Morocco by Bicycle

The following is my own personal diary from a solo trip I made by bicycle around Southern Morocco over Christmas and New Year 2005/2006. My bicycle tours invariably seem to turn into wild and woolly adventures involving deserts, mountains, extremes of weather... and fantastic experiences. This trip was meant to be a little less 'epic' in nature, as such all the camping gear was left at home in favour of guesthouses and pensions though I did fill the space to a degree with a lot of cold weather gear and my sleeping bag… fortunately as you’ll see! It worked out well, though the terrain and weather proved to be no less extreme than past adventures and events did not quite turn out in accordance with my admittedly very rough pre-trip plan.

This, my second visit to Morocco, only served to strengthen the memories I have of the country as being populated by overwhelmingly hospitable people and blessed with some of the grandest scenery on the planet.

Note that this introduction is the only part of the journal that I am writing after the trip it describes, the rest of the content that follows is transcribed directly from my hand-written journal with no changes other than to remove some of the more personal stuff that I have no wish to air publically (though a suitable bribe might do it if you're desperately interested....)!

Enjoy!

15 December, Day 1: Marrakesh

I know I won’t be setting off into the wilds of Morocco on my bike ‘till tomorrow but I need an excuse to sit for ages in the sun at this café so what better way than kicking off my diary for this, my latest cycling adventure. Besides, it was late when the flight got in yesterday and I wanted a lie-in; the cycling can wait! Besides, if I had started out today I would have missed “Bob the Builder” in Arabic on the telly this morning, such outstanding culture we Brits export around the world! Empire-building queen Vic would have approved…..

Heathrow with the bike yesterday was pretty uneventful, my cheap BA ticket had a pretty tiny baggage allowance so it was nice that they didn’t bother to weigh my bike – that could have been expensive. Getting my bike through the drugs and explosives check was a comedy though, the poor guy at the oversize baggage portal was a newbie and didn’t have a clue what he was doing when it came to anything more challenging than a small suitcase.

Shame arrival in Marrakesh wasn’t quite so easy, the going rate for a cab into town from the airport is 100Dh (about 7 quid) but whether it had anything to do the late hour or not I was b***ered if I could persuade a cabbie to take me and the bike for anything less than 200. Ho hum, the need for my bed took precedence in the end and I gave in, wasn’t so bad – got chatting about cycling to the driver, turned out he was holding a racing license for the Moroccan cycling federation – amazing, it’s not exactly a high profile sport here. I later found out that there is indeed a Tour du Maroc, a 2-week long stage race. Sounds like fun!

My hotel for 2 nights is a typically dull-but-comfy identikit modern place, but that’s what you get for booking at last minute close to Christmas. On the plus side it’s spotless, has a buffet breakfast (so I can surreptitiously fill my panniers tomorrow before setting off….), and is close to the Djemaa el Fna, supermarket and bank next door. Ideal. They didn’t even raise an eyebrow as I wedged my (currently spotless) bike in the lift up to my room. Wonder if they’ll be so forgiving when I return filthy dirty and smelling of the desert (camel crap…. or is that dromedary dung…?) after 3 weeks on the road……?

It’s great to be back in Marrakesh after a 7 year absence. On the face of it nothing has changed…. But in reality it has, the hustlers and touts have {almost} gone… not by magic a’la an Arabian Nights fairy tale but rather thanks to a somewhat pro-active police force mobilized when the government realized the place was gaining an awful reputation amongst tourists. I can’t remember it being particularly bad during my last visit but I guess some visitors find adjustment tougher than well-travelled folk like me (don’t mean to brag or anything but…). Serves ‘em right for turning up looking like proper tw*ts in their flowery resort wear… honestly, some people have no taste! I’m not complaining however, it’s very pleasant but I can’t imagine the ex-hustlers trying to scrape a living agree….. on the bright side I imagine they get free meals when in jail…. Ahem (apologies, that was a very politically incorrect statement!).

I’m on my second coffee now, got a really thick head this morning and I can’t even blame jetlag (there isn’t any). It’s funny to be back in the very same café I spent my first morning in Marrakesh at in ’98. The terrace looks out over the Djemaa el Fna, there’s only the usual crowd of mad storytellers, snake charmers and brightly painted juice stalls at the mo but I’m looking forward to a good feed this evening when the food stalls get going.

I had thought about planning my trip a bit while sitting here…. I have my map with me but as usual I’m failing miserably in that respect. The only real decision I’ve made for tomorrow is the road I’m taking out of town…. It goes south east, straight towards Asni and the wall of the Atlas mountains I can see rising up from the plain in the distance. That’ll do for now, I’ll see how far I get and then take it a day at a time. I do know that at some point in the next few days I’ll cross the Tizi’n Test road pass at 2100m. Map says it’s a poor road and gets snowed in during winter….. so that’ll be now then…. I await the adventure with interest!

Later: well, back in my nice-but-dull room after a fun afternoon re-acquainting myself with the souks followed by dinner in the Djemaa el Fna which was…. an utterly forgettable couscous, so I won’t go back to that stall on my return…. Perhaps I should have had the boiled sheep’s head after all. This evening I’ve done enough faffing around with my gear in the name of getting ready such that I feel able to sleep though I’m scared silly about tomorrow, as I always am on the first day before setting off into the unknown on my bike!

Good night!

16 December, Day 2: Marrakesh to Ouirgane (68km)

Brilliant start today, buffet breakfasts and cyclists were just made for each other (well, for this particular cyclist anyway)! I no longer get embarrassed by the incredulous looks from hotel staff and other diners as the piles of food rapidly disappear into a deceptively skinny body (and, ahem, into my bag… supplies for the road and all that!). The only downside is that the French legacy means it’s a so-called continental breakfast – baguettes, jam, cheese and hardboiled eggs. Some fruit and cereal would be nice though they are cooking fresh the little pancakes that seem to be a Moroccan specialty – nice with honey. The tea and coffee though is bloody awful, the fresh-squeezed orange juice barely compensates for it!

After breakfast the hotel staff at reception fell about laughing as I gingerly wheeled a fully loaded bike backwards and vertically upended on the rear wheel out of the hotel lift… an operation even I thought would be difficult but I execute without a hitch! It was fun riding my bike with panniers down the carpeted corridors upstairs beforehand…. When no-one was looking of course!

Nervous as a cat I wheeled my bike out into the chaos of a Marrakesh morning rush hour – I had hoped that starting on a Friday morning (Moslem day of prayer) might have meant quieter roads…. but not so. Ah well, not so different to my days cycling in Montreal I guess. It felt great to be finally “on the road again”…. The cycling gods weren’t in a good mood though, I lasted 5 minutes before “psssssss….” and I was riding on flat rubber. My supposedly kevlar-belted tyres had succumbed to the glass liberally strewn across the streets – in particular a rather evil looking shard nearly an inch long. Can’t criticize Panaracer too much, these very same tyres carried me across the Himalayas without a single flat. The whole episode caused much amusement to a guy tending a roadside hedgerow as I swore loudly, upended my bike and started wrestling with tyre levers….. Being Friday and all I did offer a small prayer to the aforementioned gods that this would be my one and only puncture for the entire journey….. but either they weren’t listening or were peeved that I didn’t sacrifice any small animals (or whatever…) across the altar of my saddle as I did have another… about 2 hours down the road, only this time it was the valve blowing out of my spare tube (mental note: don’t buy any more tubes from Continental!).

Navigation out of the city proved refreshingly easy with the help of a friendly copper on one confusing intersection and I had a lovely note of encouragement as a local guy cycling to work gave me a pat on the back and a hearty “bon voyage!” as he passed.

I found it pretty hard going for the first couple of hours, mentally and physically….. The road south out of the city is monumentally dull as it first departs the scruffy outskirts of the city and then makes its way across the plain towards the mountains. Pretty much dead straight & just ever so slightly uphill – you wouldn’t notice in a car but on a bike it’s just enough to hurt and make you wonder what’s wrong with your legs as it appears flat. The surface is rough enough to be annoying and the surrounding plain is just grey, stony waste….. mind-numbing. Not even a scruffy village or two to break the monotony! Nearly forgot to mention the headwind as well….. ! The only thing that keeps me going is the sight of the high Atlas in front of me with snow-capped peaks gleaming in the sunshine. It’s a major relief when I reach the foothills and the road starts to weave and climb properly, the scenery gets interesting too.

My first stop on the road is the village of Tahounate, just in time to grab a tea with a local guy before the place shuts down for the midday prayers. He’s a nice guy and I can’t imagine they see many visitors in this place but predictably he has some silver bracelets for sale buried in his blue djellaba… equally as predictably I don’t buy one citing such excuses as extra weight on my bike etc, and I feel rotten about 2km up the road as I realise I left him to pay for the tea as well…. Ooops, though he did eat nearly all the pretzels I brought from the UK!

Divine retribution for the tea came pretty quickly in the form of my second puncture of the day. This time I had company for it though, local youths cycling home from school had been my escort for a few km – a captive cycle-tourist makes great practice for their English, which is pretty good!

I had planned to try and get as far as Ijoukak today in order to get a good crack at the Tizi’n Test but once on the road I realise that would be a very long day, and now after all the mucking about with punctures and tea I revise my plans to stop at Ouirgane. I’m not one for being a slave to a guide book but seeing as I’m going that way, and that Lonely Planet makes it sounds like a lovely little village I decide to terminate my day there. All of a sudden, knowing I only have another 20km or so to ride and that I’ll have plenty of hours of daylight to explore when I arrive, I start messing about and really enjoying my ride after the monotony of the plains.

When I do arrive it turns out that Ouirgane is so small it couldn’t even be described as a one-horse town, perhaps one-pony would be a better description. It is pretty though and in a lovely setting. Even the coppers at the police checkpoint (they’re everywhere in Morocco) have a big grin for me. Sort myself out with a room at the pricey-but-nice (in a rustic way) Chez Momo (well, I am on holiday and this is only a short trip!)…. Price is all relative I suppose when I realise that my 400dh (£25) gets me breakfast and dinner as well as a room with hot water! There’s even a swimming pool with a view but at this time of year and altitude (I’ve climbed 1000m since Marrakesh) it’s positively glacial. Not even my big toe gets a look in….. I’m happy without the diversion of a swim, a wander round the tiny village and some futzing with the bike and my afternoon is gone!

A few other guests turn up later, the first couple (English, Hugh & Sheila) meet my criteria of “jolly nice people” straight away by a) being here for some walking, b) being completely unpretentious, and c) sharing their tea and sticky cream buns! The other couple demonstrate how wrong first impressions can be – young Londoners they turn up looking like they’ve stepped right off Oxford street… and hence a little too trendy for back-country Morocco….. but it turns out they’re also super-nice and the five of us have a great evening – huddled round a roaring log fire in Hugh and Sheila’s suite (I haven’t got one… shame, the temperature plummeted this evening!) sharing travel stories, and later enjoying a fabulous rabbit tagine from the guesthouse kitchen. Yum. Fab bread too.... I do the typical hungry cyclist thing and ‘vacuum up’ everything left over by my more normal (non-cycling) companions!

Glad I have my sleeping bag to curl up in, it’s absolutely frigid this evening and although my room is well equipped with blankets and portable heater (which, by the state of it, looks rather dangerous….) it’s not the same as having your own goose-down cocoon!

17 December, Day 3: Ouirgane to…… Ouirgane! (36km)

I had plans today, big ones involving 160km on the bike and crossing the Tizi’nTest at 2100m… but as usual my plans rapidly go out the window. It would have required an early start, so yesterday I’d requested breakfast at 7:30am… “no problem” apparently… except it was and by 8.30am the staff were still sleeping. I’m very ‘brekkie-oriented’ as friends well know and I didn’t feel particularly enthusiastic about tackling a big day in the mountains on an empty stomach. Well, that’s my excuse anyway. Instead I kick back, relax, swipe a couple of incredibly fragrant oranges off the trees in the garden (frost on the ground this morning!) and enjoy a leisurely breakfast at 9am with the others. I also manage to convince myself (quite successfully) that I’m still tired and stressed from work, I’m on holiday, and various other excuses so decide to just explore the local area today on my bike. The surrounding valleys are quite beautiful – so I do exactly that and thoroughly enjoy it. It also means I get to spend another fab evening in good company, munching oranges and talking by a roaring log fire. Hugh and Sheila are interesting characters, they both have a major love affair with Africa going on and he has worked and travelled in just about every nation on the continent it seems.

I cycled back down the road to Marrakech a few km’s during the afternoon, to Asni. Its pure luck that it’s market day so I pick up fruit, veg and dried fruits (energy!)in the bustling melee, where naturally I’m ‘found’ by a “tuareg” chap who has {apparently, just like the guy yesterday....} fallen on hard times and just happens to have some silver Berber jewellery for sale… he’s a nice guy though so after I’ve stocked up on fresh stuff at the market we enjoy a leisurely mint tea at a nearby café. This time however I do buy a lovely silver bracelet from him – it’ll be handy as a belated Christmas gift on my return home and isn’t too bulky or heavy to carry on the bike over the next few hundred km. I still let him pay for the tea though…… Scored a bonus on the return trip too – found a bike shop so I’m able to replace my spare inner tube, peace of mind for the coming days in the middle of nowhere!

Back in Ouirgane the local shop has become something of a hangout for the 5 westerners staying in the village, we each seem to be making multiple trips across the dirt ‘plaza’ for yet more biscuits/bread/chocolate/cake/milk/water* etc (*delete as appropriate!). The shopkeeper is particularly bemused when I rock up on my bike on return from Asni and tell him that tomorrow I’m riding all the way to Taroudant…

Once again the temperature plummeted come nightfall and I retire early determined that tomorrow I really will endure the pain of the next 80km of climbing to the top of the Tizi’n Test….. and a further 80km after that to the next town likely to have accommodation.

18 December, Day 4: Ouirgane to Tizi’n Test (82km)

Wake up early… and a bit hungry so have a pre-breakfast snack (huddled in front of the heater) of bread (toasted over the heater…), tuna, bananas and oranges (OK, I was very hungry…) before packing up my gear.

I also now know why the guys are so reluctant to get out of bed early to provide breakfast, at 7.30am. I do get breakfast but it’s absolutely bloody frigid….. (the air temperature, not the breakfast!) inside as well as out. There’s no sun yet to take the frost off everything and the fire in the dining area has gone out…. So I eat breakfast with my gloves and get jam all over them… ah well, worst case I can suck the sugars out of the fabric when I run out of energy on the climb…. hehehe! It was worth staying for breakfast though for fresh pancakes and proper, freshly ground coffee (luxury!).

At 8am I rolled away from Ouirgane in the early morning sunshine full of trepidation for the climbing ahead and not knowing if I’d find a place to stay in the next 160km. The first couple of hours were lovely, the road weaving and rolling its way through a steep mountain valley – following the course of the river. Bloody freezing though as the road happens to be on the eastern side of the valley and hence won’t get any warmth until around midday when the sun moves above the surrounding peaks. It’s also satisfying to note that I’m also climbing steadily without too much pain… that is unless the laws of physics have changed since yesterday and rivers no longer flow downhill…

The road is really rather peaceful, especially this early. Just single vehicle width with a reasonable surface. The only hazards I encounter in the first couple of hours are a couple of “enthusiastically aggressive” dogs and a bunch of stone throwing brats. A well aimed rock deterred the first, I suppose I should have done the same to the second but I’m too nice for that… instead they were called off by a couple of adults just around the next bend. Bit of a shame really, generally the kids are really nice but I guess here they do see some tourists…. The standard ‘greeting’ for a passing foreigner goes “un stylo, un stylo, un stylo…..” and if no pen is forthcoming it changes to “un dirham, un dirham, un dirham….” And if that is unsuccessful they either give a dirty look, or in this case….. chuck stones…. (or try and shove a stick through your spokes).

By 10.30am I’m at Ijoukak, a sizeable ‘village’ situated on a riverside plain where the valley opens out. The view from the road into town is stunning, the surrounding area is heavily cultivated and terraced and I can now see the snow-covered high peaks ahead, towards which I’m climbing, forming an incredible backdrop to the ubiquitous mosque minaret….. It would be really nice to stop here for a while… but there’s a long way to go so I pull in at the first shop I come to and buy hot bread and water (the water was cold, only the bread was hot….!) and promptly ride off again clutching a whole loaf of bread in my hand and munching away as I ride….. much to the bemusement of the locals I pass.

It’s olive harvest time here at the moment, the groves surrounding the town are bustling with activity as I ride on through the surrounding farmland. Back in Ouirgane, Hugh, whose French is far better than mine, had found out that olive harvesting is one of the highest risk occupations in Morocco… the branches of the trees are very weak so it’s the job of all the small, light people to go up into the trees and shake the olives into waiting blankets below…. quite often followed by themselves as a branch gives way. The list of injuries every year is quite substantial…. Broken limbs, necks, backs etc etc. Could be the one part of the world where being a fat bloke is good for your health… you wouldn’t be expected to climb trees!

The road started to climb pretty rapidly a few km’s after Ijoukak, but spirits are really good, everyone I pass in the little communities has a cheery greeting for me. It gets pretty toasty warm too as I move into sunlight, it’s welcome for a bit as my fingers and toes thaw out… but then gets really warm with the sustained effort…. The brief periods of deep-freeze as the road moves back into shadow on the hairpins are almost welcome. Amost!

When I really start to overheat I stop to remove my thermal “lycra arms and legs” and stuff some dates inside of me. A little white car coming down the mountain pulls up to make sure I’m OK (westerners on bikes seem to be something of a rarity around here…!)… a voice call’s out “g’day, you alright mate!?”… it’s a pair of Australian blokes in their rental car! I’m fine but it’s funny to have a chat. They think I’m totally mad cycling up here… I know I still have a lot of climbing to do but I go ahead and ask a really silly question… “is it far to the top?” to which the half-laughing predictable reply is “you must be bloody joking, it’s miles up there…..!”. I get caught out too as absent mindedly I take a little jar of chamois cream out of my seatpack to deal with a bit of chafing “behind” and get caught with my hand down the back of my shorts – “Oi !! is that Vaseline for yer arse… you’ll bloody need that!!”. Hehehe, good fun. Scrounge some water off them and then crack on towards the top…..

The roadside has km markers on the climb, same as in the mountains of Europe – in Europe though they count the distance to the top of the climb, here they’re counting down to the next town, Taroudant. They started at 161km this morning and it’s something of on occasion when after more than 60km of mostly uphill riding I reach the 99km marker! Stop to have a celebratory pee (all over the marker I’m afraid…) and another handful of dates!

The climb is a real classic as it approaches the last 15km or so to the top – the narrow road winding its tortuous way around the steepening mountainside with stupendous views back down the valley I’ve travelled up. I’m too busy enjoying the scene to notice the effort…much.

The top of the climb wasn’t very ‘fair’, the road reaches a crest and I figured I’d done it especially when a local guy in a pickup coming the other way gave me a great cheer…. But it’s not, it’s a false summit and I think I can see the true summit seemingly miles away. Bugger. The next couple of km is slightly downhill and I begrudge every meter of it, I’m losing my hard-won altitude only to have to climb back up again. Finally reach the summit at about 1:45pm… it’s 80km from Ouirgane, nearly all of it uphill, I’m rather happy to be at the top! There’s a breeze-block café, the usual fossils and tagines for sale and not a lot else though the proprietor clearly thinks I’m some sort of superhuman for having cycled up there… I decide there’s nothing wrong with letting him continue to enjoy his illusion! I do have a celebratory mint tea from him but decline the food, I’m not really hungry and it’s still 80km to Taroudant so rather than fill up on oily stuff, and waste too much time, I just sit and quietly stuff dates, bread and biscuits from my panniers, after putting all my arms, legs and jacket back on - it’s freezing at the top!

Set off again just after 2pm, 100 metres from the café the road rounds a bend and an absolutely mind-bending view opens up to the south! I’m perched right on the edge of the, Atlas Mountains, from here the mountainside (and the road, yippee!) plummets 2000 metres to the plain of the Souss Valley. Far in the distance the massif of the Anti-Atlas rises up again on the other side of the Souss, it really is an epic scene – well worth the 20 minutes or so I spend just sitting absorbing it and enjoying the absolute silence of the desert.

From here the (now downhill!) road turned to loose dirt and pebbles, little bit tricky, especially on the hairpins with no barriers or run-off margins and a 2km drop-off. It’s not too difficult on the bike but I’d hate to be caught up here in bad weather and I can understand why it apparently freaks visitors out in their rental cars or the local buses! The Australian guys this morning mentioned a little tea-stop at the 1800m mark on this side of the mountain, run apparently by a super-friendly multi-lingual Berber chap…. I’d made a resolution to stop there as it sounded nice and opened up the possibility of being able to spend the night up here instead of killing myself trying to get to Taroudant before dark.

Sure enough, perched on a hairpin with stunning views down the mountain is the “Sunset Café”! Appropriate name I guess seeing as it faces west, and what the place lacks in luxury the owner, Ahmet, more than makes up for in warmth. I can’t imagine he sees many people at this time of year so a nutcase turning up on a bicycle is quite an event! He has a basic room I can have too, it’s rustic in the extreme with animal skin on the floor and freezing cold but the view is simply incredible. Decide to stay, dump my gear and proceed to eat my way through a mountain of biscuits with tea while Ahmet prepares the best “Berber Omelette” I’ve ever tasted!

Hunger satisfied (for the time being anyway) we get talking, he’s been up here for 10 years though has family in a village at the bottom of the mountain, they bring supplies up and occasionally he swaps with his brother so can have time at home. Turns out he has a huge pile of photographs of his family and of visitors from around the world…. so I put my ‘politely interested’ face on while inwardly thinking “gawd, I’d rather just go and sleep” but he’s as good as gold and only shows me the best while drifting off into a reverie of his own memories, leaving me to go and sort my gear out and investigate the washing facilities….

I’m contemplating an ice cold bucket of water when Ahmet shows up with a bucket of piping hot water he’s heated on his stove for me… how nice! Retreat to the washroom (read “smelly pit toilet with a dim 12v light bulb”) where my slippery bar of soap promptly pops out of my hand and disappears down the hole…. There’s no way I’m even going to attempt to retrieve it! Don’t mind too much, sweat and road dust doesn’t really need soap, just being slightly cleaner makes me feel like a million dollars… ready for more tea and biscuits now!

There’s no electricity as such up here but there are solar panels on the roof charging a car battery which drives a couple of inadequate bulbs, there’s also a half-built wind-generator lying outside – it looks pretty new so I imagine it will get finished rather than turn into a perpetually unfinished project.

Sunset is epic. I’m not normally one for getting romantic over sunsets but from up here and with the enormous views it really is something special….. just like the night sky once it’s properly dark – the air is crystal clear and dry so it’s a classic “big sky” crowded with stars. Bone chillingly cold though so the rest of the evening is spent in retreat round a log fire eating a super veg tagine and talking about pretty much everything current – politics, religion – you name it. Ahmet is a pretty switched on guy. It’s easy to get in some quality criticism of mister George Bush too, he seems to be subject to extreme dislike globally. Good.

Just one last thing – I can’t help noticing the lighting arrangements this evening - typically “Moroccan”… the gas lamp is simply a propane bottle with a tall u-shaped piece of copper pipe jammed in the valve, flattened at the free end with a wick bound on with wire. Health and Safety rules…!! Bed early feeling happier than I have done for a long time.

19 December, Day 5: Tizi’n Test to Taroudant (86km)

Kind of reluctant to drag myself out my sleeping bag this morning, as I write the sun hasn’t poked it’s head over the mountains yet so the air is frigid, I’ve got the promise of a cold start too, the first 20km are all downhill so no chance to get warm pedalling. Breakfast is bread, warmed over a gas flame, filled with sardines in chilli sauce and lots of instant coffee. At 8.30am I say my farewells and take off down the mountain wrapped up in waterproofs (it’s not raining but the wind-chill is nasty) and my down gilet, it does feel a bit odd to be riding a bike while dressed up looking like the Michelin Man but I’d rather than freeze my nuts off for the next 45 mins or so.

The descent is superb (aside from the cold), the road surface is pretty good, views… well, I already mentioned those yesterday I think, and it’s fun getting into a rhythm round the hairpins. There are no foothills tapering out from the high mountains which simply feels wrong, never before have I have literally ridden straight down from one of the highest mountains in a range and literally rolled out onto a plain. The Atlas really does stop here just like a wall, albeit a very big, snowy wall….! It’s lovely and warm on the valley bottom, pretty dull in the scenic stakes but the road continues to go gently downhill, with a tailwind (hooray!) for the next 60 km or so all the way to Taroudant. There’s bugger all to write about for this bit, it was pretty dull – just a few dusty one-street towns, kids on bikes trying to race me, endless orange groves and not a lot else. The only saving grace is that the wind and gradient mean I get to Taroudant in record time (for a fully loaded touring bike) and it’s not long before I’m installed in a relatively nice room at the Hotel Tiout, and my bike is similarly comfortably installed in the laundry shed outside under the watchful eye of a giggling maid! I only chose this hotel because apparently it has that cyclist’s favourite – a cheap but good buffet breakfast….. nothing to do with the hot shower, honest!

On the face of it Taroudant doesn’t look anything special, it’s a warm and dusty town surrounded by many km of fortified walls. It does feel like an outpost town in a way and for this reason I like it. It’s devoid of sights as such but the souk is pretty interesting and low key and the street life is typically Moroccan without any tourist influence which makes it a top place to explore in my mind. Only exception to the no-tourist rule seems to be one or two coaches on day trips from Agadir that disgorge their cargos of fat, badly dressed Germans (and, errrm, English) into the main square for an hour or two of “authentic Morocco” before whisking them back to the sterility of a resort hotel. Cheap and tasty grub here too, a decent lunchtime feed of chickpeas, vegetable stew, bread and tea sets me back a mere 9 dirham at a little “hole in the wall” place with a happily grinning chef behind his big steaming pots out front! The rest of my afternoon is given over to eating oranges, exploring the town, drinking tea, eating more oranges and generally trying to chill out. Did I mention the oranges… all those orange groves I passed on my bike are producing some wonderful fruit and dirt cheap too. By sundown the sun is covered by an ominous looking layer of high cloud but it gives a bit of atmosphere to the scene I stumble across of an informal football match taking place on a patch of bare ground alongside an austere, crumbling section of city walls…. It doesn’t look so good for the weather outlook though.

I never do myself any favours really by cycling 90km and then spending the rest of the day running around looking at things when really it might be a good idea to rest my legs… But I think I’ll stay here tomorrow anyway to enjoy the town, feeling lazy and I kind of fancy the attractions of a haircut, good food, getting laundry done and so on, though in my mind I’m really just putting off the effort of having to regain all my lost altitude by riding back up into the Anti-Atlas! I also need to get myself properly “cashed up” with dirham before heading off into the back of beyond.

20 December, Day 6: Taroudant

I did half-heartedly pack my gear last night in case I woke up feeling all fresh and motivated…. But I didn’t, instead I’m looking forward to a leisurely breakfast and getting to know the town!

Spend my morning photographing the street life in and around the vegetable market, the vendors and locals here seem quite happy with the camera which is nice, I guess because it’s not a tourist destination. The fresh squeezed orange juice from the sellers in the square is expectedly tasty, and cheaper than Marrakesh… 2Dh instead of 3! It’s here while chatting to one of the sellers that he notices the state of the eczema on my hands….. and calls his buddy over who has some relationship with the local Argan Oil Co-operative…. A bit of background on Argan oil might be useful right now… so rather than me write out a load of stuff that someone else has already written down – have a look here.

I guess the key factors you need to know are:

· it’s very very good for your skin

· it’s ground from nuts collected from goat turds

· it’s rather labour intensive, 20hrs of work for 1 litre of oil

· it’s good for eating….

So there you go, that stuff I’m putting on my face and in my food came out of a goat’s backside…. Just as an aside, locally they mix the Amlou (the paste after grinding) with honey to spread on bread – it’s incredibly tasty, just don’t think about the goats!

The Co-op has tons of stuff on offer, it’s all fixed price and quite expensive but at least here I know it’s genuine and my money will go straight to the right people. Apparently because it is expensive anyway there’s a lot of fake stuff for sale as Argan on the streets, especially when there’s tourists around….. It also means my ‘guide’ has no vested interest in a commission or similar, in fact afterwards we chat a bit and agree to meet for tea later. Nice guy. As to what I bought – just pure oil for my skin.

As for the rest of my day – well aside from wandering the souks, chatting to various locals, stuffing my face with figs and dates and burning some film in my camera only two other things of note happened… The first was my haircut, much needed and a great cut, and the guy who cut it was proof that the stereotypical hairdresser is the same all over the world…. i.e. just a bit, how shall I put it… of a fairy if you see what I mean. Only difference between my Moroccan barber and his UK counterpart being the lack of an Audi TT/Toyota MR2/MGF/any other frilly sports car parked outside! One thing I will say – he took a lot more care over his handiwork than his average UK counterpart. 1 1/2 hrs it took though that did include the obligatory break for mint tea and a “natter” with his buddies who also popped in for tea. I was silly really, I should have negotiated the price before sitting down but never really thought about it … “how expensive can it be here” was my thought as he sharpened his razor. Well, either very expensive or the tea was a special premium brew at £9/glass… 10 quid it cost, or its equivalent in dirham. I didn’t argue (much) since it was my fault for once being the gullible tourist….!

The other significant event was that it started to rain…. Pi** it down in fact. The cloud had been getting thicker all day. I felt the first drops about 2.30pm, by 7pm the streets were flooded… wet feet walking back to the hotel after dinner! Spent the rest of the evening in the hotel’s street level tea-salon watching the rain, eating chocolate from the little shop opposite and drinking….. for a change….. tea! Proper tea though, not the sickly sweet mint stuff – a real “Thé English” as it’s popularly known. Good old Lipton, found all over the world except, strangely enough, the shelves of any of my local supermarkets in England!

Today has also been a good chance to bash off a few emails to the folks at home, let them know what I’m up to – though negotiating the knackered French/Arabic keyboards in the internet café is a painful process for my QWERTY-conditioned fingers!

Hope the rain stops before I set off tomorrow for the lofty heights of the Anti-Atlas…

21 December, Day 7: Taroudant to Igherm (89km)

6.30am… wake up to the sound of rain hammering down outside and my heart sinks…. Spent an unusually long time in the hot shower this morning trying to corral the fragments of my motivation left shattered after waking up to the cacophony of raindrops! Breakfast sorted me out though… typically enormous with loads of coffee! Motivation returned in spades as I stuffed my gear into panniers, retrieved my bike from its cosy home next to the industrial-sized washing machine across the yard and sealed myself into raingear…. Just one more obstacle to my departure presented itself…. The guy who ‘watches’ the parking area for guests cars wants his due for ‘guarding my bike’ despite the fact that it’s been locked away out of sight for the last two days… oh well, in the interests of international cyclist relations I cave-in easily and give him his fee of 20dh… negotiated down from 40 on the basis that my bike has two wheels, not four….!

Rolled out of town around 8am, wheels splashing through the flooded streets. Conditions are such that it feels very odd to be riding through what, on arrival, was a dusty, desert town surrounded by a typically desiccated landscape.

The first few kilometres are simply backtracking the way I came in, which aside from being rather dull isn’t much fun as the wind is now in my face and I also receive firm confirmation from my protesting legs that the road I travelled into town from the Tizi’nTest is indeed slightly downhill…. I’m crawling back up it at a measly 18km/hr.

My latest plan, developed last night, is to ride East to Igherm high into the Anti-Atlas before, in the coming days, heading North then East again to reach the oases of the Draa Valley…. Hard cycling ahead, but exciting. Also means no beach at the end, but an oasis in the desert will do just fine instead! {post trip note: The first part of that plan, to Igherm, turned into perhaps the second hardest day I’ve ever spent on my bike, after one particular day in Ladakh… but more about that later, back to the morning….}

My Michelin map says there’s a tiny road that turns off this main road about 8km from Taroudant and eventually joins up with the road to Igherm (there’s only one road going East!)… and sure enough, 8km out there’s a right turn – must be it so off I go spirits much higher now I’m away from that dull drag from Taroudant! The next few km hints at a promise of interesting riding to come – the road is nice and twisty and about 90% dirt (with very large puddles) so no chance to get bored. Despite carrying a full load I still whip past locals negotiating the broken sections on their boneshakers… though I’m having my bones shaken too and if Murphy and his law have been translated into Arabic I wouldn’t be surprised if something breaks…. Though I abused my bike far more in the Himalayas there weren’t any people around to be embarrassed in front of!

The promise of interesting riding evaporates pretty quickly when I reach the easterly road I want… for the next 2 hours it’s just a slog – dead straight, slightly uphill (again!) with enough of a cross-headwind to make life difficult. To add to the ‘misery’ there’s not even anything to look at, there’s nothing but barren scrub all around as far as the eye can see… which isn’t very far because the drizzle is so thick! The only thing I can see that isn’t a stone or scrubby little bush is the Anti-Atlas rising up in front of me… I can’t wait to reach the mountains where things are bound to be more stimulating. To get there though I have to keep going dead straight – I can see the ribbon of road gently stretching up ahead without even the merest hint of a wiggle. Bugger. Most cyclists moan when the road starts to climb proper hills…. but not this one (‘they’ always said I was a bit odd…..), it’s blessed relief when all of a sudden I’m in the mountains, there’s a proper gradient, bends and stuff to look at, even if it is just more rock! The rain has eased too so I give it 20 minutes further riding to see if it’s just a brief pause before stopping to strip my now sweaty raingear off… but of course when I do stop, and pack all my gear away it returns with the very first pedal stroke…. It’s not hard to decide I’d rather be wet now though, I’m sheltered from the wind and working hard so stay warm in just a windproof top and knee-warmers. A couple of passing trucks (in fact the only passing things I’ve seen so far today) slowed down and their drivers yell encouragement, clearly they think I’m some kind of super-human cycling god riding up here….. can’t say I blame them hehehehe!!

The climbing is pretty monotonous for an hour or two but about 11am I reach a typically windswept and scruffy village clinging to a mountain ridge….there’s one shop I can see… so with a couple of dodgy looking kids trailing me I roll up to re-supply… but he’s got no bread or water, instead I’m directed 20yds further to what looks like a crumbling concrete shed with a very faded coke sign painted on the wall… doesn’t look promising inside either… dark and nothing but hundreds of bottles of lurid orange fizzy stuff stacked against the walls. The old boy sitting inside though is much friendlier than the kids outside (and the weather) and he sorts me out with some still-warm bread to munch and a water bottle refill.

The next few km lull me into a false sense of security because even though I have a strong headwind the road ahead looks vaguely flat/rolling with no significant climbing, stupidly I think I’m doing really well and have got the worst of the day over……..

To cut a long story slightly less long – the next few hours turned into a major endurance test as the headwind increased to gale-force, I ascended into the low, wet cloud-base and the road started to climb again… relentlessly as it wound it’s tortuous way round barren, windswept peaks and through tiny, remote settlements (what a place to live, I shall moan about Cornish winters no more!). It went on for hours and every time I thought I’d cracked the latest climb the noise of a truck on an un-noticed hairpin high above me would bring me almost to tears (and swearing loudly)! The landscape was pretty epic though (when I could see it), tortured volcanic escarpments and summits separated by barren rocky plains – quite the place to go riding a bicycle… on your own… in a storm… in winter….. (hmmmm, maybe I do need to see a ‘head doctor’)!

I was literally on my last legs, mentally as much as physically by the time I passed a milestone saying “Igherm 2km”… at last! By now I’d been reduced to a pathetic crawl of around 6km flat-out because of the wind, with hailstones and icy rain periodically stinging my face. My happiness at only 2km to go was tempered slightly (well, lots – the air was blue, luckily only my bike to hear it) when the edge of the village appeared out of the swirling cloud… 2km above me! More uphill grovelling, bugger.

The first straggly bit of settlement was not inspiring, the sign said “Igherm” but the only sign of life amongst the straggly settlement with it’s one and only café (closed and shuttered!) was the open blue door of a telephone office…. My heart was rapidly sinking by this stage as there wasn’t any obvious place to stay or get food… Closer investigation of the teleboutique though brought a very warm welcome from a group of local women, all wrapped in stunning blue silk dress (veiled of course) huddled around a charcoal brazier. They made room for me and for the next 20 mins I warmed my hands over the charcoal and made the best use of my French to have a conversation… and failed miserably, the cold, fatigue and almost 8 hours of effort had thoroughly addled my brain! It was seriously heart-warming as a foreigner to be made so welcome by the women with not a local male in sight, maybe the traditional Muslim taboo is slightly tempered up here by the harshness of life. My lasting memory of this encounter though will be their eyes, with covered faces the eyes become the centre of attention…. They were sparkling eyes, full of laughter……

Despite the refusal of my brain to cooperate they did manage to get clear that this place with the Igherm signpost, logically, wasn’t Igherm at all…!.The real Igherm was another kilometre or so along the road and yes, there was an open café there with room to stay! My legs felt slightly better at this news but failed again when I eventually stumbled into an open café with a very, very loud TV (showing a bad spaghetti western) and collapsed in an exhausted heap! My arrival seemed to provide some amusement for the locals, wrapped in their wool cloaks, huddled in front of the TV, the owner appeared eventually to tell me that he was closed (!) and that he had no rooms available despite the sign outside saying quite the opposite….. So, directed back out into the muddy, gritty, deserted, derelict, storm-swept, ice cold main street (I’m trying to think of as many suitable words to describe the place as possible...) and round a corner 100 metres up the road…. To find a regular metropolis (well, compared to anything else I’ve seen today!) where there’s another café, a couple of trucks, some locals standing around, wrapped up against the cold and a couple of beaten-up old Grand Taxis. I’ve arrived! Fate started smiling for a change, this café is really quite nice (it’s all relative) and equally as packed with an equally loud TV as the last one… except the owner is a super guy who shows me a tidy little box room for 50dh and carries my panniers upstairs for me while I negotiate my bike, to the bemusement of the locals, through the packed café and up the same windy staircase at the back. It gets better too…. There’s a doorway near my room with a rough sign on it saying “douche chaud, 6dh” (hot shower)…. I couldn’t have been happier if I’d won the lottery!

First priority though is food, my legs are like jelly so a quick change into just about every item of dry clothing I own (it’s cold in here) and downstairs for the hungry cyclist routine…. Coffee, biscuits, bread, lentil stew, bread, meat stew, bread, chickpea and vegetable stew … and more bread followed by tea! A good start to my ‘tab’!

The highlight of my day…. the shower, it was ace, gas-powered and boiling hot – I can forgive the cigarette butts in the sink outside for that! The shower and the food saw me sufficiently restored to wrap up take a walk round the village… it didn’t take long, aside from the weather the place consisted of a muddy street, a couple of forlorn looking shops in a covered “souk” selling the usual oranges, carrots, biscuits (and chocolate, thankfully!) etc, owners huddled collectively around flaming braziers, and a sort of makeshift tent/market stall with an old guy selling piles of dates…. Good enough, lucky I like oranges and dates…

The rest of the afternoon and evening was a blur…. Mostly spent eating chocolate and oranges while huddled in my sleeping bag in my room at a balmy 5 degs C indoors, or downstairs in the café watching al Jazeera and eating yet more, all in the interests of recovery you understand, tomorrow could be an equally hard day of riding… though I hope not.…!

In bed by 7pm accompanied by the sound of the storm raging outside my metal shutters (which appear to be permanently fixed shut).

22 December, Day 8: Igherm (0km)

6.30am: It’s 2 degs C in my room when I wake up…. and depressingly, after a night spent listening to it, the weather is still raging outside as every so often a squall howls it’s way down the street, rattling shutters and increasing the intensity of rain and ice pellets on my shutters. Drat.

My legs are still feeling pretty dead after yesterday’s efforts too so when I got up I left just about all my enthusiasm for riding behind, tucked up in the bottom of my sleeping bag I think…! Still, I’m supposed to be a tough cyclist explorer type so I went through the motions of dressing for the weather and wander downstairs for breakfast and to ponder whether I can really find the motivation to ride over 100km today, i.e. the distance to the next nearest town in any direction…. As it turned out after a drawn-out breakfast of coffee, bread, jam and eggs spent staring at the desolate scene outside I decide that conditions are just too dangerous to ride a long way in this terrain and altitude, heck the wind is gale force, it’s snowing mixed with rain, visibility is about 30 metres and I fear the chances of finding shelter along the way are pretty much zero. That was handy, my conscience is clear as it’s no longer a question of motivation but rather one of common sense. Excellent, I’m getting much better these days at finding justification for a day off! My day suddenly became something to look forward to, though what I’ll do with myself for another 24hrs in this place is another matter….!! At least Dooudi, the café owner, is happy to have me hanging around, drinking his coffee and enjoying his food, of which I imagine I’ll be consuming lots.

It’s very much a ‘bloke’s place’ this café, just like all such places out in the sticks. The locals are certainly friendly but I’m not sure I’d bring a gal here! By 8am the café is full of locals, wrapped up in their cloaks staring at the TV like rows of shrouded corpses except every so often one moves to light a cigarette or take a sip of tea. The place pretty much stayed that way right through the day, even when the call for prayer goes out – I guess the “ever so slightly warmer than outside” café is attractive enough to make the effort of leaving just too great!

10am: venture outside into the storm for a better look around the village… same result as yesterday though I found a little shop tucked away that had candles for sale so I grabbed a box to see if they can make even a degree of two of difference to the temperature in my room. Even if they don’t they’ll be handy this evening when the electricity is flicking on and off like it did last night. Also picked up a few sheets of scrappy paper so I can fill time writing a couple of proper letters to best friends. A sad reflection I suppose on modern life that the only opportunity I seem to have time to write a proper, old-fashioned letter is when I’m stranded in the middle of nowhere with nothing to do…. It’s so much more satisfying, and meaningful, than a quick email bashed out in a hasty few seconds. The shopkeeper is a jolly chap and falls about laughing when I tell him that I might as well be on holiday in Igherm as back home in England given the weather is exactly the same…. He knows already I’m the crazy Englishman who arrived last night by bike… seems my reputation as an extraordinary (probably extraordinarily stupid…) athlete for riding up here from Taroudant in the storm is spreading round the place! Hehehe, I might as well make the most of it as it’s the closest I’ll ever get to celebrity status – everyone has a greeting or a few words to say. Nice. The weather is cold and unwelcoming but the hearts are warm. It’s terrific how the humour of the locals is so good, even scraping a living in a place like this. People back home could learn a lot…..

Later on while sitting, head down, scribbling in a corner of the café, on my umpteenth café au lait (Nescafe + milk!) I hear an English accent… a group of 4 people have emerged from the storm and are ordering tea… company! Doesn’t take me long to gate-crash their tea break and in fact they’re glad to see a new face too with interesting stories to tell. They’re all on a guided trekking holiday with Exodus, and like me have been trapped here by the weather – apparently the rivers are too swollen from the rain for their mules to cross and the high altitude paths simply too hazardous in the ice and wind. Unlike me they’re camping, and they’re welcome to it I think, so I cruelly tempt them with tales of the hot shower upstairs! They’re a really nice bunch, lots of interesting stories to tell from past travels but, like the locals, they seem pretty impressed that I’m mucking about here alone on a bike… I’m well practised at modesty though… so it’s “nothing really”…

They’re certainly a friendlier bunch than the cargo of French tourists that a passing tour coach disgorged for a quick lunch stop in a private dining room upstairs. It was interesting to watch the reaction of the locals as this lot minced in wearing their flash gear and moaning about the cold, moaning about the toilet, moaning about everything in fact. I really felt for Dooudi as their behaviour was overall pretty rude. They didn’t stay long, just long enough to eat food they’d brought with them and sweep out again on their way to the next resort stop…

Spend my afternoon watching the snow, poring over my map, drinking tea and planning and replanning a rough trip schedule. With this weather, unscheduled stop and the difficult terrain I think I’ll be pushed to get out east to Zagora without flogging myself to death and while still enjoying the trip, so it looks like it’ll have to be the opposite direction, i.e. south, with the next stop being Tafraoute. The area is supposed to be lovely down there so it might be a good place to spend Christmas with a couple of days to do some exploring locally by foot and bike. It’s not a difficult decision to make really – although it’s over 100km away through the same difficult terrain, the wind will be generally at my tail and there’s a net elevation loss of about 800m! Easy….

Not a lot else happened today, I ventured out again for chocolate (Moroccan chocolate is actually OK, not exactly Green & Blacks standard but it does the job!), had another shower to warm up, I’m wearing everything I have and I’ve been cold all day – the humidity is a real killer with no heat to warm things up in the café other than a load of bodies glued to the TV!

Crawled into my sleeping bag really early, not much else to do except watch the candles and scribble my journal while listening to the storm outside which is still going full tilt…. At least I’m rested now and motivation to get out of here whatever the weather is sufficiently high that I’m looking forward to the morning, whatever it brings I’m hitting the road…

23 December, Day 9: Igherm to Tafraoute (102km)

7.30am: I ask you dear diary, how is it that a bloody dog can do what dogs do all day and still have the energy to wander all over the place barking it’s head off all night? If a human tried to do the same they’d have knackered vocal cords well before even simple fatigue became an issue. Sodding animal, I spent much of the night just praying for someone to throw a rock at it… I wasn’t about to go downstairs and out into the storm though – a) because the weather was (and still is) horrible, and b) because it was just too cold to even contemplate leaving my sleeping bag for anything less than the café burning to the ground…..which would at least provide some heat (and a pee of course).

Anyway – back to this morning – I’d thought I’d pen a quick entry before braving the elements on the next stage of my journey….

First thought on getting up today was “well, bu**er me if it isn’t colder than yesterday”, it was snowing outside while I sat shivering eating breakfast…. A slab of chocolate soon fixed that though! As well as the chocolate breakfast was a real exercise in fuelling this morning… lots of café au lait, a loaf of bread with cheese and jam, 2 eggs, 4 oranges and a banana. Yum, Dooudi was staggered, hungry cyclists are an alien breed round here in think! I could have kept eating but that would have been plain gluttony….!

I have to pack now, the next entry in here will, inshallah, be this evening in Tafraoute… or somewhere else that I’d rather not be, especially if the weather is like this…..!

7.30pm: Well, given that I’m writing this while tucked up in Tafraoute’s best hotel all nice and warm, then something must have gone right today…! I wasn’t going to stay here but after a long day in the saddle, weather still playing games, still cold, and with Christmas coming up all my resolutions caved in immediately as I passed a sign on the road into town advertising hot water and central heating (!!) at the best hotel in town…. Must be getting soft in my ‘old’ age (well, less-young then)! It was quite the adventure getting here though…..

By 8am I was all packed and ready, wrapped in multiple layers of clothing in a waterproof shell. I also discovered that I could just about wedge my cycling helmet on top of my windstopper fleece hat, looks silly but then the rest of me didn’t exactly look stylish. Winter cycling always was a bit of a fancy dress party…. I’m feeling particularly clever though as I have an additional intermediate layer of waterproofing on my hands – the thin polythene gloves I swiped from a petrol station at home for working on my bike do excellent duty over my glove liners, inside my outer gloves, to keep the cold and wet out.

Before lugging all my gear down, I popped down to the bar to settle up my ‘tab’… with no idea what I owed I left it Dooudi to spring a number on me. He hadn’t written anything down with his helper they spent a few minutes with their heads together and came up with a grand total of…… 330dh! I’d expected more given that included the showers, room and vast quantities of food and drink! Brilliant place…. mental note to stick a recommendation on the Lonely Planet forum. With the bill out the way Dooudi springs an unwanted dilemma on me… he can’t quite believe I intend riding to Tafraoute in this weather and tells me that today there is a truck going to Tafraoute and I could catch a ride on that…… Arrrgh, that’s the last thing I wanted to hear… I took a whole 5 minutes to decide that I would rather ride the whole way, heck – that’s the point of this adventure really, besides I like a challenge! With that little hic out the way I lugged the bike down while Dooudi brought all the panniers. A quick photo session outside the café at Dooudi’s request (me with bike, Dooudi with bike, me with Dooudi etc etc!), farewells were said and I rolled off with some trepidation down the desolate main street with ice pellets stinging my face and the wind howling round the buildings….!

The route to Tafraoute backtracked a couple of km to the straggle of houses where I warmed my hands on the journey here before turning sharply south and, surprise(!) steeply uphill, towards Tafraoute. I’ve only covered 5km and am just getting used to the idea of riding in such miserable conditions when the first little ‘adventure’ of the day occurs…. I’m spotted by a pack of 9 or 10 stray dogs on a nearby hillside… oh shit. Still going uphill so even at maximum effort I’m not exactly quick and the buggers have gone absolutely nuts at the sight of me and are on a course carefully calculated to meet mine about 500m down the road, they’re gaining rather rapidly on me too….. I managed to pick up one rock without stopping but I doubt it’ll do much good so I give it everything in a sprint for the next hairpin which would get me out of sight…. On the point of throwing up with the effort I just make it and it all goes quiet behind me – seems “out of sight out of mind” really does apply! A little more relaxed now but with regular glances behind I carry on… the next hairpin though brings me back into view of the pack who are now just mooching about on the road way behind me…. The distance isn’t enough though, one of them spots the blue rainjacket and they’re off again, gaining rapidly…. Turned my lungs inside out getting out of sight again and just about made it but this time keep hammering to get as much distance between us before I pop into view again. The same drama was repeated one more time before I finally crested the climb and was able to get my speed up to 60km/hr on the gentle descent that followed…. Phew. The rock stayed wedged on top of my front pannier where I can easily reach it for the rest of the day!

The weather was pretty nasty all morning, the wind though ‘fresh’ is generally a cross or tailwind so not too bad, I only have a nasty ‘hitting a brick wall’ experience on the occasions that a switchback brings me dead into wind. As the morning went on the cloud came right down so although I had no views to enjoy the atmosphere was truly awesome as the road snaked it’s way between brooding peaks and past scruffy little villages tucked into hillside niches. By about 11am the snow and ice pellets had turned completely to rain, being wet already it was a relief not to have to deal with stinging ice on my face. The general trend of the road is clearly down hill too judging by the steadily reduced accumulations of snow at the edges, and my average speed which isn’t too shabby for the terrain, especially compared to my grovel to Igherm a couple of days ago! I seem to be making good time but the cold and damp with wind-chill is really getting through to me, feet aren’t too bad with SealSkinz socks over coolmax cycling socks but it’s my hands that are the problem. I must look pretty silly riding down the road alternately swinging one arm then the other to send the blood back into my fingers…… Not that it matters, I’ve only seen one vehicle so far (and they gave me some ‘comedy encouragement’ mimed through the windscreen as they passed!).

Just one more canine encounter before mid-day, this time approaching a village there’s a dog walking in the road with someone I assume to be it’s owner… predictably the dog goes for me as I sweep past as quickly as possible but this time the mere sight of the rock in my hand stops it dead in it’s tracks. Haha….

The only other event this morning was when I stopped briefly to fiddle with my gears by the roadside. A scruffy old camper van with Dutch plates rolled up to see if I was OK (I was). Nice of them, coming from Tafraoute they immediately felt sorry for me and offered hot tea and biscuits…. Not wanting to stop here, getting cold, too long though I decline and just blag some water instead. It felt good to meet some friendly faces on this lonely stretch though having learned my lesson on the Tizi’nTest I don’t ask them how far and how hard the road is to Tafraoute!!

By 12:15pm I’ve made great time with 61km covered so when I roll into the most sizeable village so far (shadowed by a great, dark, glistening wet peak) and spot a little café (possibly the only one on this route) it’s an easy decision to stop for tea. The village is called Ait Abdallah though I only know that because it’s actually considered significant enough to appear as a dot on my Michelin map! My arrival causes a bit of stir, seems the sight of a foreigner, dripping wet, wrapped in Gore-Tex and riding a bicycle is not a common thing round here – what must be almost the entire population of the village rapidly materialize and try to follow me into the tiny café… it’s like the London Underground at rush hour ‘till the proprietor kicks them out…. So they crowd round my bike instead!

Tea and bread is ordered and I sit down at the only table with 3 locals, one of them is an old guy in a grey djellaba who appears to speak passable German, Spanish and English as well as French and Arabic…. Quite a surprise out here. The other two are pretty much mute with nothing more than laughter as I wrestle with wet gloves trying to pull them off cold, unresponsive hands. It’s nice encounter, I share my tea and bread, drag out the old “Moroccan Whisky” line as I pour, which gets plenty of laughs, and manage to get my hands functional again. Only a brief stop though, not wanting to get cold so 15 minutes later I retrieve my bike from the crowd, seal up the raingear again and….. the sun comes out!!

…..Not for very long though and the rain comes back while I plod with heavy legs (thanks to the stop) up the hill out of the village. It’s not all bad, a few km further on a hazy sun does make a reappearance and looks set to stay so at last I strip down to more sensible “spring conditions” riding gear! The effect of the hazy sunlight glistening on the dark flanks of sheer, wet cliffs is fantastic, especially as the cloud is still swirling around the peaks. I’d love to be able to “roll the view up” and take it home with me!

With just 20km to go (according to the not-always accurate) milestones I have what I hope is one last major climb for the day up to the Tizi'n Tarakatine. Nothing for it but to find the granny gear and