Morocco

The tanneries, Fez


A child and man, Fez

Chefchoun

I’ve been in Morocco for five days now. It’s a completely different world to its close neighbour Spain, a more chaotic and mysterious world. Full of colourful markets and street stalls. Every street is alive with all walks of life. Where bakers are baking, carpenters carving, where people are making things and battering in ways unchanged for centuries. It is truly amazing and exhausting just taking in the many visual treats and fascinating glimpses that wait around every corner.

From Ceuta I headed inland into the Rif mountains home of the indigenous Berber people. Stopping in the city of Tetouan with its amazing ancient medina (market), I then headed on to Chefchoun a beautiful old town high in the Rif Mountains. Where I met an interesting Italian aid worker who was working nearby and her visiting mother, and a local Kif (an Arabic word coming from the word for pleasure that is used to describe marijuana a mainstay of the local economy) grower amongst others.

I’m now in the imperial city of Fez one of the most intact ancient cities of the Muslim world, where I’ve already met lots of interesting people. I’ll talk about this when I next get a chance.

Chefchauon from the Kasba

Europe to Africa

On the road somewhere in Spain

Oranges and dragons - the Casa de los Dragones, Cueta

I need to find out more about religious clothing in Spanish culture as I find this kinda scary

The cathedral Ceuta

Well Ive made it to Africa!

From Nantes I got a train to what I thought was a town on route to the Alantic coast and northern Spain. From here I planned to hitch hike to Africa. Well the town in question, Lamote, has several brothers and sisters around the place. Despite showing the girl at the ticket office a map Id drawn with my route and making it clear where I wanted to go she picked, at random, one of the Lomotes from the computer screen. The wrong one.

Opus Dais church in the Spanish Pyrenees. I don’t know much about Opus Dais bit I will find out more

Lucky for me I went to a Lamote on the way to the Pyrenees where I got a lift from Rico who was picking his son up from his mother who lives on an island of the coast north of Bordeaux. He was driving with his son to his home in the Pyrenees near the Spanish border. Perfect! But it got so much better.

My mate the Rasta beanie chilling out at Rico’s in the Pyrenees

He quickly offered me to stay at his place with his playful son of three, his girlfriend, a big gentle dog and a little kitten. They were really nice and told me about their lives working on the ski slopes in winter.

I was sad to leave but I’d still a long way to go to get to Africa. Fortunately I quickly got a lift over the high snowy pass into Spain and then had another quick wait before getting the best hitch of my life so far.

I got picked up by a French guy who was on a month long holiday from his job as a fireman in Brittany. And he was travelling to Morocco!! Yes all the way across Spain. After ten minutes waiting I’d got me a lift to Africa! Amazing I felt on top of the world. Surely it can’t stay this good for much longer?

A beautiful man-made lake in the Spanish Pyrenees

The Story So Far

St Nicolas Nantes


Chateau Des Ducs De Bretagne


Cathedrale Saint Pierre

Well I'm in Nantes now and things are going OK but could be better.

My first mission objective was to contact and interview some asylum seekers in or around Calais. To this end I failed miserably I gave myself know where near enough time and didn’t research or prepare adequately. So I have learnt some important lessons in what is proving to be a steep learning curve.

I did manage to interview a lady who works for Secours Catholique, a charity that helps with asylum seekers and other causes. I also interviewed a barman from Calais who spoke good English and was happy to talk about the problem.

Other than this I traipsed around pointlessly with a bad cold that I still have and generally felt out of my depth. Unfortunately I can’t seem to get the footage of my camcorder. So I am of to Nantes city centre, where I am currently, to take some photographs to put on the blog.
More later.

Planing For The Big Trip

Its taken a good six weeks of solid preparation to get everything ready.

This is all the stuff Ive gotta take and carry for months in the hot sun. I try to travel light but this is all essential stuff like my camcorder, camera, cables, lens cleaning kit, first aid, ect.

These are my business cards I designed and hope to give to people as I travel in the hope of gaining support for my project, the One Man Travel Plan.

This is my ingenious camcorder bag made from a water proof umbrela case.
Theres a see thruogh plastic bit so you can see what your doing.

This is a security measure. Its a length of chain from a hardware store with key rings runing along it to adjust its length. At the end is a climing clip thing to tether it to my trousers so as to keep it safe. Thats the theory anyway.

This is a seccret compartment for my camcorder that I am working on.