Public Transport

Taroudent
When we head off in the mornings on our travel days we never know exactly how it will work out. Buses, especially the modern comfortable ones leave early in the morning and are often full. Most trips involve an assortment of grand taxis, mini buses and larger coaches. Whatever the combination a distance of 300km will take a good chunk of the day.

Although travel days are usually tiring, they are also a fun way to really be with Moroccans(sometimes much closer than you expect). In the week around Aid things were really busy. I quickly discovered that good orderly Canadian queuing is non existent here. Also, buying a ticket for a 5 hour coach ride doesn't mean there will be available seats until you pay the suspect " baggage fee" and they turf others off the bus. On one ride I ended up sitting much further up in the bus than Matthew and Gord. I was quickly adopted by the surrounding woman who shared their food with me and made sure I was sitting with one of them as passengers shifted throughout the ride. In return, I shared my lap for their sleeping toddlers because we all know a toddler who sleeps is a marvelous thing on a long journey.

Today our journey so far has involved two grand taxi rides because the morning bus to Taroudent was already full. We splurged and bought the whole backseat of the Mercedes. I am not willing to spend three hours with four or five crammed in. It has been a beautiful drive along the foot hills of the Atlas. We are making much better progress than the buses which stop for tea and passengers all the way along. The current taxis' odometer reads 817,430km - impressive.

Now we are waiting in a town called Taliouine, a town the book warns is sometimes hard to get out of. Once installed in our third grand taxi of the day we pull out of another back water town; indistinguishable from many others whether you are in India, Cuba, Turkey or Guatemala. The one thing that the bus stations or taxi stands in all of these towns share, however, is some of the best people watching around! In spite of the time and some of the discomfort I think the majority of foreigners who wiz by in Land Rovers might be missing a big part of Morocco.

Location:On the Road