National Lampoon Morocco 2012

We liked it so much last year, that and the crap weather here we decided to return

Vehicle: Defender 110 200tdi SW

Me,Wife & 3 Kids (7,15 & 17 years)

6000km's in just under 3 weeks.

701 litres of Gasoil works out at average of 24mpg, worse than last year that I put down to my new winch bumper and double the load on the roof rack.

Motorways :135 euros (French,Spanish & Morocain)

Ferry : Algeciras-Tanger Med 290 euros from Carlos, chuffed as saved 160 euros on the price at the port last year.Even got some cake as we showed them our Gandini camping guide!

Set off 4am 7/7/2012

Hammered it all the way down to Spain (yes the old girl will quite happily sit at 70mph all day long) wet right foot as it was pishing it doooon all the way down through France and somebody has nicked me LR plastic bag to put on said right foot from it's usual dash board position!!

Things start heating up a bit in more ways than one once we got below Burgos going towards Madrid .

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Never done that before Stop check! everythings fine, coolant radiator etc... Manage to get to the other side of Madrid holding the old girl out of the red with the heater on full blast and backing off the gas.Properly not happy and me minds raceing with probable causes ? Overloaded roof rack?, Duff Viscus fan?,new winch bumper & steering guard? so I decide to stop and take some radical action !!

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Screwed 4 self-tapping plasterboard screws into Viscus fan to block the bastid!! Sorted ! For the time being temperature returns to it's normal position!

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We got a Hotel for the night just before Granada.Set off again the next day and got to the ticket seller "Carlos" around 12 noon.

Algeciras port where we got a "Minging" Morocain boat to Tanger Med, usual happy smiley helpfull Morocain customs, not.They could'nt read the CIN N° that they stamped in my passport last year for the vehicle,so I'm sent off on foot to the "POLICE" to get the correct N° written in. But Mr Policeman sat in his little box is eating the biggest Tagin you can imagine, so I go back to tell the Customs Guy who sent me in the first place that only tells me to wait until he's finished ! You must be joking I reply you've not seen the stack on his plate. So he sends me off to see another guy who's not got a pen, so I have to then go off and find a pen- Absolute joke !!

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Sunday 8th July first campsite at Mouley-Bousselham, on the coast, pool for the kids,cool biere's in the fridge, stop for 2 nights to get over the 2000km's done so far!!
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Nice...moar

fantastic start

wow theres a trek!

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm !! typical sight at some of these Morocain coastal resorts!
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Our turn to get some grub.


Wild Monkeys in the Forest de cèdres just after Azrou.
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We are doing the imilchil route again because we enjoyed it so much last year.As it was that time of the day we decided to stop off and ask the farmers where we stopped off in their field last year if we could do the same again. What a welcome !! Treated us like kings, even went out and killed things in their yard for us to eat They were'nt having any of this camping malarky either, made us sleep in their guest's room and eat Tagin & roast chickens that had been running around earlier.
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They got no Land Rover, tractor, car, bike,toys! not got a lot realy and it must be bloody grim in winter but it dunt stop them smiling.

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The wife has stored loads of clothes on my over loaded roof rack for occasions like this-yipeeee get rid !

Wow! Keep up with the cost analysis too. That will be especially useful to a great many peeps on here

epic keep them comeing

Thanks a lot for your kind comments,realy appreciate it as it takes bloody ages put this lot up!

Market day at Agabala the last village before we start going up & up & up to imilchil.
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The only other 4x4 we met in our whole stay was this French geezer in a Toy with his mum & daughter.He was full on for a bit of off-roading but not alone, well yeh I said but that's a Toyota in it ? ooooh arhhhhh go on then but don't tell anybody

The top lake at imilchil is no longer! don't ask why it's just not there any more!dried up!
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We did the Gorge du Todra last year so this year we decided to cut across on Chris Scotts MH3 route that he describes as the second toughest route in Morocco that comes out at the top of the Gorges Du Dades.
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These people were living in caves in that rock face.
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One of them women actualy ran down that hillside with nothing on her feet with a baby on her back so she could cadge stuff off us-Nice one ! more clothes to get rid of
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A realy spectacular couple of hrs, with no real difficulty,scenery to blow your mind away, looks like a bull dozers been through recently to sort the tricky bit's out, probably be tarmac soon !

Got some camping in a Hotel carpark at the top of the Gorges du Dades .

Ps: Starting to get HOT!! real HOT, outside I mean, Defenders had some more screws stuffed in it's fan and is still holding out for the time being.

Ryder said:

Wow! Keep up with the cost analysis too. That will be especially useful to a great many peeps on here

Click to expand...

Diesel gone up since last year to 58p litre and as for every thing else if you don't ask the price before hand & haggle for ten minutes you get "bumbed" !

Gorges Du Dades
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Direction Zagora to get a Viscus fan .

On the "piste" Boumaine Dades - Tizi n Tazazert- Nekob 4hrs to do 42km's up and back down through the Atlas mountains-Wicked !


Flowering Laurels as big as a house.
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Back on to tarmac the other side, you realy do see some crazy things at the side of the road, like changing a lorry engine with a digger!
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Looks like great fun!

More pls

when are you next going as it could get people thinking

drewster said:

when are you next going as it could get people thinking

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Don't know ! Can only plan it around school holidays hence the reason why we were nearly the only silly git's there in the height of summer!

Jason2 said:

Don't know ! Can only plan it around school holidays hence the reason why we were nearly the only silly git's there in the height of summer!

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Bet your kids holiday blows the friggin doors off all the other kids holidays...

Wow awsome!!!!! would love to do this though my lot Moan on the trip to Cornwall to see family let alone all the way over there ha ha

Great write up and great photo's. Thanks for sharing.

Love the screws in the viscous....top job

Thanks a lot matey, more to come when I sort some time out

Great write up, fantastic photos.
Did you know the couple in the Land Cruiser?
When is the next episode due?

Vette

Thanks! No did'nt know the guy in the Toyota. We did a similar trip last year to Morocco at the same time of year and did'nt meet/see a single foreign 4x4 in our whole stay .

Soon