From Azrou to the desert

2^nd March in a campsite in the Ziz gorge

Well, it was so cold last night that the water froze in the van and the gas wouldn't work in the morning! It's been like this for 2 days and even though its sunny in the daytime, its still too chilly. Yesterday we went to the local souk which was mesmerizing. Krysia bought a lovely woolen blanket from a Berber at a good price and haggled him to a fair deal. We went to a cyber ( internet ) in the bustling town of Azrou and Skype'd our Jaimie. We chatted for over an hour at the grand cost of 6 dirhams! 40p. They hooked up a set of headphones and a mic each so we could speak as a family and see each other on video. Modern technology eh!! I would have written a blog but the French style keyboards are just too confusing. Loads of letters and things are on different keys? It's hard enough on an English keyboard, why the french have to have it different?, well that's the french.

So after 5 lovely days in Azrou, we set off at 11.30 …...... south! Snow is forecast and we've done that already this winter in Wales. We drive up through the ceders, waving goodbye to troupes of apes ( so sweet ) and over the top of the middle atlas. We stop at a water spring high up and like other Moroccans passing, fill up our water bottles. Sweet, clean water, mmmmm. The scenery is intoxicating, vast high planes of stony desert back-dropped by snow capped peaks giving way to the distant High Atlas in the south. We descend into red desert plains around Midelt, leaving the lush memories of Azrou behind. These towns live at 3000 ft + and temperatures will plummet tonight so we drive on into the barren but awe inspiring High Atlas to complete our intention of finding some warmth!

The roads are good and progress is made. It's incredible what changes one can see in a few hours. As we arrive in the desert of the south, flat plains of stony hamada greet out eyes. As far as the eyes can see! We stop at a well known campsite only to find it packed. With camper vans, tourist shops!, tour groups, restaurant and more. Too much for us, we didn't come all this way for that, so we left and drove some more to arrive here at a campsite in a palmerie, 6 other vans, lovely receptionist with mint tea and chats, now thats more like it!

No internet access here so blogs will continue to be sporadic! Thank goodness I hear you all say. I don't want to become boring now do I? We'll drive 12 kms to the nearest internet and post this tomorrow. Which incidentally, is dear krysia birthday! So all sing won't you. Well at least raise a glass of cheer tomorrow night.

So lots of love to you all

Ted and Krysia

ps deserts in Morocco fall into two categories. The majority of them are stony, desolate places with little or no vegetation called Hamada. The other type aka sand dunes, are to be found in two places here. Erg Chebi at Merzouga and much smaller at Tinfou and M'hamid further west. When we get to the dunes we will be sure to let you know.