Momentum is your friend

Friday 11 Jan (mileage 4 piste, 367 roads, total 1537)
It is just 4c when we leave Bikershome in the morning. Looking at my schedule to meet Irene in Senegal it becomes obvious that Steve and I will have to part company. He decides to head north, but the new road over the High Atlas to Demnate is closed through rock falls, so I show him the piste from Ouarzazate airport that leads to Ait Benhaddou and then to the Tizi ‘n Tichka, and we part company. Steve is a great travel companion and I have really enjoyed our short time together.

The High Atlas in the distance

Rather than retrace my steps to the centre of Ouarzazate I decide to take a shortcut to the main road. I am renowned for my shortcuts, many of which end in ignominy. As does this one. I am following a cycle track through irrigated fields and am only 200m from tarmac when the track crosses a muddy water-filled irrigation ditch. It is about a foot deep and about three feet wide, and to make it worse, the track crosses the ditch at an angle of 45 degrees.

A cyclist would undoubtedly dismount and carry the bike over, but my GS and luggage weigh 300+ kilos so that option is out. So humming the refrain to the well-known offroad rider’s ditty, “Momentum is your friend, you can never have too much momentum”, I launch at the ditch with predictable results.

I lift the bike by standing with my back to it and using leg muscles, quite impressive considering I am up to my ankles in slippery mud. I try launching again and drop the bike on the other side, this time into the ditch. Ted Simon had it right when he wrote in Jupiter’s Travels, “I wondered who would come to my rescue this time,” and sure enough four locals fairly sprint to my assistance and together we get the bike over the ditch.

Right, no more offroad today. I switch on the iPod and listened to the various ‘Yes’ albums as I head south.

The quickest road to reach the Tarfaya area is one which I had travelled on only three months before with Andy Shortridge—via Foum Zguid and on to Tata. In October we found the 40c heat oppresive, but today it is cool and sunny, beautiful riding weather, and I find the road much more interesting than before. I visited the Tissint waterfalls and gorge.

Tissint gorge

After about 200 miles I come to a sign that reads Dahkla 1247km.  Dahkla is the last major town heading south through Western Sahara before the Mauritanian border.

I am making good progress and stop at the station thermale (hot springs) at Abaynou near Goulimine. Reading the description in the Rough Guide to Morocco I envisage something like Hampstead ponds–pools surrounded perhaps by palm trees and bull rushes, steam gently rising from the waters.  The reality is two indoor swimming pools circa 1960, one at 26c for women and another at 38c for men during the day and mixed bathing in the evening. I soak for an hour or so then go back to my room to do the laundry.

I’ve been using technical clothing with anti-bacterial compound. But although clothes are still nose-fresh after two days of wear, the unburnt hydrocarbons from diesel fumes and the trail dust mean the water is an unpleasant dark brown, even after several rinses. Just as well the clothes are black!

Tim