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Published: June 11th 2007
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gran taxi from Tiznit
Tafraoute I left Essaouira just before the music festival because the lady whose family owned the place I was staying was going to start charging me double what I was paying. I headed south to Agadir to check out the beach and the scene there. I also wanted to try a find a bookstore that the guidebook mentioned but that turned out to be a waste of time because if there ever was a bookstore there wasn't anymore. I stayed a day in Agadir and spent the night in a yellow 8 by 8 foot box but it did have a mini sink and a structurally questionable balcony so that more than made up for it.
The next day I left Agadir and headed further south. I got a shared/gran taxi to Inezgane and waited around there for a little while to get a local bus to Tiznit. When I got to Tiznit I found a decent place to stay and wouldn't you know it there was a tiny tv in the room. Now the remote didn't work and there were only two channels (Morrocan state run channel and another that had no sound) but it was a tv nonetheless.
I checked out the medina in Tiznit and some of the places where they work with silver. The near complete lack of tourists in the medina was refreshing except when one of the guys tried for the life of him to sell four pieces of amber and silver work when I only wanted to buy one. I was going to give him a decent price for the one I wanted but because he was pushing so hard for me to buy them all that I had to walk out on him without buying anything. Then as I was leaving the guy had the balls to ask to for some D's for the time he spent talking himself out of a sale. Tiznit has a cool medina and is an interesting place and with the lack of tourists had a definent Moroccan feel to it.
The next day I got up somewhat early and instead of trying to get the one afternoon bus from the nonexistant bus station I decided to get a shared taxi to Tafraoute. After waiting around a while for it to fill up we left for the drive up into the southern part of the Atlas
the o called Anti Atlas. The drive up into the mountains was spectacular and very different from the parts of the Rif that I saw in the North. In the south the landscape is as rugged if not more so than the parts of the Rif that I saw and much more arrid and almost desert like. It probably would've been worth renting a car for the drive just to be able to stop and appreciate the view especially when you level off after the majority of the ascent. As it was I as sitting in the back on the wrong side of the taxi to get any good pictures of the scenery on the opposite side. I did take some short videos of the ride up including one with it's soundtrack. After one near head on collision on a blind corner and a couple hours of very windy and mostly one way road with a little bit of unpaved shoulder on each side we got to Tafraoute. Right after we got there the guy who'd been sitting next to me (we hadn't been crushed together as we only had three people in the back instead of the usual four)
promptly threw up all over the road.
Tafraoute is in a wild spot surronded by an smaller inner and higher outter ring of mountains and rock formations. You wouldn't expect to see as many palms trees as there are in an area where the rivers look like they haven't flowed in years. The mountains around the town are definently worth the trip south to see. There is some good rock climbing, trekking and mountain biking in the area but I won't be doing any of that at least not right now. Somehow I've managed to screw up my knee to the point where it won't fully lock and is becoming a pain in the ass causing me to limp. As it doesn't seem to be getting any better I'll have to find a knee brace or maybe some crutches. Although that would be a last resort because I can't imagine trying to get around with a 25 kilo 60 lb. pack on one good leg.
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Mj
non-member comment
Coool
Nice pics mate. Reminds me of my trip to essaouria amd sidi kaouki. did you get a chance to do some quad biking there ? Well it is amazing, had sea on one side and mounains on the other. anyways, hope your enjoying the weather and the trip. goodluck