PL Board "End of Year Awards 2016"

Fantastic picture Sounds like a great trip and one that's made a big impression on you.

I know the area around Agadir, Essaouirra and Marrakech and I've driven through those high atlas mountains in a sketchy hire car. Some of those mountain roads are as scary as ****. Did you ever notice little rock piles in the road ? That's to notify drivers that there's a hazard ahead, maybe a rock fall, part of the road that's slipped down the mountain etc. I once swerved round one and 100 yards down the road was a truck on it's side straddling both lanes with just enough room to pass without going over the edge !

I love Morocco and the hospitality you write about is found all over the country, I have a friend called Khalid who I stay with in a place called Immesouane down near Agadir. It's basically a rough and ready guest house built into the sandstone rock on the beach, no electricity or running water, yet every night he cooks up a 3 course traditional moroccan cuisine. Tagine, Goat curry, fish, spiced chicken etc. Beautiful

How do you like the mint tea ? One lump or 10 ?

 

Aha ha ha yes mate the drive is immense. I drove this route through the mountains R203. I saw the rocks but had no idea. We would stop at a few "layby" type areas just to get out and enjoy the view. On one, we got back into the car and I drove off totally forgetting to drive on the right. So it's like a cliff edge (something out of the end scene of The Italian Job) I go round this bend on the left hand side and right there is a 4 by 4 in front of me and the two of us just breaked. My mrs screamed and I **** myself. The couple in the car opposite just freaked out and I'm there giving him hand signals of apologies. He must of thought I was a nutter I would happily do that drive again though. The best!

The other thing is I was warned to watch out for the police because the speed limit changes and if you're not keeping your eyes open, the speed you may be doing is higher than it should be and they rinse the tourists. So I'm doing about 80km/h not realising it's changed to 50 km/h and yep I get pulled by the cops. I heard stories it cost some tourist £100. So once again I'm crapping it, thinking **** £100! I was so relieved when the copper says 200 Dhirams which was about £20 iirc.

The Moroccon hospitality is indeed brilliant. Nice people and the food is hot and wholesome. We hired a guide and he took us on a trek through a mountain range about 2km high and then down through the valleys and up again. We had bought a couple of whole chickens and vegetables etc from Imlil which we took with us. We got up as high as the clouds which at one point were below us. We got to another village which was a hillside and went to a house belonging to a family. The bloke must've been like a 100. We sat in his courtyard looking out on to the valley. We gave him half the food to cook a meal for all of us, and gave him the rest for his hospitality. Spent the afternoon listening to the old codger telling us about his life and the village he lived in. Puts life into perspective tbh. When we eventually left and walked back, as we walked up the mountains and looked down, there he was in his courtyard, sitting on his outdoor chair waving up to us. In the words of Ferris Bueller, life moves pretty fast, if you don't stop to look around every now and again, you might miss it!

 

Love it

I've been busted on that road from Marrakech to Essaouira several times for speeding, not because I've been driving like a nutter, but because of the graded slow down, you know the ones 80 kmph / 60 kmph / 40 kmph / 20 kmph / STOP. I also got pulled over by the old bill and fined for having 'too many surfboards on the roof'. When the copper was writing out my ticket I was trying to point out to him all of the cars going past with goats strapped to the bonnet, trucks with hay bales falling off the side and vans with so many guys in them that they were having to hold the doors closed because their legs were sticking out He just waved it away and carried on writing out my fine.

Ironically, I always found that the Gendarme military police were far more chilled out than the local constabulary. We used to pass through road checks with the lads with guns always up for a laugh and a bit of banter. The civil police though just see Westerners as an easy target for a random fine (Bakshish)

There are some classic villages up in the Atlas mountains, I once stayed in a village which was just red all over. Red roads, red houses, red dogs and cats, red shop fronts, red children etc. The clay pigment was that Ocre rich red and it stained everything. I had red bogies for a week after staying there. My wife is an artist, so she was in her element, collecting pigments from the rocks and clay to make into paint.

If you ever get a chance to go back, I would recommend the Gnawa festival in Essaouira in the Spring

 

Yeh I want to. Going to do drive to Agadir and/or Casablanca. Will check out Essaouira I liked Marrakech as well. What ppl (including me) don't realise about Morocco is that the terrain is so varied. You have the bustling city centre of Marrakech, go a bit further you have villages and the mountain ranges of the Atlas, go a bit further you have desserts, go the other way you have the beaches.

 

Essaouira is quite cosmopolitan compared to the mountain villages in the Atlas mountains. It's a great place to visit for a few days, especially for the Gnawa Festival (google it) I love the south and the deserts, mainly for the endless right hand point breaks from Anka point right down to the Mauritania border. I've been into Mauritania once with a good friend of mine who is a professional surfer, with his photographer for a shoot for a mag. It's sketchy down there as lots of the roads are mined. It's a bit more 'dig in for survival' than relaxing surf trip, but it was a rare experience never to forget. We scored some epic surf down there, camping out under the stars with nothing else around for hundreds of miles.

 

I once saw Judith Chalmers on a BA flight from Faro to Laaandaaan. It was the first flight out after the ash cloud restrictions were lifted.

 

I thought she was dead

 

Ash cloud was over 6 years ago, maybe she is now.

I just wanted to contribute to the travel thread.

 

She was a shrivelled up old Prune when I used to watch the Holiday programme back in the 80's.

I thought the old Sangria swilling bint would be 6ft under by now.

 

Just checked. Alive. 81.

Probably a question for GC...

 

Perhaps we should have a Dead Pool thread for 2017

my 3 nominations are:
Kirk Douglas
Prince Philip
Pete Docherty

 

****ing hell, you're full of Christmas cheer aren't you

 

Start one

 

Yeah, I'll play.

 

Would it be who you think will die, or who you want to die?

Makes a lot of difference imo.

 

Who you think will die. I haven't got time to post all the names of the people who I want to die.

 

It's a game that's been played in The City for years.

I won £100 on Les Dawson years ago. Made me feel so guilty, I've never played since.

 

Basically it's your fault Les Dawson died.

 

Cheers mate!...

It felt a bit like that at the time...