Western Sahara

The truck has finally been fixed, improved a bit, and caught up with us in Marrakech! After one last night at a campsite outside the city it was time to get going again. The next main stop is Nouakchott, Mauritania, but before we get there we have to pass through Western Sahara, a former Spanish enclave and now ruled by Morocco (or an independent country depending on whom you’re asking).

On the way from Marrakech to Western Sahara we made a few stops in the last touristic and western towns, Essaouira and Agadir. In Essaouira we had some beach time for those who wanted and I had a good opportunity to repair my sleeping mat that had already broken once. Agadir was mainly a stop to stock up on food and we also had what’s probably the last McDonald’s in 5 months.

After Agadir it was mostly just driving and camping for quite a few days. It was really windy, unusually windy for the area according to a police officers at one of the many checkpoints we had to pass. The desert is also turning more and more into a sandy desert with sand blowing across the road, into the tents, and everywhere. The places we camped weren’t optimal either as there were no wind shelter what so ever, and the ground was either too soft for the tent pegs to do anything, or you hit rocks, making it impossible to peg the tents down properly. I managed fairly well with rocks and knots, but some people had a rougher time with their tents.

Eventually we reached the border of Western Sahara. The border is not really a border though as Western Sahara officially belongs to Morocco, it’s just a dotted line on the map, but we still stopped for as good of a photo as we could get.

The first real city in Western Sahara was Laâyoune, which is also the “capital”. It was really nice to get to a city that seems like it’s never seen a tourist before. All of a sudden a proper lunch at a restaurant is €2.50 instead of €6-7.

We stayed a few nights in a small town by the coast, not far from Laâyoune, for a few nights to rest after the several nights of bush camping we had, as well as to mend the tents. The town had a bit of an odd feeling to it with half of the buildings looking really old and worn-down, half of them looking brand new or still under construction. And it didn’t help that the town was almost empty of people. It seems like we hit a tourist beach town in the lowest possible season. It had a nice beach walk though and we even managed to find one or two open shops, even if they didn’t have much for sale.

The journey through Western Sahara is mostly just driving through the desert and with a maximum speed of the truck at just over 60kph it takes a few full days of driving. The view from the truck is nice but gets a bit monotonous after a while with nothing but sand, low, dry vegetation, and occasional dromedaries.

The last stop in Western Sahara was Dahkla, a city known for water sports, mainly kite surfing. This was just another short stop though as the validity of our 30-day stay Morocco stamps were drawing to an end. After some last preparations we set off towards the border of Mauritania.