Er Rachidia to Hassi Labied
The only good thing I can say about the hotel last night was that at least it is convenient to the bus station and the water was hot in the shower. It was also incredibly noisy so not much sleep was gained all round.
We got on a local bus, not the nice clean luxury CTM bus, but it was still quite good. We didn’t get wet at least, ok so it wasn’t raining but even if it was I’m sure we would have been fine. They also only seem to let people on that they have seats for which is also a bonus.
While we were waiting for the bus to depart a male stood up with a portable tape recorder and started singing. Imagine live karaoke on a bus in Arabic. At first I though oh so the radio doesn’t work so they are providing live entertainment to keep us all amused. Then he went into sales pitch pulling three tapes from his pocket he finished his speech then lunchtime singing while walking up and down the length of the bus. I was laughing. Louise being a little kinder then me was remaining poker faced. Talk about a captive audience.
After about five to ten minutes of the little man parading up and down the isle of the bus singing his little heart out he finally stopped gave a short bow and launched into his sales pitch once more. Then with a short pause presumably to see if anyone wanted to buy one of his tapes he finally got off the bus.
Next in the Live on Bus entertainment was the ‘Cure-All’ man who walked on and Launched straight into his sales pitch handing out a pamphlet describing all the benefits of his product. I would tell you all about this amazing product but we had to give the pamphlet back but apparently this stuff could cure everything and anything wrong with your eyes from irritation to blindness. Amazing stuff. Really doctors should hear about this stuff. Here we are having operations to remove cataracs and fix short sight and all we needed was to apply some of this little miracle lotion and all would be well. Once he had finished his pitch the ‘Cure-All’ man gave up and got off the bus.
There were two other Belgian backpackers in Efroud when the bus pulled in and it turned out they were going to Merzouga to do a camel trek in Erg Chebbi as well so we teamed up and hired a Grand Taxi.
As predicted they first tried to recommend ‘a good hotel’ in Merzouga. We told them we wanted to go to the Kasbah Mohajut. They tried saying that we could not go there because it was full. On telling them that it was ok because we had reservations they then told us we did not want to stay there as it was a ‘bad place’, ‘no good’, but this other place they knew of was ‘very good place’. The next tactic was to tell us the road was too bad that it was not possible for the taxi to drive to Hassi Labied. When it became obvious that we were not going to stay where they wanted and thus they would not earn commission they flatly refused to take us to Hassi Labied. The only place they would agree to take us all to was Merzouga about 5km down the road from Hassi Labied. We went with the other two figuring worst case it was only 5km, we could walk if we had to. We continued trying to negotiate with the driver but did not get anywhere except an admission that it was possible to drive to Hassi Labied but would cost about 70 Dirham, we still had to go to Merzouga first.
On arrival in Merzouga it became apparent why they insist on going to Merzouga. The taxi kept stopping so touts could try to get us into their hotel or on their camel trek. Funny we still did not agree. Finally the driver dropped the price from 70 dirham each to 50 dirham between us to take us to Hassi Labied. We accepted but he then moved further into town where the taxi was met by more touts offering us a room that was ‘better’. The taxi driver increased the price once more to 60 Dirham each so we got our backpacks out of the boot and start to walk to Hassi Labied. The driver realising that he was loosing his fare waved us back and agreed to the price of 50 dirham to take us both the Hassi Labied though he did not seem happy about it. Tough.
Of course while the road was not paved it was fine and certainly possible to drive there with a car. It is a pity really since this is the first time we’ve encountered this problem in Morocco. I hope it does not catch on and spread throughout the country. If your in this part of the world I would suggest taking the bus or train where possible as we’ve certainly found them to be clean, comfortable, assigned seating and absolutely no hassle with a set price.
From the outside the Kasbah does not look like much. Just a mud brick building. Inside it is beautiful with gardens in the central courtyards with impressive rugs on the floor and decorating the walls.
We arranged a 2 night 3 day camel trek to leave tomorrow afternoon. One night in an existing camp the next just out in the dunes by ourselves. The weather is still overcast but since they have had a 7 year drought which has only just broken we really can not complain. It is good for them even if it isn’t for us.
