See Ya' Later Morocco! - Algeciras, Spain

…An old German guy, Rudy, gives me a ride to Rabat… As I climb out, and thank him, Rudy calls out,”vatch out for ze Moroccan beetles! Don’t let zem get in your blood! Next sing you know, you vill be here ten years, like me!” He roars with laughter as he zooms away in his VW…

I wake up just before dawn, in a venerable olive grove, overlooking the Moulay Idriss valley.
I know it might be my last morning in Morocco for a long time, so I just sit, watching the sun rise, and drinking in the beauty of the landscape.
There’s a raucous squawking, like a demented turkey. It’s answered by a rooster crow, then a hooting owl. I can’t figure out who’s making the sounds at first, then I spot little groups of olive farm workers, spreading out across the valley. As they set to work, they trade woops and jeers and bird calls.
It’s a perfectly absurd start to a Moroccan day.

I hitch quickly and easily. Hitching in Morocco is rarely difficult. Before I know it I’m on the side of the highway just outside Rabat. Spain is only a stone’s throw away.

(Above: Mohammed and Bea, and the awesome picnic they shared with me.)

An old German guy, Rudy, gives me a ride to Rabat. He’s lived in Morocco for years and married two Moroccan women (not simultaneously, he assures me). Rudy has me in stitches with stories about his in-laws and the trials of trying to build a house with a Moroccan builder, translating his German instructions, through his wife, into Arabic (more was lost in translation than the grammar).
As I climb out, and thank him for the ride, Rudy calls out, in his thick accent,
“vatch out for ze Moroccan beetles! Don’t let zem get in your blood! Next sing you know, you vill be here ten years, like me!”
He roars with laughter as he zooms away in his VW.

I want to thank all the great people I’ve met in the last four weeks for making my experience of Morocco so awesome. There’s a few people I want to thank especially. Ouma, the hostess with the mostess in Fez. Bill, my Sahara Desert road trip buddy. Finally, thanks to Mohammed and Bea for making my last impression of Morocco unforgettably nice.

Mohammed and Bea stop for me near Rabat. They’re a young brother and sister team, heading to Spain for a vacation. They’re friendly, curious and great company.
Mohammed and Bea are northerners, so Spanish, not French speakers. We chat as best we can, despite my lousy (non existent) Spanish, compare FaceBook photos, and laugh at the absurdities of Moroccan traffic. They offer to drive me all the way to Seville, since it’s on their way, so we roll onto the ferry and across the water we go.

Sitting in the lounge on the ferry, I realise; I’m in Europe. I’m among my own people again. I’m not exotic anymore. I’m just another white guy. I’m swept by a wave of relief. It’s Spanish, but it’s still familiar compared to Morocco. I understand
how things work here. I fit in. The distance across the Strait of Gibraltar is tiny. You could paddle
across from Africa to Europe in a canoe if you had strong arms, but the cultural gulf is greater than flying half way round the planet from Australia to Europe.

Mohammed jockeys the car off the ferry, and through the gates of the harbour into Algeciras. The city is orderly, clean and well lit. There are no donkeys anywhere. No fruit barrows parked across traffic lanes. No old men in hooded robes arguing on the street corners. No veiled women with flashing eyes, lunging into the traffic suicidally. No raucous wedding guests wielding drums and swords.

We drive out of town, and Mohammed pulls the car into a roadside service station, so we can have some supper. I steel myself for my first bad, overpriced, European truck stop food in four weeks. But Morocco has one last treat for me. With a flourish, Mohammed spreads a bright red rug on the tarmac of the parking lot. Bea unpacks a picnic basket. There is fresh Moroccan bread, yoghurt, a roast chicken and bean curry that their mother prepared for their journey. I am speechless. We sit on the rug, under the flood lights, and stuff ourselves, while the trucks roll by. One thing about Moroccan’s: they understand life on the road at a cellular level.

After we eat, we sit and look up contentedly, with full bellies, at the night sky.
“It’s a Moroccan moon” says Mohammed.
It is. A perfect crescent.
“La vida Gusta!” I manage, in my pigeon Spanish.
Mohammed nods and smiles, pleased with my effort. I grin stupidly at my hosts, and hug them. Then it hits me. I’m going to miss it: the crazy, unpredictable, smelly, sumptuous, decadent, ancient, dazzling, awe inspiring place, I’ve just left.
Seems like the Moroccan beetles have bitten.