Atlantic Coast, Morocco, Terre d’Ocean Camping

Zagan the motorhome has tracked down his French brethren! They’re all down here it would seem, enjoying months of endless sunshine on the Atlantic coast around Agadir. We’re in Camping Terre d’Ocean (www.terredocean.com) about an hour’s drive north of Agadir, and it’s a seriously packed out remote corner of La France (N30.562921, W9.740941). It’s costing us all of €12 a night to stay, including electricity, but if we put down roots and stayed more than 2 months, avoiding the leccy cost and using cheaper local gas, we’d be looking at €7.50 a night.

At about £580 accommodation costs for 3 months in the sun, on a site with a stupendous view over the ocean, and a groceries, gas, bread and nic-nac shop, I can see the attraction. Word from fellow travellers is the huge (500+ pitch sites) around Agadir are full to bursting, setting up waiting lists for the vans parked in the surrounding streets.

Camping Terre d’Ocean on the Atlantic Coast, Morocco

After the touters and shouters of Essaouria, I was keen to get away from the parts of Morocco which are inundated with streams of fellow tourists, and the small middle-of-nowhere site at Sidi Kaouki Beach did the job. We stayed three nights, and staying that length of time seemed key to finding relaxation. Contributing to said relaxation is the obvious removal of need to unpack and pack (as easy as it is), choose somewhere to go, pay, service the van, navigate, drive, buy groceries, check in at the next site, level the van and unpack it again. But here in Morocco there’s also the fact the stream of sellers who sometimes walk and drive the sites quickly get used to newcomers. The Berber jewellery man, who was the most persistent non-taker of the stock phrase ‘no thanks, la shukran, non merci’, didn’t even bother us a second time. We also quickly worked out the pack of half-owned dogs and puppies wandering the site were harmless enough, although we kept them away from Charlie as none looked in great health.

The days passed quickly somehow. The sun’s streaming down here like it knows no different. Our limbs, free of the Islamic need to remain covered in public, have been rubbed with holiday-smell factor 50 to remain unburned as we’ve sat and read. The awning’s made some uncommon appearances, shielding us and the van from the heat in the early afternoon. Tagines were serially cooked, three in three days, and we enjoyed trying new combinations of meat, veg and spice. Each day we’d venture out the high walls of the site, down the dirt track to the beach. Like much of Morocco (and some parts of Europe), the beach is either quite beautiful, or a mess of plastic and rubbish, depending on how you choose to cast your eye. This same ‘choosing how to look at things’ approach yields two widely varying views of the campsite. In the one eye, everything was low quality. Poor workmanship showed everywhere. Botched plumbing, broken, uneven tiles, nothing level, anywhere, nothing straight. In the other eye, everything worked, and yielded a warm feeling in my own DIY capabilities: here on this campsite with even my meagre skills, I’d feel confident having a go at anything.

We kept in touch with Phil and Jules in the parking at Essaouira, and they enjoyed another couple of days there, watching another world wander past their windscreen in the form of camels, the usual concoction of weird stuff driving past, more sellers of stuff and a (my interpretation) guard who did more begging from them than guarding them. They enjoyed the medina, buying a dress and a cardboard-esque pastilla (pigeon pie), before turning south and heading here. We followed them down yesterday.

From Sidi Kaouki we had a choice: turn right and back up 10km of known-quantity single track road to the N1, or turn left down 20km of single track road, marked as piste (unsurfaced) on our ancient Michelin 742 map. Errrrmmmm, left it is. Rumbling along on good tarmac all the way, we loved it. The road was dead, only a handful of vehicles passed us, and we enjoyed a slow, scenic drive through low rolling hills, thick with Argan trees and 50-strong donkey gatherings, lifting our hands in greeting to goatherds and nippers.

Up onto the N1, the main road south from here which runs the enormous distance down through the Western Sahara to Mauritania, we ambled along at 60kph. Phil’s warning of having seen several speed traps on the route rang in my ears, unwilling as I am to get nicked again for speeding here. He’d relayed how, at one point, a slow moped had refused to let him past, the passenger waving an arm as they approached a 60kph sign, after which appeared a policemen with a radar gun. The moped driver gave the thumb’s up afterwards, when the road sped up again. We’ve witnessed lots of flashing headlight warnings from the locals; the need to help your fellow man avoid being nicked seems universal.

The N1 ran inland for an hour or so, through a gradually more arid landscape. The dryer the land becomes, the more I sense we’re approaching an edge of the world. Somewhere very remote from where I’m from, and I enjoy this feeling very much. I feel like an amateur adventurer. The Dutch-registered caravans we held up by crawling along, and the sure knowledge a hundred thousands campervans have made this same journey, did nothing to detract from my sense of departure.

The road rejoined the Atlantic just before Tamri. Alan, a friendly ex Army chap we met on the campsite who only seemed to own olive green things, had called Tamri ‘banana town’, and as we rolled around a valley full of broad green banana tree leaves, we could see why. Finding a spot in the street to pull in, we finally (re)overcame our fear of the traditional Moroccan butcher, buying some goat meat from a blood-splattered scene. Wielding heavy cleavers, the two chaps cut a leg from a carcass, the head of which sat on a tray at the entrance beside its feet, trimmed off some innards from it, and popped it on the scales. With a few words of French we indicated we only needed maybe half a goat leg, as you do. One of the butchers, by this point on his mobile, hammered the sharp metal blade through it with a thud, weighed it in at €6, then chopped it in half again and wrapped it in paper. Yes, he confirmed on our enquiry, he still had ten fingers.

The Atlantic here looks endless, heading due West from it’s all rolling waves until you hit Florida. As the N1 shadows the contours of the coast, I had to keep from staring out at it, or the series of beaches appearing below us. The curved waves are apparently good for surfing down here, and the waters stay warm enough to enjoy the sport all winter.

Finally, after 3 hours of driving (maps.me guessed at 2 hours), we came to the campsite entrance, a mud and stone track marked at the end by a rock. Up a km of track, we passed under the barrier and were asked to park at reception. Pulling in outside the office, the French manageress leaped out and indicated I needed to be properly lined up (I’d just wanged us in there in any old way for the few minutes it would take to get a pitch sorted). Ah, no, this is our pitch it would seem. The site was so packed, every last bit of space was being used. After inspecting us for a moment, we were guided to a small scrappy bit of land between the petanque courts, bins, electricity pylon, a drain and a walkway down to the pool. It’s a crappy pitch to be honest, and the site’s pretty remote, but the views are incredible, the feeling is laid back, and our mates are here to share a beer. Which we did. Beer, wine, and a surprisingly good goat and date tagine, cooked on our electric hotplate outside for 5 hours. The meat was delicious.

Today we awoke to French words outside as our many neighbours and the small community around us came to life. Phil’s been invited to watch the rugby in one of their caravans, learning the occupants worked in Morocco for some years and have already widely travelled the country. They now enjoy 3 months here each winter, taking in the sunshine. As we walk the site, folks sit outside enjoying a meal and a bottle of Bordeaux, play petanque (Phil just gave me a trouncing at it!), ride off on quads, take their dogs for a walk in the hinterland and generally have a rather spiffing time of it. It’s not for me, months on end in one place, not quite yet I think. There’s too much of the world I want to see, but I can’t really fault these sunbirds in Africa, they’ve got a pretty great life.

Our motorhomes and worldly comforts compare with the locals sat on the beach

Cheers, Jay