Waking with the rising sun at 5am we got on the road quickly. Another noticeable assault on the senses was quick to appear as we made our way down the road to Sidi Kacem...carcasses of various animals adourn the roadsides of Morocco and are usually first smelt before seen. A specifically early morning specimen is not handy for keeping the rushed breakfast down but with the amount of food we need to keep us going we're not going to let some roadkill relieve us of our meusli!
Aside from the reduced temperatures this early in the morning making for a more comfortable ride, the lack of traffic is a welcome respite from the usual suicidal, tooting masses of Moroocan drivers. To some it may be admirable that a country of people are so devoted to Allah that they are willing to forgoe seatbelts because they believe they are being looked over...to cyclists, this level of assurance in Moroccan drivers is unsettling and sometimes very scary. A lot of the drivers here think nothing of overtaking on blind corners and coming within inches of our bikes or other cars. On a more positive note, however, the roads have been excellent so far. If it wasn't for the traffic and the odd bizzarely warped section of road Morocco could rival France as a destination for cyclists.
Also, overlooking their questionable driving, the vast majority of Moroccan's have given us an excellent reception with every second car honking their horns and shouting support or banter. Groups of kids at the side of the road would run alongside us waving and shouting, "bon chance," and today featured a large number of "racers" as Chris termed them. The odd ageing Moroccan would be slowly cycling along on a deathtrap of a bike before spotting us and doubling efforts in order to join the pack and have a chat.
As we stopped off in Sidi Kacem for water and snacks a fairly stoned man on a bike stopped for a chat and to offer a guide to Meknes; our next destination. However, his hustling skills were clearly worse for wear as he was pointing in the direction we had just come from. We may be using a very large scale map but we weren't falling for that one! On the subject of maps, we seem to have done very well with navigating so far considering the scale of our single Morocco map is 1:400000, with the usual scale being 1:50000. To those not inclined to mapreading it would basically have been impossible to find our way in Europe with such a lack of detail on the map. However, with main roads simply passing straight through towns and cities in Morocco and Matty's prep work on the route we've had no problem navigating so far.
Back on the (correct) road to Meknes, we stopped about 3 miles from the city for a break and to top up the quickly drained water bottles. A cheeky wee lad at the side of the road obviously took exception to us sharing his shady patch with him so got down to launching a few stones in our direction before his mum gave him a clip round the ears. This seemed to have calmed him down but whether the raw onion he started tucking into was a punishment or a treat we'll never find out!
Following Satan's little helper was a very hot and steep climb into Meknes where I (Donnie) made the decision to get my mop chopped in an attempt to cool my head down after the frying it just recieved. This has to be the best, most relaxing haircut I will ever experience even with the looks of disgust from the barber as he untangles the salty, sweaty mass of helmet hair!
As we carried on along the road after my trim we all suddenly realised that it wasn't possible to carry on in the mid-day heat so we found a shaded spot and got tucked into some cheeky bacon rolls that we had managed to smuggle in from Tarifa! As we were finishing off lunch an old man on a bike rolled up and started chatting to us. Through our collective broken French we managed to work out that he was saying the desert at Merzouga is three days cycle away. We found this a bit amusing since we had yet to cross the Middle and High Atlas mountains by this point and dismissed this as friendly banter. Looking back on this exchange, now that we're finished the trip, it's strange to think that this old man on a knackered old, steel-framed bike was actually right!
Once we'd all had a bit of a siesta and the worst of the heat had passed we saddled up again; en route to Ait Hassin at the start of the Middle Atlas mountains. Stopping just before the large climb up through the village of Ait Hassin we chatted to a guy opening his food stall. Telling him where we were headed, he gave a sharp exhale and wiped his brow, saying "il fait chaud en Merzouga." It wasn't the first or last time that we would hear about the heat in the desert and with two pasty Scots and a geordie with "questionable" facial hair we were beginning to worry slightly how we were going to cope.
A fairly steep climb through Ait Hassin brought us to a cluster of farmhouses where I (Donnie) went to ask one of the farmers if we could set up camp in their field for the night. On reaching the farmhouse there were only children running around and none of them spoke English or French. After one gave up on sign language they would run and get the next, slightly older child who I hoped would have some form of communicating with....After the fifth sibling had been fetched I was finally speaking to somone old enough to understand the international sign of "sleep" and "tent." According to Chris and Matty this was a hoot to watch as I stooped down trying to make the tent the right height! However, my theatrical questioning of the eldest had worked and he understood what I meant. Unfortunately, he pointed at the farmhouse...made a sign as though the farmer was a bit crazy and the other, very recognisable handsign for shotgun. It's fair to say we didn't stick around for the next eldest sibling and cycled a couple of farmhouses up the road just to avoid any mental, shotgun weilding, Moroccan farmers!
A small steading with a massive haystack in the field was the setting for tonight's campsite as the friendly farmer led us to an ideal, hay-covered camping spot. With dinner on the boil and the lads watching an amazing, deep red sunset we readied ourselves for tackling the first major obstacle of the Morocco leg; the Middle Atlas.
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