Sea level last night, over 1,000 metres tonight. We left Essaouira promptly this morning, 08.15, and took the coast road down to Agadir. From our first arrival in the very strong winds, Essaouira has grown upon us. Today the weather was sunny with whispy clouds and there were already people on the beach by 07.30, walking and playing football. It is a nice friendly place and we agreed that if we had not got travel plans we could easily settle in there for a week or so of winter sun. The hotel was good, the staff very friendly and although quite large it never seemed crowded or rushed.
Driving down to Agadir the coast line was stunning, it is supposed to be a surfing destination but the waves didn't look very big and we didn't see any surfers, maybe it isn't the right season. However the sea was a beautiful colour and the waves rolled over what looked like shallow beaches. As the road wound around bays and inlets there were rocky promontories, it all looked very attractive and until we reached the ourskirts of Agadir there was very little serious development.
Getting through Agadir was a bit of a nightmare, there was a lot of traffic and we made a couple of mistakes and had to retrace our footsteps. This was mainly due to the fact that we were headed for Tiznit and it was very late coming up on the signposts. We decided to take the Tiznit approach to Tafraoute as that road was supposed to be particularly scenic, however the main road down from Agadir to Tiznit was very built up with a lot of slow moving lorries so it was a bit of a frustrating journey.
However once we turned inland at Tiznit everything changed very dramatically, from being nose to tail down the Agadir-Tiznit stretch, after Tiznit we drove for long periods of time without seeing any other cars at all. At first the scenery was rocky desert, with occasional maquis type shrubs and cacti. About 20 km from Tiznit we began to climb steadily and more trees appeared, at first in what were obviously dry or underground river beds and then a little more generally as we reached into the Anti-Atlas mountains. At the high point we were about 1,400 metres, for anyone who might have stayed with us in Greece, that's higher than Mount Okhi. Although still stark and bare in places the landscape became greener and with larger numbers of trees, especially eucalyptus.
Finally, after 7 hours and about 400 kms, we reached Tafraoute. We drove around a bit and picked a hotel called Le Rochet Peint, which was a bit out of the centre and looked rather nice, a bit 'oldy'. It turned out to be one from the Rough Guide which used to be called Riad Tafraoute and has had a bit of a freshen up, without changing the character. The rooms are still quite quaint with wonderful carved wooden doors from Mali and our sink has been beaten out of a single sheet of brass. There is a rather plastic cafe on the ground floor, which may or may not be a recent addition and rather spoils it and the general appearance from the outside. We have a small but adequate, clean and comfortable en-suite room for 300 dirhams a night (about 13 dirham to the £, so that is roughly £25), AND there is a wifi connection in the entrance foyer and the cafe. This is the third hotel we have stayed in, all around the same price and in each case there has been a free wifi connection available. A quick walk round suggested that Tafaoute is a nice mountain village/small town. We saw lots of shops, cafes, restaurants and a small Souk. We know that there are at least 3 camp sites here and the area attracts a lot of older, retired people who come in the Spring in campervans, mostly the French. We had been amazed at the number of campervans on the road, we even saw one or two British ones. There also seems to be quite a few 'serious' hikers and climbers. Evidently the granite rock is good for clmbers and some quite specialist climbs are marked. We went back to the hotel to put warm clothes on before going out to get a meal, it is cool, as we would expect at this altitude at the end of March.
We found a small cafe and had some nice food, harira (Moroccan bean soup), tomato and a onion salad, a tajine which we would call shakshouka (from Egypt), but here is just described as Kofta with Egg, oranges with cinnamon and mint tea. As we walked back to the hotel we were struck by the clear sky and the abundance and brightness of the stars, it was such a cold clear night and at this altitude there is little light pollution, the planets were particularly bright. So we are glad our room is not too big and rather snug. The wind has dropped completely and it is very quiet, although there are at least 2 mosques within shouting distance so it won't be so quiet at 05.00 in the morning.
Things of note today:<br>
There is an awful lot of development and building work going on. We had seen some evidence in Essaouira but put this down to the fact that it is probably an expanding sea side tourist resort. Here in Tafraoute it looks as if the size of the town is set to double. Almost all the way here the road has been recently improved and resurfaced. We saw large residential building complexes nearing completion.<br>
Once outside large urban areas practically all the housing seemed to be of a high quality and well maintained. There must be substantial rural poverty here, but it was not apparent from the roads we used. In the mountain villages there were several large impressive houses, small mansions by our standards, often in large enclosed plots of land where irrigation had produced orchards in otherwise arid surroundings. We don't know where this money has come from. Is Argan Oil dramatically overpriced? Returning diaspora? Or? ?<br>
Hoodies have a whole new meaning here. A form of dress, mostly by men, is a long cloak like garment (it's called something like djellaba, but I'm not sure of the spelling), with a pixie type hood which they frequently wear up covering most of their face to provide protection from wind and /or sun. There is a resemblance to Middle Age monks.
No comments:
Post a Comment