Atlas Mountains

Finally departed Casablanca for the country and the beautiful Atlas Mountains - some amazing scenery as we wended our way south via Taroudant, finally ending up in Tiznet. Spent 2 nights camping in the rough before arriving at Camping Municipal in Tiznet. One of the most amazing sights was little goats clambering all over the Argan trees - yes, goats up trees! Unfortunately my camera battery decided to run out, so no pics I'm afraid.

Leaving Tiznit, after lovely hot showers on Saturday morning, we came across 3 French travellers hitchhiking to Dahkla. We With limited space, we offered to take one of them, so Christophe jumped aboard. This is his third trip to Mauritania, Senegal & Mali, so it's been good to ask him all about his experiences. He plans to meet up with his friends in Dahkla, inshallah! It wasn't long before the mountains were behind us and the desert started to stretch ahead of us for miles & miles - welcome to the Western Sahara. After a full day driving, we decided to stop by the beach at El Ouatia, near Tan Tan and watch the sun set. After a little beachcombing (still far too cold to swim), during which Neil found his supper for that evening - mussells washed in by the tide - we collected loads of shipwrecked firewood, and set about building our most successul fire yet. Went to sleep serenaded by the crashing of the waves.

Sunday, and another day of full on driving to Layoune and beyond. The roads looked pretty straight, with not much traffic, so I decided to drive for a while...only to be stopped by a police checkpoint - our first time! It transpires that they wave all foreigners on in Northern Morocco, but stop everyone in the South - made our hearts stop for a while though! Then, a plague of locusts literally descended upon us. The roadside was littered with what we thought were dead locusts, but we soon found out as the day hotted up, that they were only resting. We soon found out why all the vehicles we'd passed had nets tied across their front grills - the locusts hurl themelves across the road and attempt to invade all the engines, so we had to stop and make a makeshift net for ourselves from an old mosquito net. The photos should speak for themselves - but it was like being rained on by thousands of flying pink prawns! K

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