Tangier

Finally after 4 countries, 2200 miles, a lot of a beer, hardly any sleep, only a small mechanical niggle and lots of new friends we were heading to Africa and Morocco! Pushed on by the wind farms of southern Spain (yes i know they do not work like that!), we arrived at the port of



Tarifa just 13km away from Morocco over the Gibralter Straights. After dealing with the tickets for the ferry and brushing off some tourists wanting to take pictures of the cab we set sail, well sort of, for Morocco. On the ferry we met an English guy who lived in Marrakesh who filled us in on some important things to remember. Firstly that passport control was on the boat, secondly and most importantly perhaps, how much to bribe policemen if they stop your car (50dh, about £3)

What he didn't tell us was that every single person you come into contact with at the port and at customs needed to be bribed in some way shape or form. Like the well prepared team we are we had arrived with about 30p between us leading us to bribe people with anything we could that was lying about in the cab! In addition to this before even getting out the the customs area and only some 10 feet from the boat someone offered to buy the cab, while at the same time we were bombarded by people selling sunglasses and watches and hashish. Although it was only 13km away it was clear we were in a whole new world now!

This feeling was enhanced by the narrow lanes up to our hotel (complete with bendigo nearly running over an old lady!), the Continental, a hotel stuck in a time warp. It hadn't seemed to have changed since it had been built and was probably the place to be during the jet set and literary past of Tangiers. The other issue we had to contend with was the fact that we had arrived mid way through Ramadan, the Islamic festival, where nothing can pass into the body from sunrise to sunset, this made getting anything to eat or drink in the day rather difficult, especially beer! (despite the initial shock we have by and large stuck to it, when in Rome and all!)

Heading out of the hotel we were met by Abdul, who became our helpful guide for the afternoon who showed us around to get our bearings around the maze of the medina. The next day we set about our first major task of the trip getting a new radiator, this was to be an eye opening experience in itself. The mechanic we found proudly proclaimed "I know every engine in the world", of course this was before he saw what we had causing him to add "except for that one!" when we rolled up! This task was also a good demonstration of how much Moroccans like to argue, with english speaking locals wanting to help for a nominal fee of course our mechanic let rip with a few choice words, hurled his tools on the ground and shoved one of them onto the ground! With this out the way he set about fixingnthe radiator with McGuyver like inginuity while we all lounged in the sun! Including tips for a days labour this set us back about £60 which isn't all bad!



The final task in Tangiers was to buy some local get up so we would blend in to our new surroundings

Next stop Asilah...