Felt better, no fever, but still a bit newborn lambish about the legs. A bit of fresh air and exercise seemed to be in order so out I went to play with the touts in downtown Agadir. A great game, once you understand the rules, and you even get the occasional free glass of tea. The 
best was joining in an elaborate charade of pretending to buy some tat to help two young Moroccan wide boys rip off a party of particularly snotty tourists. I know I shouldn’t have, but I needed a bit of light relief and they did make excellent tea.
Shortly after, I took a wrong turn on my way to the port, left Africa, and entered Holidaybrochureland. Mature date palms were being planted by JCB outside a shiny new McDonalds, armed tourist police were on the alert on every corner to guard against any non-brochure experience, and I’m sure t
hat, somewhere behind the scenery, someone was painting the pebbles white. Fighting off my Victor Meldrew cynicism attack, I chatted to some typically friendly Dubliners and had a really nice lunch in a really nice French restaurant, ‘Restaurant au Parasol Bleu’. It cost 10 euros, twice as much as any meal I’d had in Morocco, very good value for Holidaybrochureland.
Finally found the port but wasn’t allowed in, though one of the customs officers tried to buy my bike even though it was on temporary import documentation. He just pointed at his Douane badge and laughed at my naivety. I was tempted, just for the hell of it, but the thou
ght of finishing my blog on lavatory paper in a Moroccan prison dissuaded me, as did the further thought that there would be no lavatory paper in a Morrocan prison.
In the evening, a text from Hans convinced me I had been correct to stay put. I should firstly explain that the Berber kids above the Todra Gorge had all named me ‘Ali Baba’. I still don’t know why they did but the name stuck.
The text from Hans:
‘Hello Ali Baba. The road down it’s god bad the sidewind hard to fight against. How you feeling today? Hans’ If it was ‘god bad’ for Hans, I probably couldn’t have ridden in the conditions even if I’d been fighting fit.
best was joining in an elaborate charade of pretending to buy some tat to help two young Moroccan wide boys rip off a party of particularly snotty tourists. I know I shouldn’t have, but I needed a bit of light relief and they did make excellent tea.Shortly after, I took a wrong turn on my way to the port, left Africa, and entered Holidaybrochureland. Mature date palms were being planted by JCB outside a shiny new McDonalds, armed tourist police were on the alert on every corner to guard against any non-brochure experience, and I’m sure t
hat, somewhere behind the scenery, someone was painting the pebbles white. Fighting off my Victor Meldrew cynicism attack, I chatted to some typically friendly Dubliners and had a really nice lunch in a really nice French restaurant, ‘Restaurant au Parasol Bleu’. It cost 10 euros, twice as much as any meal I’d had in Morocco, very good value for Holidaybrochureland.Finally found the port but wasn’t allowed in, though one of the customs officers tried to buy my bike even though it was on temporary import documentation. He just pointed at his Douane badge and laughed at my naivety. I was tempted, just for the hell of it, but the thou
ght of finishing my blog on lavatory paper in a Moroccan prison dissuaded me, as did the further thought that there would be no lavatory paper in a Morrocan prison.In the evening, a text from Hans convinced me I had been correct to stay put. I should firstly explain that the Berber kids above the Todra Gorge had all named me ‘Ali Baba’. I still don’t know why they did but the name stuck.
The text from Hans:
‘Hello Ali Baba. The road down it’s god bad the sidewind hard to fight against. How you feeling today? Hans’ If it was ‘god bad’ for Hans, I probably couldn’t have ridden in the conditions even if I’d been fighting fit.
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