three kilometres away. Then he said words that were music to my ears: village, telephone, tractor. He could obviously see I was shagged, so he made me a cup of Moroccan tea, said "touristic, stay", left me in his tiny hut, and walked off.

Ten minutes later he returned with a younger, smaller, mate, Ahmed, and they were carrying picks and shovels. They were going to dig me out. My Tuareg guardian angels.

We set off on the "short cut" walk back to Suzanne. These two walked up and down the bloody mountain slopes at a brisk pace, carrying tools, and chatting away, while I struggled to even walk. My guess is we saved about five hundred metres with the crow flies line, but the track would have been heaps easier on my poor, old body. I was stopping frequently to try and catch my breath. Hussain suggested that I lie down and have a sleep. I wanted too so badly, but no. If I was ever going to have a heart attack  today was the day.

We finally came within sight of our overnight camp, and I could see a white van, and the bike was out of the mud. Relief. 

When we reached the camp Suzanne explained that the van rolled up not long after I had left and two Sand People (We call the guys wearing Djeballas Sand People because they look like the characters out of Star wars. No disrespect intended), a cow in the back, and their mate. They climbed out to see if they could help. Well, all except for the cow.

Cow in the back? Of course.

It took the three guys, and Suzanne, to get the bike out. One guy drove the van with a rope tied to the bike pulling it. The other two pushed, lifted, and shoved, and grunted while Suzanne steered. Suzanne told me that the bike hit one of the Sand people fair in the chest when it fell over on one attempt at extracting it. She thought it had killed him. Three men, a van, and a super woman! No wonder I couldn't get it out by myself last night.

The "boys" who rescued the BM.

They are all very young aren't they?
Thank you, thank you, thank you.

The leader of the rescue team showed Suzanne how to set a fire using these bushes that are everywhere. One spark and they are off.
They burn for a while as well.

Look closely and you'll see Hussain, Ahmed, and I on our way back. We're in the dead centre of this photo.

When I finally managed to drag my sorry back side up the hill to where everyone was, the sand people were laughing at me struggling to walk, and breathe. Thanks for the sympathy guys. Then they signed why didn't I use the track they were on. I signed back that it was dark, and I didn't see it. They laughed at me again.

My Tuareg rescuers, Hussain and Ahmed.
Luckily they weren't required in the end, but I still really appreciated the effort these two young guys put in for us.

The sand people left, and then Hussain and Ahmed set off on their walk back home. I would have felt a lot better if the Sand People had hung around to make sure we made it to the next village safely, but, oh well.

Suzanne and I took about an hour and a half to pack up camp, something that normally takes about twenty minutes. We had to keep stopping for breathing breaks. Eventually at about twelve thirty we were back on track. Sorry 'bout the bad pun.

We were heading down the "other" track that I couldn't see in the dark last night and a minute later we were slithering down a muddy slope. One of the panniers hit a big rock, kicked the bike sideways, and destroyed the last bit of confidence Suzanne had. She wanted to walk to the village. She ended up walking down the slope while I skidded the bike down. I wish I could have walked as well.

Check out that front tyre. What traction?

Suzanne is on the slope in the background.

A few minutes later we saw a four wheel drive driving in the opposite direction along the other track. I thought "They will be able to get through no problems." Very soon after they had turned around and then pulled up next to us as Suzanne was remounting after another mud section. They decided they couldn't get through where we got stuck and were going back where they came from.

Suzanne asked where they were going. When they answered Agoudal Suzanne leapt at he opportunity to ask if they would take her with them in the car. After Agoudal it is all paved roads again. We were both pretty happy when they said yes. Suzanne could rest, and I could manage the bike a lot better.

Jean Oui and Marilyn were a lovely French couple. Jean Oui had worked in Casablanca and had recently retired, so they were exploring Morocco before heading home to France.

We had a convoy.

The bike was so much easier to ride and I started to enjoy the dry parts of the track and have a bit of fun. A few minutes later we came across Hussain and Ahmed. When Ahmed saw a vacant seat on the back of the bike, he asked for a lift to Agoudal. How could I possibly say no? So off we went.

My new pillion.

It was still harsh terrain.

Our convoy rolled into Agoudal to be greeted by the local kids, who saw us as a source of entertainment. Ahmed was king of the kids arriving on the back of a huge motorcycle.

I think they thought I was a bit odd when I got off the bike and kissed the sealed road.

We said our goodbyes and thank yous to Jean Oui and Marilyn. They were continuing south, while we were going to make our way north.

Jean Oui, Marilyn, and Suzanne.

A huge than you guys.

We rode off feeling a lot more comfortable being back on a sealed road. Without any switchbacks we descended down the mountains on nice, gently sloping, downhill roads. We rode downhill for about three hours through more incredible scenery, but our priority was a hot shower and a soft, warm bed, so we probably didn't enjoy it as much as we could have.

The road out of Agoudal. It was all downhill from here,

but in a very good way.

The road was a bit of fun.

We thought about stopping at the local laundromat,

but decided against it.

There was just mountain after mountain.

How do you transport goats in Morocco?

Put them on a roof rack of course.

After a few more hours of riding we found ourselves in Rich. I should say we lost ourselves in Rich.

We stopped for a quick fuel and drink break

just outside Rich.

Rich was odd. It looked like a village, but it was large, had all the shops and teemed with people like a city. It was very crowded, and not particularly welcoming. We decided to push on to Midelt. This had to be our overnight stop because it was getting dark and I had no headlight as I'd broken a headlight bulb last night.

Almost as a reward for last night's troubles we were given a superb down hill, sweeping bends, twenty five minute ride into Midelt. It was just right.

We must have been a sight walking into the Hotel Kasbah Asmaa reception. Dirty, smelly, tired, and still covered in mud from the ride the day before. They welcomed us with open arms, insisted we park the bike inside the grounds on the marble floor, and showed us to our room.

What luxury. Hot water, and a bed with a soft mattress. We were happy. We'd booked for two nights and planned to stay in bed for most of tomorrow.

Later that night we went downstairs for dinner and met Olivier and Thierry, a couple of French guys touring around Morocco on BMW R800GS bikes. Olivier lives in Morocco and Thierry came down for the holiday. It was great to sit and swap stories with these guys over dinner and a few bottles of wine. Unfortunately we had to make it an early night as it had been a long day. 

Having gone through our experience I realise the outcome could have been much different. As I pondered this, a tour bus full of people came in the door and were shepherded to their tables for a feed. I looked at them and none of them looked happy. I thought to myself "I never want to do that." 

We have just spent the last two weeks in incredible places, most of which we'd never heard of before. We've met some remarkable and extraordinary people, and seen landscapes that you don’t even see on postcards. Morocco is breathtaking. Just when you think you've seen it all, it slaps you in the face with another spectacular vista. We've taken a thousand photos in one day and still haven’t captured everything we’d like too. Morocco is truly a stunning experience.

This appeared on Facebook a few days later:

We are staring in our own movie, and it's a blockbuster.

Ouarzazate to the middle of nowhere...

Literally!

Sunday 24/2/13

PREFACE TO TODAY'S BLOG:

We are both safe and well. This blog was written days after the event. We are very careful, safety conscious, and we are well equipped in case we have any problems while travelling. We have top quality camping gear, a comprehensive first aid kit, emergency food for at least one day, and two or three litres of water on the bike at all times. We're not ready for anything, but we are ready for most things.

We also have a Spot GPS tracker that keeps track of our progress. You can check it here - http://tinyurl.com/nougatdog 
The best thing is that if we are in real trouble, we can push a button on Spot and it sends a message via satellite to the international emergency response centre telling them our GPS location. They then notify the local authorities that we need help and give them our exact location. The bottom line is, if we're in big trouble, and "push the button", someone will come and get us. (We also carry spare batteries for Spot with us.) Now that's out of the way, on with today's blog.

A thought popped into my head this morning. This trip has been pretty uneventful. Don't get me wrong, it's been fantastic, but I'd like a little more adventure in our adventure touring ride. We've covered some challenging dirt roads but I'm in the mood for some more. I was about to get what I wanted - in spades.

Today's weather was perfect riding weather. A forecast high in the mid twenties and just a wisp of wind. We demolished breakfast and were on the road early.

We left Ouarzazate to follow a planned route to Beni Mallal via Boulmane Dades Gorge. We had a fairly straight run through some desert which was a change to our usual dose of mountain roads. Straight roads are still boring though, it doesn't matter which country you are in.

Yup! That's a desert.

The only vegetation we saw for ages.

Looks like we'll see some more snow today.

Suzanne will think I put this in because it's romantic.

I put it in because it's a good shot of the bike.

These guys will build anywhere.

Turn north.

Places like this are everywhere.

Not long after turning north we climbed a road up a cliff in very short time.

The road to the top.

We decided to stop for lunch at the top and ordered some mint tea and a Berber Omelette. Now we have another recipe to take back home. Very nice.

Suzanne pours the mint tea the correct way.

Berber omelette. Diced onion, capsicum, a few spices, a handful of olives, and some eggs on top. This was delicious.

Fellow Pinguinos had been here before us.

We got back on the road and continued north through some amazing country and a lot of little villages.

The road ran along the edge of the gorge

for quite some way...

...like this.

These photos give no indication whatsoever of just how terrifying these roads were. The really hard part was convincing Suzanne I was fine so she felt OK. Yes, I lied to my wife (Sorry Suzette) and I just wanted to be somewhere else. We were at about 2,000 metres and still climbing when we rode through this...

...and we were still climbing.

There were still little villages dotted along the road, but nothing substantial or big enough for us to find somewhere to stay for the night.

Another courier delivery.

That's real snow.

Mountain goat. Is that a bad sign?

We're still climbing.

It really is a long, long way down.

We stopped at an intersection and were looking at our map. All the villages we rode through are too small to even be on the map, so occasionally it was a bit of hit and miss. We were riding off when a local stopped us and told us the road we were about to follow only goes six kilometres to a village, and a dead end. We took the other road.

Just passed the next village another local told us we wouldn't be able to cross the piste on our moto. It was impassable. Suzanne refused to go back down the road we came up on, and I was all in favour of avoiding it if it was at all possible. The local said we could go the other way. I'm always happy to listen to locals, so we backtracked to the village and looked for the alternative road. We weren't having much luck finding it when yet another local asked where we were going. I told him, he pointed to our map. He pointed us back to our original path. When I asked about getting through the pass he said "No problem." So off we went, back on our original path.

We were now well and truly into the mountains, and still climbing. Every time we crested a mountain, we saw another one, or two, three, or four in front of us. We rode past the gorge and along the highest cliffs I've ever seen. Yes, this time they were even higher than before.

Then the road turned into this.




Not much later the nice dirt road above turned into a pretty difficult dirt track.

We came to a Y junction, and of course chose the wrong way and rode about fifteen kilometres to a village, and a dead end. It's times like this that I'm glad the bike has a thirty two litre fuel tank. Plus we carry a little extra for insurance. We have a range of just under six hundred kilometres. We turned around and rode back to the Y junction and took the other fork. Onwards.

It was getting darker, and the track was getting rougher.

Then we encountered light snow on the track.

Nothing to worry about though.

Yes, that's the track in front of us, the gorge is on the right, the sun is low in the sky, and the moon is up.

The track was challenging to say the least. We were climbing steep, dirt switchbacks. Going east was OK, but heading west the sun was on the horizon and I couldn't see a thing. I had to stop a few times just to check where the track went. I was paddling through the muddy sections, and the bike was all over the place. Times like this direction of travel is less important than forward momentum. The BM clutch was getting a thorough workout and was getting a bit spongy. It was also pretty smelly.

Now it was starting to get very dark. I wasn't too concerned though as we'd had no real problems so far. All of a sudden we were above the real snow line and it was getting a lot darker. There were patches of snow and ice on the track in a lot of places and it was muddy and slippery in between the snow and ice.

Then it was night time.

OK, I got what I wanted, some adventure in my day. By now I'd had more than enough. But we weren't finished yet.

I could tell Suzanne hadn't been enjoying the ride today. When she gets nervous she concentrates on taking photos. Today she flattened the battery in one camera and filled the memory in the other one. That's over 1,000 photos for the day!

Then, for the first time on this trip, I dropped the bike. It was just a slow speed fall over when I lost the front end on a snowy mud patch. Nothing major. Suzanne fell off the side and rolled down the hill a little way. If we hadn't been so worn out, we would have laughed about it. Suzanne helped me pick up the bike and we were on our way again. I'd been watching the trip meter and knew we only had about thirty kilometres to go to a town where we could spend the night. Then I dropped the bike again.

This is the last photo for the day. I deleted one from the camera to take this one, then lost all interest in photography for some reason.

OK, now it's time for a little geography lesson. Mount Kosciuszko, Australia's highest mountain, reaches a height of 2,228 metres. We were up around 3,000 metres plus! (Update: We found out later that we were at around 4,500 metres) This height creates problems breathing and small efforts can wear you out pretty quickly. I was sucking air like a vacuum cleaner.

I picked the bike up and after a small rest we got going again. We didn't get far before we came across a large snow drift across the track. It was about twenty five metres across, so Suzanne dismounted and I rode on...until I hit the mud underneath the snow. The back wheel spun and slipped sideways. I managed to get it pointing in the right direction, but when I tried to move forward the wheel just spun again, and dug a hole. Bogged! We were well and truly stuck in the mud. This was not good. I wanted to take all the bags off the bike and try to get out. Suzanne wanted to camp the night. We compromised. We took all the gear off the bike, and camped for the night.

With the help of our great little head lamp torches (Thanks Mike and Laura. We've used them a lot, but tonight they were worth more than their weight in gold) we set up camp. Then we put on nearly all the clothes we had with us, crawled into our sleeping bags, and tried to sleep. Fat chance. It was freezing, literally. The water in our Camelbak and drink bottle was frozen solid. We did manage to get a few hours sleep though. 

Tomorrow, after some rest, we'll formulate a plan to get out of this mess.

UPDATE: Here's a great video of the road we traveled that I found on YouTube. Hans de Waard shot it on is ride through there. It's definitely worth a look.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4zTz4ICo7s&feature=youtu.be

For anyone interested our little camping location was: latitude was 31.95191, longitude -5.61584.