Finally - Africa!

Last night we camped near Tarifa again, which is the closest you can get to the port of Algeciras as far as we could see – about 40 mins drive for us.  The campsite is right next to the kite surfing beach, and was full of people camping out of cars, who spontaneously improvised a Battle of the Stereos across the campsite all evening.  There was quite a mix of tastes – French music, Dutch, Drum n Bass, modern Spanish, traditional Spanish – although by 11:30 it was starting to wear a bit thin, so it was fortunate that somebody told them all to shut up, as we had an early start.

Up before dawn to drive to Algeciras to catch the 9am ferry.  We'd been warned to get there early, which was just as well, as it was heaving.  We bought the ferry ticket last night, on the way through, so we were ready to turn up and board.  The "queue" was somewhat savage and at times it seemed the traffic police might have a riot on their hands.  Against all odds, we made it onto a ferry and made the crossing in about 45 minutes.

You land at Ceuta, which although it is in North Africa, is a Spanish enclave, much like Gibraltar is an English enclave in Spain.  It's just like mainland Spain, but cheaper, so we topped up with about 250l of fuel in the tanks and jerry cans (causing some havoc at the petrol station) before heading to the border, a couple of miles south.

The border was absolutely heaving.  I stayed with the vehicle, in on of about 12 lanes of traffic all filtering towards the same point.  Abby went to get the passports registered and vehicle logged, but the queues were more mobs, and it took quite a while just to get the blank forms!  Once I'd made it to the side of one of the 12 lanes, I joined Abby for moral support.  We got through in about 2 hours.

Entering Morocco we headed around the mountainous coast road towards Tanger (Tangiers), with predictably nice scenery.  We found we got a lot of waves from the Moroccan children (mainly boys) straight away.  I also noticed a lot of drivers flashing their lights at me, giving thumbs-up, and waving, particularly lorry drivers;  I'm not sure if it's friendly, whether it's to warn me of one of the frequent police checks (at which we've not yet been pulled over), or maybe I'm just a lousy driver.  (I nearly demolished a lamp-post in Estepona in Spain yesterday;  certainly left it at a jaunty angle.)  On the whole I think it's just the friendly Moroccans.

After navigating through Tanger we headed south for a while on the newly built motorway.  We were both surprised at the landscape;  parts have been mountainous and arid, but much of it is very green and fertile.  One place looked a bit like Sussex in fact.  Unlike Sussex, however, you're surrounded by the daily activity of people ploughing fields with oxen, carrying cargoes of artichokes on donkeys, or travelling home from school in a tractor trailer.

The towns have been even more lively, with people spilling out onto the roads all the time, making driving quite hazardous.  I'm confused about roundabouts;  our book says you give way to the right, unlike the normal convention in left-hand-drive countries, and this seemed to be the case in Tanger, but in Meknes everybody seems to do the opposite!  Fortunately in the truck people tend to give you the benefit of the doubt.

We were heading towards Meknes on the basis that Abby once read a book by Giles Milton about some Irish slave here.  Apparently there's a palace, which we'll look for tomorrow, but we'd read about a campsite which seemed a good target.  Typically, the Lonely Planet map is somewhat incomplete and in places downright misleading, which is why we spent 2 hours driving around the city, getting progressively more confused.  (The sat nav is not very useful in cities here because the base maps are either incomplete or outdated.)  In the end we spotted another campervan driving through an impossible small hole in the city wall, followed it (to the consternation of the workman at the bottom of the trench he'd dug right in the roadway there) and found the bloody campsite at last!

Tomorrow we'll see the sights of Meknes (in the unlikely event we can find them) before heading towards Casablanca.  The truck has been on good behaviour today, but is still dripping oil from the inlet manifold gasket;  if anybody can tell me whether the engine has crank case breathers, and where the hell they are, I'd be interested, as neither of the highly detailed military workshop manuals mention them.