Lanzarote 4 March 2007 Les på norsk

Underveis in Africa

**TOURISM** Tourism has made its entry into Morocco, but there are still many places that are untouched by modern mass tourism. These are the places we try to seek out. Here from the market.

NEWS AND FEATURE STORIES

ESSAOUIRA: Nice people, corrupted customs officers, shitty harbours and delicious foods. Morocco is a land of contrasts, and our first encounter with Africa was one of contemplation.

**TORTOISE** We spotted our first tortoise midway between Europe and Africa. It was as big as the ones you see in the magazines, around 10 inches in diameter. It looked so cute when it was paddling its way, in the middle of the high seas, a 100 kilometers off shore in any direction.

FACTS ABOUT MOROCCO

Morocco is situated in the northernmost part of Africa, between Tunisia and Western-Sahara, which is currently illegally occupied by Morocco. The capital of Morocco is Rabat.
Aprroximately 33 million people live in Morocco.
Tourism, fruit crops, chemicals and fisheries are among the main industries.
Morocco is a monarchy, like Norway. The monarch is Mohammed IV. He is young, and considered as a very progressive statesman, who the people in Morocco put a lot of faith in will modernize the former French colony.
Morocco has long since occupied Western-Sahara, former Spanish Sahara, for which they have been criticized harshly by the international community. Fighting still rages on between the Moroccan army and the liberation movement Polisario. As of today, no diplomatic solution seems to be in range fro the conflict.
The currency in Moroccol is Dirham. Bank cards are accepted in many hotels and supermarkets, and there are ATMs everywhere. The price level on food and drinks is around one third of that in Norway.

(Sources: Caplex, Wikipedia)

**BETTER THIS WAY** IN Essaouira, Underveis was berthed just in front of the rescue vessel, just in case. The inlet into Essaouira is shallow and narrow, and with a lot of swell and waves, even inside the harbour.

**BAZAAR** The markets in Essaouira had everything for sale.

**BOATBUILDING** Essaouira is renowned for her high quality wood. The boatbuilding business in the entire country is extensive, and there are fishing boats being built everywhere, in all shapes and sizes. The boats are colourful and seaworthy. The larger boats are actually quite similar to the ones we constructed in Norway in the first part of the 20th century.

Most of all it resembled a small meteorite, but knowing that more than 6,000 people perish every year in small, open boats trying to escape from Africa to the Canary islands, he woke Finn Olav. We stared together into the dark of night for a while. The winds were strong and there was quite a lot of sea as well in the area. After a while we returned back on course. Rune is quite sure that it was a small meteorite he spotted, but the sense that there might be human beings in distress out there in the dark, was terrible. It will be with us for quite a while. But if it was a meteorite, it was a magnificent sight.

As this is being written, we have spent three days in an expensive, but good marina in Puerto Callera, Lanzarote. We have showered, topped off our fresh water tanks and slept. Now we are going to Las Palmas, a leg we expect to spend less than 24 hours on. There we shall start the preparations for the trip across the Atlantic, a passage of some 2,800 miles, a distance we expect to spend some 22 days to cover.

**FISHERIES** Between fishing vessels of upto 70 feet, constantly heaving back and forth, we were berthed alongside the only pontoon in the harbour. IN the background the rescue vessel, the shipyard and the harbour police office.

Lanzarote, 04.03.2007