46 Hour Bus - Blogabond

The last few hours in Tangiers was really fun. We went up to this lookout point having a view of the entire Tangiers on the one side and Spain on the other side of the straight. We had this huge Subway tipe sandwhich stuffed with chips, mince meat, egg and other delicacies. It was here that Niel started making hand signs and talking nonsense. We just discarded this as one of Niel^s special moments. And so we attempted this humungous trip acrossing the length of Morocco and pushing deep in West Sahara. We started on Sunday evening at midnight en route Casablanca. This was the first 6 hours of this gruling journey. It was not 2 hours into the trip when Niel had his episode: in a bus with no toilet. Luckily it was from the top and not the bottom so we tucked him in and waited for the stop. Everyone was clearly exhausted and I did not think straight, leaving my camera bag on the bus. We had to wait for it to come back and wasted 3 hours in which we really wanted to see the 3rd largest mosque in the world, Hasan 2. Maybe this was a blessing in disguise...

Tangier Terasse Hotel

And so we pushed on - at a frustrating max speed of about 90km/h. This was the speed of the entire journey and clearly frustrations aboutmaking so little distance in the time we spend. At Agadir we changed busses and the leg space was reduced by about a 1/3. My feet started swelling up and Iak also began feeling the fatigue of the journey. We met Stuart, a Brit on route Dakhla, West Sahara for a kite surfing gathering. He grew up in SA so it was nice to have some chats about the experiences he had back in the day and also about the Cult, Motorhead and other cool bands! We are on about 21 hours and still a few to go. We also met this very shy Senegalese guy and communicated even though we couldnt talk to one another. He liked Jason Upton on my mp3 player...

Stix spying on border police

We always knew that West Sahara would be intersting as its a Moroccan protectorate and many encounters with the police would be inevitable. We were stopped about 6 times asking the same questions. After the "rd time when explaining our occupation was Accountant/ Finance we switched to saying wr worked on computers and this seemed to do the trick! We were also very pleased to see that Stix Green (!!) joined our party and will hopefully give inspiration in times of need! Once we came into West Sahara, the contrast of landscape was uneal. On the right you had the vast Atlantic ocean and of the left the Sahara desert. I thought of the change our planet is undergoing and that deforestation and desertification could be disasterous for all of us.

A Solitary man was standing on the edge of a great cliff
I asked him where he was going
The desert thirst for his company;
And the ocean would not come to rest without his closeness
The sky, adorned in Heaven^s brushstrokes, was content

Dakhla by night

And finally we arrive in Daklha. This isnt a great picture but maybe it will give you an idea. It took us 46 hours to get here and we were well stoked to start looking for accomodation. Now we need to organise transport into Mauritania as there is no big bus company doing this trip. Our hope is a taxi to the border and then busses or to hitch a lift with people going that way... lets see how this works out!

written by

afrikawasbeer on October 14, 2009 from Agadir, Morocco

from the travel blog: Traveling Africa Overland

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strongs Brother!Let's face it..you not travelling Africa in a Porsche buddy!Slow-mo(w)biles can be expected!So sit back and enjoy the rides! :)
The Photos...man I like the one of you next to empty deck chair...fill that space bro!
Loveyamore than words can say!Enjoy your ride and be safe!

written by Lorraine Fieuw on October 15, 2009

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