• How people live. Atar

    December 10, 2025 in Mauritania ⋅ ☀️ 21 °C

    Atar is a dust bowl in a state of chaos. Tiny houses, families living on the floor with goats running in between the rubbish piles, Tiny stalls all selling the same few goods. 50year old Mercedes Benz, held together with tape, transporting at least 7 persons. Without lights or indicators, frequently without windows.. Donkeys and camels standing around waiting for their next task.
    Meat and fish stalls consisting of a table standing in the sun, where various pieces of meat, covered by flies, lie waiting all day.
    Women sitting on the sandy pavement, holding their baby and selling fresh bread.
    In between, the constant calling to prayer of the Muezzins already starting at 4 in the morning.
    Oh my god!
    What a tsunami of impressions,
    all making me shudder.
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  • Ben Amira and Aischa

    December 7, 2025 in Mauritania ⋅ ☀️ 24 °C

    Our route follows the train line through the dunes to the two world leading Monoliths Ben Amira and Aicha.

    Legend tells, many years ago Ben Amira married his beloved Aischa and they received two sons. They lived happily in paradise together with their maid.
    Drought came and Amira left for the capital Nouakchott where he stayed many years.
    And you guess the rest of the story,
    Aicha found herself a lover., Veleklek.

    When Amira returned, he was so furious that he hit Veleklek so hard with his head that the latter flew 50km to the north and Amira ended up with a huge dent in his head.
    Amira was so sad that he took his two sons and moved 7km away.
    Aischa kept her maid. And so the two live on, both wearing their black grief robes.

    Mind you, Amira is the second largest monolith in the world!
    So, in the year 2000 a group of Stone masons from around the globe assembled around Aischa to create art for peace.
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  • Thundering Dragon! The Iron ore train.

    December 3, 2025 in Mauritania ⋅ ☁️ 24 °C

    About 50% of Mauritania's GDP stems from one Iron ore mine in the Sahara in Zouerat. An infamous 2km long train transports the ore through the desert to Nouadibou for shipment. Dunes block the tracks, trains have derailed and the train is the life line of huge desert regions not connected by roads. If you can't afford to travel in the one Passenger waggon you sit on top of the iron ore together with the live sheep you are bringing to the market.
    This train is legend.
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  • Mauritania, This is where Africa begins.

    November 30, 2025 in Mauritania ⋅ ☁️ 25 °C

    At last tha long drive through the west Sahara is behind us, and we spend our last night on a parking spot directly at the border. It is also time to get rid of all drugs and alcohol, unless we feel like 10 years in prison. So we get really drunk and finally smoke the Weed that we have been carrying all through Marocco.
    The Border crossing took 8 hours! No surprise when you have experienced Irak and Iran.
    But entering Nouadibou on the other side was a culture shock. With a bang! If Marocco was a rubbish dump then I have no words for Mauritania. Statistically it is the poorest country on earth, and you feel it.
    And yet it knocks me over, the people go about living, loving, and dying like everywhere else, however on a level we cannot imagine. Our Sprinti is like an oasis in the midst of chaos and Armageddon.
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  • An "OASIS" in Daklah

    November 25, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☁️ 22 °C

    Daklah is the southern most town of Marocco before the Mauritanian border and known for it's incredible Kite surfing winds in summer.
    It is being developed at hair-raising speed by the Maroccan Government to bring wealth to this desert region. Among other, by 2029 north Africa's largest fishing and container harbour will be completed.
    We decide to spoil ourselves for three days before we head into the desert for 2 months and ended up in the cutest boutique hotel imaginable., the "OASIS". And by God was is an oasis! Three wonderful days of relaxing, reading, phoning with family and good food.
    After two months of travelling this was like a breath of fresh air.
    It is with bleeding hearts that we now leave the "OASIS" and head into the real Sahara of Mauritania.❤️
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  • On to Daklah

    November 20, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☁️ 22 °C

    Today we head to the Houi en Naam 100km off the road to Daklah.
    The water flowing here is absolutely salty and undrinkable, but there are wild donkeys here that seem to survive.
    The return trip takes most of a day as dunes have crossed the road everywhere requiring us to turn off and weave our way through.
    Suddenly MANTOCO is standing by the road, two huge bolts holding the suspension have simply sheared off. Thank god they have extra bolts with them.
    I ask myself what on earth I will do if something lake that happens to us. We have very few spare parts with us.
    I decide to trust in Allah like the Tuaregs and Berbers. "INSCHALLAH"!
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  • Our first dune experience

    November 19, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☀️ 22 °C

    Today we had our first "dune" experience.
    While following a track for about 100km things got sandier and sandier, until We found ourselves more and more confronted with dunes blocking our path. Suddenly we found ourselves standing on a small dune looking at a steep drop-off., with the decision to either take the risk to drive down this drop or to spend hours searching for a way to pass through the dune field. That was when "Mocca" the truck of Frank and Christina suddenly arrived. Looking for the way through dunes is always better when you have several heads working..Read more

  • Climbing the Jebel l'Kest

    November 12, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☀️ 16 °C

    In the Anti atlas near Tafraoute lies the Aammeln Valley. In the years of draught in the 70ties, most families sent at least one child to France. Money which came back led to most families building really fancy homes, which relative to the rest of Marocco is really striking.
    We drove up an incredibly steep multi-hairpin road to 2000 meters into a tiny village without a name to hike up the Jebel L Jest.
    This country simply doesn't stop surprising me!
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  • Agadir Tasguent, the bank of the Berber

    November 11, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☀️ 19 °C

    Around 1000AD the Berber kingdom spanned the whole of north western Africa, and was led by a wise, warrior Queen, around whom whole legends are woven. These Berbers already had a system of banks, called "AGADIR" for the storage and protection of their valuables.
    About 12 villages shared one AGADIR, a type of fortress on a hill managed by a captain, a person of trust with a team of guards. In the AGADIR we're tiny rooms, each rented to one family where they could store their "Riches". Berber gold and jewellery was buried in covered holes in the walls or floor. To remember where the holes were, they would code the number of handwidths from a certain point in the room. Furthermore they stored their contracts here. Due to the lack of paper, these were written on a piece of wood and signed by both parties under whitness. Other treasures were garments, argan oil, grain and even dried vegetables.
    The AGADIR Tasguent, which had 360 compartments, is world heritage but has been closed to visits due to danger of collapse. A local villager who had access, gave us an exclusive tour spiked by many stories.
    In 1969 several years after maroccan indépendance, the captain of this AGADIR robbed what valuables he could find by breaking into the various compartments and disappeared to Paris.
    Now, does that remind us of the banks we have today??????
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  • The king of Marocco comes by

    November 8, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C

    What an exciting day today, and an exercise in total trust!
    Elfi drove one of the most beautiful mountain tracks I have ever encountered today. Hardly more than 2 meters wide, Vertical drop offs and frightening hair-pin bends on a washed-out path.
    And once arrived in "commune Al Tifnoute" the army suddenly blocked off the village, full in the middle of its weekly market, for a motorcade of 20 SUV vehicles with black windows followed by an ambulance and a small tanker vehicle.
    The last time I heard of this sort of treatment it concerned the "Sultan of Oman".
    When I asked a bystander who is driving by, the answer was:"the king". This was followed by a shrug of the shoulders,😁
    As soon as they disappeared the market and village continued as if nothing had ever happened.
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  • The road of the Kaspah's, Quarzazate

    October 27, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C

    Kaspah's were the previous palaces of wealthy families. In the past they were made of stamped-mud bricks. Today most have been abandoned and are slowly eroding away.
    But most faszinating was Ben Haddou, a stamped-clay town on the slope of a hill which has been the backdrop for numerous block buster movies, among other "james Bond", "Game of thrones", "lawrence of Arabia", "Gladiator" and "Dune".
    We entered the town with the plan to stroll through this beautiful location but left it screaming when we saw hundreds of tour busses with chinese tourists wearing face masks!😁

    Shortly afterwards follows Quarzazate a totally unreal large city in the middle of the desert and home to a Hollywood style film studios and "Noor", the largest solar thermal powerstation with thousands of sun-tracking mirrors facing a huge tower and generating temperatures of over 700 degrees centigrade.
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  • Okaimeden - Mohammed Cous Cous

    October 26, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☁️ 10 °C

    On our second evening, when returning from our climb I bumped into Mohammed Couscous who was walking back to his village after an unsucessful day of trying to sell a few fossils to the three tourists that he had met. It was freezing cold, his shoes worn through and clothes tattered, but he spoke french!
    Elfi and I rummaged through our clothes and gave him everything that wad not essential, clothes, shoes, and several packs of coffee we had with us inviting him to sell them if he wants to generate some income for his 5 kids.
    He spoke of desperate poverty in the region!
    Oh my god, how privileged and lucky we are❤️
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  • Goodbye Marrakesh, on to Okaimeden

    October 26, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ⛅ 10 °C

    The last thing I would expect to find in Marocco is a ski resort, and yet,
    Okaimeden is just that, a ski resort!
    The village, at 2609m is full of chalets and typical french ski resort hotels. Okaimeden peak reaches 3255 meters with a view on the high altlas chain of mountains all over 4000meters, among other, the 4167 meter Jebel Toubkal.
    And now the sad part.
    The village is empty, with exception of a few locals and sheep, the fancy hotels are falling apart and the lifts are broken.
    Everywhere decay!
    One small cozy Gite, "chez Juju" is still open, but not even they have guests. "Juju" founded the gite in 1946 in the days when they still had 4 meters of snow and you hiked up the mountain with skins under your skis. Modern lifts followed, hotels sprung up.
    Today average snow in winter is 50cm, the tourists are gone and everything is falling apart. Listening to locals talking of the "old times" is agonizing! They speak of constant mountain streams of water, all summer long, today everything is dry.
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  • Marrakesh 4

    October 22, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☀️ 29 °C

    Right next door to Hassan Fessie making brass lamps, in the same back yard complex, were three guys producing mosaik tables in a workshop no bigger than 10m2. The Mosaics were chiseled out of clay pieces with utmost precision using a tiny hammer.
    Before leaving Marrakesh we returned to the courtyard of Atisains Africaune to say goodbye to the wonderful people we had met there: Salah Nasiri and hi uncle Aziz el Khanjar and , Mohammid Tari who poured some wonderful tea as a farewell.
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  • Marrakesh, an insane boiling pot.

    October 20, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☀️ 31 °C

    Marrakesh is a mirror our arrival at our our Riad in town, (riad = traditional Maroccan town house) .
    We walked through narrow, dirty, incredibly loud, stinking ally ways at 35deg. with hooting scooters racing by, and shouting carts pushing through. Then we turned down a tiny pitch-dark ally way into a dark tunnel, wondering where the hell we are. Suddenly on our left a decorated door with knocker. We knock, and enter into a court yard, with fountain and trees in the middle, surrounded by 5 beautiful maroccan rooms and TOTAL SERENITY! An oasis in the middle of chaos.
    Marrakesh is crazy, it is everything! Claustrophobic, Loud, dirty, stinking, beautiful, artistic, fascinating, touriststic, warmth, politeness, agressiveness, stress. Acute poverty crashes head-on into extreme wealth.
    And it is totally exhausting!
    It was like a roller coaster ride.
    Merchants and artisans, motor cycles and carts, incredible african and arabic art next to the most terrible touristic rubbish, luxury restaurants next to the street butcher that imediately grills the sheep he just killed.
    Simply crazy!
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  • Kasbah Bab Ourika

    October 19, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ⛅ 26 °C

    While preparing for this trip in Germany Elfi and I watched a film on Netflix called "Love in Marocco". It was absolutely terrible, but parts of it were filmed in an incredibly beautiful Kasbah, today a boutique hotel decorated in exclusive maroccan style.
    As we neared Marrakesh we remembered the film and researched where it was located and decided to spend a night in this incredible location and really spoil ourselves.
    I phoned them, only to hear that they were booked out for the months in advance. We decided to look at the place none-the-less, eat a luxury meal and then sleep somewhere else in our "Sprinti".
    Oh my god, were we spoiled! The place was incredible. The evening began with gin tonic (hardly available in this Islamic country) while watching the sun set, then continued with an incredible meal and wine.
    As we returned to our car I passed a seated british gentleman talking to the hotel manager and spontaneously developed a really nice conversation. It turned out to be the founder and owner of the Kasbah.
    He promptly offered us the room they keep in reserve for VIP'S.
    And so it came that every staff member knew that we were befriended with the owner. They carried us on hands!!!
    And so, we spent two days in heaven.😁
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  • Cascades d'Ouzoud, major negotiations!

    October 17, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ☀️ 24 °C

    On the way to Marrakesh we passed the cascades d'ouzoud. A 100 meter waterfall that used to transport huge quantities of water is today just a memory of the past.
    Obviously it is overrun by tourists, but it had ONE very exceptional carpet shop run by Abdelkabhir and his nephew Yassir Ben who regularly visits Berber families in the Atlas mountains where the women weave the most unbelievable carpets during the long winter months. I promptly fell totally in love with one of the carpets. While trying to negotiate the price, the number of carpets kept increasing. Due to "complexity" of the negotiations we posponed to the next morning. After breakfast we continued, I told him about our trip and how I had produced hashisch at the "weed farmers", he told me about his visits to the weavers in the mountains and how they use natural dyes for the wool, I told him about my family and kids in Germany and he told me about how each carpet he buys is like a child to him especially the one carpet I loved most which he called his best horse! We dealed-and-wheeled for three hours with breaks for tea and discussions with our "back-up teams" (Elfi and his uncle).
    All the while Elfi had philosophical discussions with his uncle about ethics, beauty and bought some earrings😁
    Finally the deal was closed! 6 carpets for an absolute fortune😁
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  • Road construction as development aid.

    October 17, 2025 in Morocco ⋅ ⛅ 20 °C

    The Riff mountains, as well as the central-, and high-Atlas mountains are home to the Berber tribes. We have experienced this region as one of extreme poverty, with people sometimes totally desperate, begging us to buy something, anything, just so that they can have some money. It tears my heart to experience this, especilly when one realizes that they are talking about several "Dirhams", less than 50 Euro cents.
    It seems the region is totally disconnected from the development marocco has gone through in the last decades. Houses are made of stamped clay frequently in total disrepair, transport is by donkey, cooking is with wood. Water, which was once readily available in the mountains has becom a magor problem as the drought continues. Villages are dying out and the cultural heritage of personal jewelery and family carpets is being sold to the markets in Marrakesh to people like us, to generate at least some money for the families. It is all very sad!

    What we have noticed is that there is massive road construction and repair work taking place all over, especially in the Atlas mountains where tracks leading tens of kilomerters to tiny villages in the high mountains are widened and graded. These multi-year projects train and use locals, also in qualified positions, such as truck drivers, operators of machine shovels and other infra structure.
    This brings desperately needed income into the region, villages and families.
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