A new adventure to Africa

[helzie2020]

Oh no we've been saying since we got in to Spain how amazingly clean and smart everything feels. Even the sides of the motorways were immaculate. Think there is one shot there where some paper slips had blown down the pavement as it's been windy but honestly after seeing Morocco's waste problem I don't think I'll ever moan about a few bits of litter on a pavement again.

I don't think I can get across how absolutely terrible the situation was there. Litter isn't even the right word for it as it suggests someone dropping a piece of something they've just consumed because they can't be bothered to find a bin. Waste is a better word. Imagine all the waste a human produces going about their lives.. plastic, glass, food, nappies, building waste, everything just dumped in heaps at the side of the road, into rivers or in fields then pulled apart by dogs and birds and blown for miles and miles.

This is around every small village and town as there is no waste collection, no landfill sites, no incinerators. I think perhaps the large developed cities have some sort of system but everywhere else is just left to themselves. It's really tragic and the Moroccan government need to do something about it.

I agree about the huge amount of waste dumped everywhere. It's horrible horrible horrible and is seriously affecting my enjoyment of this trip. You can't really blame the people as there doesn't seem to be any waste management most places. It seemed worse further north and not quite so bad further south.

However, we drove into Rabat one day as we were STILL trying to get a working Inwi SIM card on day 3. What an incredible contrast! There was not a single piece of litter to be seen anywhere either side of the road into the city; it was immaculate. It became clear why when we noticed that there were absolutely loads of men and women in uniform cleaning along either side of the road. Of course, who knows where the picked-up rubbish ended up — perhaps just dumped out in the countryside!

 

[helzie2020]

Thanks very much for this informative thread Helen. We are in Morocco about 2 weeks behind you so it's been really helpful. Hunkering down today as the forecast is for a high of 33ºC.

 

[PaddyM]

Some Malaga street art pics, as well as some beautiful buildings.

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Incredibly lucky to see not one, but two works from the highly respected artist called Space Invader!

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These are pretty rare so to see two in a day was great.

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22c at 18:30 walking back from the locals bar to the Metro.

Paul

We are going to malaga mid March for my wife’s birthday / retirement celebrations for a week ( air B n B ) , thanks for the pictures .

 

[Lenny HB]

A great trip I've enjoyed being with you.

We also like Malaga great city bypassed by most tourists.

 

[helzie2020]

Photos from our second visit to Essaouira. We walked from Carrefour again but through residential Essaouira this time. Saw lots of kids coming out of Saturday morning school. Did quite a bit more browsing in the souk and some bartering. Only bought a leather purse in the end as not wanting to carry too much stuff about at this stage. Lovely lunch with a mother cat who brought her kitten along for some training on how to hit up the tourists for their sardines.
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Food was lovely. A plate of crispy grilled sardines, Moroccan salad, I had a tagine that was tiny lamb mince meat balls in a rich tomato sauce and Paul had a flaky pastry stuffed with chicken and nuts and was drizzled with honey and sesame seeds. Yum. £20 with soft drinks.

We jumped in a taxi back to the van and then drove to where we are now.

Hi Helen

Can you remember which restaurant this was?

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[Pixies]

A bit late to the party, so had to binge read this thread. What a fantastic write up, and fabulous pics, I really need to up my iPhone game, because mine look nothing like this. Loving the dog and cat photos too.

 

[Helen Ariel]

Hi Helen

Can you remember which restaurant this was?

I'm afraid not. It was somewhere near the sea wall but in slightly. There were a load of restaurants together on a little square and it was the 1st one we came too.

 

[Helen Ariel]

So we found a cracking little place to stay in the hills above Málaga for €20 a night with services. Only room for 6 vans or under 7m motorhomes so I booked it in advance. The real reason was because it’s very close to some of the excellent MTB trails to the north of the city. I went out for a recce when we arrived on Tuesday early afternoon while Helen chilled out in the sun as we have the most amazing view stretching to the Med.

Google told me a route to cycle so off I went. It was really tough as there are no easy climbs in Spain hence us buying e-bikes, but some of it was unrideable so I ended up pushing up quite a bit! Still the trails were excellent fun and I spent about 3 hours exploring.

The next day we headed off but took a different route to the trails. This one was rideable the whole way and we got really high with corresponding views of the whole city as far as Torremolinos. Stunning.
We were both excited and ready to ride!

The problem was that the trails down were incredibly steep and technical and whilst I might have considered riding some of them common sense took over and we both walked down as best we could until the gradient and technicality got less severe.

Once we got to the main trails we had a ball. There were a multitude of different trails as you can see on this screenshot from the excellent Trailforks app.

We record our routes to another app called Strava which gives loads of data including a ride profile.

You can see why we got the e-bikes! Back home if we did over 3000ft of climbing in 30 miles we’d consider it a big day out. Here we did it in 14 miles!

We had a snack lunch at a viewpoint and chatted to a couple of locals about how good the trails were.

We were pretty knackered after about 3 hours so it was a fast ride downhill to the area called Ciudad Jardin and stopped at a bar that was packed with locals having a leisurely lunch. We had a couple of well deserved beers with some olives then pedalled back up the hill to enjoy our homemade burgers.

We’re going to walk into our favourite market today as it’s only 2 miles from here and all downhill, then Uber back as it’s less than €10.
More trail riding tomorrow! I can’t wait!

Cheers, Paul

 

[Helen Ariel]

Having an electrical issue if anyone here can help...

Help please.All electrics apart from plugs have gone off.

Fridge, water pump, lights have switched off but sockets working. 240v feed in is fine. RCDs are all fine, fuses are fine. We discovered this blackened wire under the seat though. What's this called and is it likely to be the issue. Why would it have overheated? Only thing on was the fridge and...

www.motorhomefun.co.uk

 

[Riverbankannie]

Here you go
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31! That's too hot. Spain at the moment is 23 high, just perfect temperature for doing stuff and not getting lethargic or too sweaty. Off for a big mountain bike ride today

That is a more difficult one with just a fat finger on ipad so I’m not surprised you missed a bit

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[Riverbankannie]

Looks a gem of a site, did they provide the artificial grass? I am a bit surprised that you hang heavy water bottles from the awning leg catches. Ours are only plastic.

 

[Jimbohorlicks]

Your both mad. All that biking about. .

 

[Helen Ariel]

Looks a gem of a site, did they provide the artificial grass? I am a bit surprised that you hang heavy water bottles from the awning leg catches. Ours are only plastic.

The artificial grass is on the best two pitches already.

The water bottles are attached by bungee to the top of the metal legs. A tip from the Frenchies when the ground is too hard for the awning tie straps. The stretch in the bungee allows a bit of give and you can just empty the water out from the bottles when they’re not being used. One less single use piece of plastic from Morocco…

 

[Helen Ariel]

Your both mad. All that biking about. .

We love it! Such a great way to explore an area and get an amazing adrenaline buzz when you find the trails.
Plus it’s an excuse to drink more beer…



Paul

 

[Northernraider]

We love it! Such a great way to explore an area and get an amazing adrenaline buzz when you find the trails.
Plus it’s an excuse to drink more beer…



Paul

I'm tired just reading about it

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[Stonemags76]

Re the water bottles - we used a similar set up in Spain years ago, & the sun shone through one of the bottles & burnt through the awning strap! Just a heads up!

 

[helzie2020]

I'm afraid not. It was somewhere near the sea wall but in slightly. There were a load of restaurants together on a little square and it was the 1st one we came too.

Quite by chance, we found it so had to try it out of course. Le Petit Resto Poissons et Herbs.

 

[Helen Ariel]

Re the water bottles - we used a similar set up in Spain years ago, & the sun shone through one of the bottles & burnt through the awning strap! Just a heads up!

Wow surprised about that. I know glass can magnify but wouldn't have thought water and plastic would!

 

[Helen Ariel]

Quite by chance, we found it so had to try it out of course. Le Petit Resto Poissons et Herbs.
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Different cat this time

 

[bobnick]

We love it! Such a great way to explore an area and get an amazing adrenaline buzz when you find the trails.
Plus it’s an excuse to drink more beer…



Paul

Now the last reason i can live with

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[Helen Ariel]

So our time in Málaga is coming to an end. It’s been great and we’ll definitely come back to this park up as it’s so close to the excellent MTB trails.

We walked into the centre of the city visiting the 2 main markets, grabbed some seared prawn and tuna skewers with a drink whilst chatting to a couple of Brit ladies, one of whom ran a bar in Nerja for almost 10 years. Unbelievably she had never tried fresh tuna and couldn’t even order a beer in Spanish! The mind boggles…

The choice of seafood that you could get cooked for you was superb.

And the choice for you to cook at home is arguably the best we’ve seen in Spain.

Not just seafood though. The fruit & veg was really well presented.

We picked up a kilo of the most amazing fresh prawns for €7 and ended up walking home rather than getting a cab as we’d planned.

Perhaps it was made easier by enjoying more of the fabulous street art en route.

I cooked all of the prawns and made a lovely fresh salad to give Helen a break. It’s nice to cook once in a while and you can’t really go wrong with fresh prawns, only if you overcook them.

We had heavy rain in the evening and woke to an overcast day so delayed our planned bike ride until late morning before heading back to the trails. It meant we got a cracking sunrise though!

Another 1000m of vertical gain and several more trails followed with Helen getting a Queen of the Mountain on Strava!

Once we’d tired ourselves out it was back to the bustling locals bar for the menu del día, 11.50 euro for 3 courses and a drink. Simple, traditional dishes.

Today we leave for a couple of days visiting friends in La Herradura. Our host Carlos has recommended a bar that has great live music at the weekends so we’ll enjoy that!

Have a great weekend everyone, Paul

 

[Helen Ariel]

Well we got stood up by friend in La Herradurra. Arrived as planned at the Aire in the centre and I was immediately thinking 'oh no I don't like this place at all'. Very hemmed in by tall buildings, sardines in a row, van in deep shade for more than half the day. Messaged friend (we're here) went for a walk and some lunch. Another nice, simple menu del dia on the main drag.

Then went to lie on the beach and read as wouldn't be any sun at the van.

Had a bit of a snooze until late avo and then back to the van for a beer and sit and roughly plan our last 10 days. We decided if we didn't hear back from friend that we would get going earlyish as we really want to visit Almeria for the first time. A good friend from Brighton had highly recommended it as a non touristy place to visit and for a really good food scene at good prices.

All worked out for the best as we didn't really like the touristy vibe in La Herradurra but loved Almeria as soon as we got here.

Parked up on the docks, loads of space and sea views and really handy for the town centre.

We visited the Moorish castle on the hill 1st and were blown away by it's
size. It's been/being restored using EU funding and is completely free to visit. Amazing! Something like that would probably cost £20 each in the uk.

The tower in the photo is where our van is parked

We didn't walk the whole site as it's huge. We didn't want to miss lunch at our recommend restaurant on the other side of town and we already know we'll be coming back here so will revisit the castle in more depth next time.

The town is just wonderful to walk around, gorgeous trees and plants, fountains and parks, wide avenues and endless lovely looking bars and cafes. There's really nice cycle, scooter lanes across the town too.

The restaurant did not disappoint. Not somewhere we would have stumbled across and nothing special to look at but we got there just after opening and not long after all the tables were taken with locals and there was a lovely buzz about the place.

We're in traditional tapas with your drink region now and the reason we were recommended this place was you actually get a menu of free tapas to choose from including some with a one or 2 euro supplement. Not just a cheap bit of pork on bread but really lovely tapas.

Had too many to list but we paid the extra euro for some Bellota ham, with gorgeous almonds and had fun trying to decifer the menu.

After lunch we walked back to the centre and then down the prom, along the beach which was absolutely packed with people enjoying a sunny Sunday afternoon.
Paul will add his pics shortly.

 

[bobnick]

Have to say some great pics.

 

[Helen Ariel]

Decided to stay tomorrow and go for a ride to see more of the area.

 

[Mikey RV]

Do you surf at Brighton marina when at home.

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[Helen Ariel]

Do you surf at Brighton marina when at home.

No, we’re very much warm water surfers plus neither of us likes surfing in water that may be polluted with raw sewage…

 

[Helen Ariel]

So we had an early start today on the bikes, leaving the van at 09:30 which is unheard of for us!

25 miles and over 3500ft of climbing later we ended up in another tapas bar in town. Fair to say we’ve loved Almeria.

Coastguard boat heading out past the van this morning. It was a beautiful start to the day. We were heading up into the hills in the background.

It was a very arid landscape, reminiscent of Morocco and totally different from the trails at Málaga. The trails were a mix of steep, loose rocky tech and some cracking smoother flowing ones to finish on.

Helen even found a lemon beer she liked to wash down the tapas.

We’re both knackered now and are visiting the local market early tomorrow to restock with fresh fish & veg before driving to the Sierra Espuña to do more cycling. We’ve stayed in the area before and are excited to get back to explore further. This time we’re on a campsite though as we need to recharge the bikes! The sooner I get the inverter & B2B fitted the better as it’ll give us much more freedom for our next trips.

Cheers, Paul

 

[Helen Ariel]

So we're getting the fear now! Time is running down too quickly and the experience is just getting better and better. Not sure if I've said it before but WE LOVE SPAIN! The amazing weather we're having obviously helps a lot.

2 years ago when we did our last trip of 5 months we had a similar plan as we're doing now of spending about 2 weeks making our way from Málaga along the med coast to the UK but when we got into Murcia last time there was a really bad spell of weather (Sahara dust pollution, really bad air quality, strange twilight sky all day and raining red sand then forecast heavy rain nonstop for 10 days plus) so we checked forecasts and found that the North coast was sunny and 20 degrees. So we legged it cross country through a day of rain up to Bilbao and had a lovely time up there and traveling back through France.

Anyway this time it's going much more to plan. We loved our 2 nights in Almeria. This morning we got a really early start helped by being bathed in bright sunlight from 8am. We got to the central market by opening time at 9am (a 15min strut from the port) and walked around admiring all the beautiful displays of fruit, veg, meat and fish.

Topped up on fresh produce whilst reminiscing at the prices of the same stuff in Morocco at a quarter the price.

There is a really good fish market in the basement and we decided we'd like some sea bass as we've not had that yet on our travels and it would make a really nice fish curry which I was craving.

Of course Paul managed to pick the most enormous fish in the whole place which came in at 25 euros and had me scratching my head about how to deal with it in motorhome kitchen.

We got back to the van and away by 10.30 and were pleasantly surprised when we inserted our parking ticket to the machine not to be charged for our 2 days parking as we had thought it was 13 euros a night.

Two hours drive and we arrived into Murcia region and were rewarded with a big change in the landscape. Out of the plastic greenhouse cities and barren landscape and into orange and almond groves and pine covered hillsides.

It was a steep, twisty road up and over to reach the campsite we've booked on for 2 nights in the Parque Regional de Sierra Espuña.

As soon as we arrived we were wondering if we can stay longer as it's a really nice campsite. The nicest we've been on the whole trip. Swimming pool (probably freezing), table tennis, bar and restaurant, looks like there's lots of good mtbing from here too. 25 degrees today and tomorrow, 28 on Thursday then plunging to 18 on Friday!

Anyway I hacked the sea bass in half so we have 2 meals for our 25 euros and if I do say so myself it was bloody lush. Thanks Madhur Jaffrey for the inspiration for this Keralan fish curry with Pak choy and courgette.

Looking forward to riding again tomorrow!

 

[Helen Ariel]

I accidentally hit post before I finished writing that so have edited and added the rest now!

 

[lebowski]

Hi Helen and Paul, really enjoying this and previous write ups as well as the excellent pics, thanks for posting it all.

Having just bought our first MH we're planning on some similar trips, although maybe with slightly easier trails to begin with. Can I ask, do you decide where to go by finding trails first on Trailforks and then find somewhere to stop off, or vice versa?

Also do you find that you're a bit limited by the range of an SL, just wondering as Mrs L might benefit from a lighter eMTB.

Thanks again

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