The blog is getting a new lease of life!
Suddenly feeling inspired, will see how long it lasts!
Morocco has been missed but we can start at Casablanca. And the start of a 29hr bus trip down to Dahkla in the Western Sahara. The landscape has been the best & most surprising part of Morocco, so varied & dramatic. Not so in the Western Sahara though, where it’s all desert, a flat endless stretch of sand:
The disputed area has not been so tourist-friendly of late, or rather tourists have not been so Western Sahara-friendly, but there’s nothing much untoward you can experience on a big bus with a handful of passengers. Here is a checkpoint:
Entering Dahkla was more interesting, as it’s located on a split off the mainland, the surrounding sea on both sides providing a nice contrast.
There is a strong military presence which I liked for the added feeling of security, but the town also had a very relaxed feel to it. The one notable difference to Morocco was the children, friendly kids saying ‘bonjour’ without asking for caramel or ‘1 dirham, 1 dirham.’
At 6:30am the next day, we had to hire a taxi to take us into Mauritania. A 9:22am view:
The area between the borders is a no-man’s land littered with landmines. Nothing blew up on our crossing but everywhere there’s scattered much rubbish & car wrecks. After many checkpoints, running out of passport photocopies, we arrived in Nouadhibou, 50kms from the border, 8 hours later. A pretty unremarkable town, but we were definitely no longer in Morocco. The real Africa begins, nice to be back!
No comments:
Post a Comment