wk 7 ctd

12th August (Lou)
Morocco day! Set off from Tarifa at 8 (painful) and headed for Alcezeraz (can't spell this one!) where K & J had kindly informed us about where to get the cheapest tickets to Morocco (Behind the big Carrefour off Junction 112 of the E5 if anyone is going) Turned up with the plan of going shopping and then going to the place but being Spain the supermarket didn't open till 10 so we settled with some service station croissants until then. Went to see the lady in the place and after much faffing to and fro we did shopping and found the man we needed for cheap fares. The transaction went something like this:
1)Go to place at 12.30 as instructed
2)Papa comes in waving tickets
3)Papa gives us a photo of the junction we needed off the E5 and says 'you go, ferry at 1.00')
4)We ask price, and don't have enough cash for the 300 euro that he wanted so we give him 250, he seems happy and we screech to the port, breaking our plodding pace of 50mph somewhat
Ferry fine, got to Ceuta and the madness begins! You basically have to sort a form for your car and a form for each of you with your passport, go to booths and get them processed by people. Problem is, people (mainly the non tourists) push in and come out of their cars to do the forms and then are stuck in the queue behind all the other cars, so it is honking horn heaven...we had our form done wrong by our guy so the policeman wouldn't let us through but then I spoke French to him and he suddenly became incredibly polite to me! Having had this process take about an hour and a bit (which is average by all accounts) we stayed in a service station having driven about 4 hours down the road to where we were aiming for.

13th August (Lou)
Drove down to Essouria today, it took about 9 hours and we really saw some sites, the favourite being what Joe describes as a 'battle reinactment' where there were an insane number of people on a tiny road and there were hundreds of tents/stalls and it was so windy and sunny there was dust everywhere which looked like smoke. After having a peek at Essouria we headed to Moulay which is where seems to be good (although rocky and hazard filled!) for windsurfing, and good to camp. Met up with Will, James and Karen's friend and Amy and John. Good chilled out evening. And I slept all night without waking up once which is a first! (And I woke up at 7 and told this to Joe who I don't think really needed/wanted to know just then!)

14th August (Lou)
Woke up and there was a donky outside the van. There were also two puppies (flip flop sized, maybe one week old at most?) Joe said he saw someone put down a bag and they crawled out. All really sad. Gave them some milk and some other people gave them some cake. But the worst is to come.. they are totally naive and know nothing ( having been dumped on the beach) and the little brown one went a bit close to the donky's hind leg and got a very swift kick. It lay on the ground for ages crying and it was really horrible. I thought it was going to die there and then. We decided to take them in. The little brown one has been making a steady recovery but it still looks pretty sad for itself, I'm not sure it will make it through the night, although we have built them a shelter from rocks and a coat to keep the wind off and the heat in. The little black one seems pretty lively and wants its sister to play with it but it doesn't seem to want to.
Went out for grilled chicken at Cafe Moulay which was good but not as cheap as we were expecting for Moroccan food...

15th August (Lou)
The brown puppy survived the night! So pleased! It walks really wonkily but I think it did that before it was kicked in the head. Had a lazing around day today, mainly being mummy and daddy to our puppies! The black one is certainly much more adventurous than the brown one, it goes off and plays with the other dogs (of which there are loads...) where as the brown one seems to sit around and find dangers to walk near....went for a walk into the 'village' and then out the other way but got surrounded by dogs which was pretty intimidating... met some nice lads who pitched up in the evening in another Ford Transit!
Moulay is good, apart from lack of toilet and bin facilities, but the windsurfing is good to watch. There are an insane amount of kids who come round all times of the day to sell you bread and things, and crawl around your van picking everything up and inspecting it (had to be a little careful when they went near our emergency-wee-in-the-van-bottle...) Most of them are pretty cool though, and they are good to practice French out on and they are very honest and would never take anything of yours. Pups to bed in their new cereal box shelter (we are preparing them for a more wild night and can't leave the coat behind, although they are snuggled in a pair of Joe's boxers)

16th August (Lou)
Joe went for a couple of windsurf sessions today, the waves were van high, about 2m, looked scary to me, he did really well, I was proud! Some good high jumps too! Puppies doing well, black one gone all day until the crazy small child brought him back to us tonight, confident about leaving them now, he loves them! Had a chatter with the UK lads again tonight, it was James' birthday and they had a yummy looking dinner of fish and tatties and salad. Dogs sound asleep in their house.