Africa at last

It has been nearly a month since we arrived in in Africa and this is the first attempt I've made to update the blog. It is practically impossible to find an internet connection that will allow you to upload photos. These two took 45 minutes!

We started our African adventure in Tanger, Morocco and within 15 minutes of disembarking from the ferry (9.30pm) we were completely lost and stuck on the steepest hill imaginable right in the middle of the kasbar. Poor Pinky Ponks clutch was smoking and she just gave up. We couldn't go back due to the huge traffic jam behind us. For a minute or two it looked really bleak and then a gang of young lads came by and they pushed us right up to the top of the hill - trailer and all.

We all loved Tanger, within the first day we found camels on the beach, monkeys at the campsite and snake-charmers in the kasbar - the children were so impressed.

Heading south, we took the auto-route peage at first. By lunch time we came off to find something to eat and en route asked a policeman whether there was an alternative, less expensive route we could use. No problem, he said, the route nationale goes along side. He was obviously having a laugh! This road still remains the absolutely most terrible road we have encountered - it took us 4 hours to go 48 km. And yes it did follow the autoroute we kept going under it again and again but we just couldn't get back on it.

This detour meant that we found ourselves driving into Casablanca at sunset/rushhour. This has got to rate as one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. Traffic from all sides, so stay in the inside lane which is full of donkey carts, bikes and buses, none of which had lights - the on-coming traffic had only full-beam. We passengers just sat so tense telling Mick every time we could see vague movements in front of us. We couldn't even stop because there were too many 'things' at the side of the road. We finally stopped when we managed to turn off the highway about 40km south of Casablanca - our first opportunity!! We just found a bit of waste ground, put up the tent all climbed in and went to sleep. % minutes later we were woken by pack of dogs mentally barking just outside the tent - they were obviously perturbed by this strange dome thing in their territory as they kept barking at it for most of the night!

Once south of Casablanca, the real Morocco starts - very few cars, lots of donkeys extremely friendly people. They always found it really amusing to see whities in a Renault 4. Renault 4's are actually one of the most common cars in Morocco, probably second only to the Mercedes. The children loved shreaking at the other Renault 4s on the road and waving madly - we usually got a similar response from the other proud owners.