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Published: October 6th 2012
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Yesterday was a bit of a bad day, not just for the possible storm, but also as we lost Mark and Alan from the group. On leaving the campsite they heard a knocking noise similiar to France, when they ran out of oil in the rear axle and wore out the bearing. So when we first pulled over, Mark added some oil and we headed back to Ouarzazate for more oil. All the way there the noise dissappeared, but when we then began heading for the first waypoint of an off road route, the noise came back. At this point the guys decided to split from Dave and I and make a slow trip up to Marrakech while we carried on to the route.
The route started off on a bad tarmac road and shifted between dusty mud to stoney gravel then back to tarmac, with the usual pot holes and sharp bends, so again progress was slow. But as with all these routes we were rewarded with some fantastic views as at about half way, we dropped into a valley that was full of greenery, which suprised us as before that the area was just mountains of rock and
sand. All the while lurking behind us was a very dark cloud with an incredible amount of rain dropping beneath it. Apart from a few drops on the windscreen, we some how managed to drive arround it, as even near to the end, as the route levelled out and became a single track tarmac road, the ground was wet but we weren't. This seemed to be way things would go through out the night as all around us, the nearby mountains were light by massive lightning strikes, we stayed totally dry.
By midday today some of my washing hadn't quite finished drying, so i bagged it up and we headed for a gorge down near Tafratoute. After 90 miles or so the route down looked impossible to achieve before dark so plan B was to reach a campsite near the sea. The Route took us through Agadir which was a big clean city with very little traffic, considering its size, then half way down to Tiznit. Once off the main road we went into a small town, where it seemed we had to take small back streets to reach the road to the campsite. Then as we came over
the hill we were meet by a green valley with a huge cliff face between us and the sea! With only 5 miles or less on the Sat nav we were unsure that the campsite was actually next to the sea at all, but the road did eventually go around the cliff and brought us to where we could see the mouth of a river meet the sea.
Once at the campsite we found it to be desserted, much like most of the sites we have stayed at, and the beach is less than a stones throw away. Tomorrow Dave and I are aiming for Marrakech as the route looks to be made up of main roads or bigger so even though its a big distance our average speed will make it achievable.
Mileage: 3012
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