The French Campers
Tuesday 19th Jan
There are some soap dodgers parked in a layby near the campsite. I saw a van that made me laugh. This guy obviously had a big knackered Mercedes van and a shitty wreck of a VW Type 1 bus, loads of mastic and a bit of marine plywood knocking about. So what did he do? He decided to put together 2 shit vans to make one bigger, even more shit van that probably leaks like a sieve.
Anywhere you go where there are camper vans in Morocco, you can almost guarantee that 90% of them will be French people and whenever any nation appear to descend on a place en masse, they are always subject to a little bit of criticism. So let's get on with it then shall we.
The French camper van experience appears to me to revolve around the camper van itself. Most of their day seems to be filled with chatting to other van owners about the merits of their particular vehicle. They will stand around often in number, staring at one or another of the vehicles, stroking chins, deep in technical conversation. And if they are not talking about the vans, they are fiddling with them. Fair enough, we all have to do a little maintenance from time to time but these vans are new, they need no maintenance. They come equipped with a trailer load of cleaning equipment, step ladders, miles of hose, miles of extension leads, motorbikes on the back. One turned up today towing a Citroen Mahari- one of those 2CV based desert looking vehicles. And they clean their vans constantly. You are not allowed to hose them down as water is scarce in Morocco so they have little buckets and go round every day dabbing off traces of salt or condensation. It is a site to see. And all this is punctuated with 3 square meals (accompanied by Ricard of course) eaten right outside the van. They appear to be uninterested in the fact that they are in Morocco, an enthusiasm for food and camper vans fuels these trips.
And parking the vans, that is a spectator sport to the English. If we see a couple of French vans enter the site, we open a can of beer, fold out a chair and get a good view of it all. The French turn up, find the spot they want, the wife jumps down to help hubby shoehorn the van in to a parking spot the size of a tennis court, wife doesn't know left from right, let alone his left from her left. They finally get the van in, get out the electrical hook up, drop the moped off the back then invariably see a spot elsewhere that they think is better (probably nearer more French and away from "les Rosbifs") so they disconnect and move and start all over again. For a Frenchman, parking a van can take half an hour.
2 Exciting developments today. Firstly, I went to see about renting or buying surfboard - yes, I might try to learn to surf. Initially I was uninterested as it just looks like a lot of ball-ache for a lot of falling over in the sea. I also confess to not wanting to be a complete beginner at something and not wanting to look like a complete punter out there with all the cool surf dudes. But today there was a guy who was obviously enjoying his first day and he was the only guy out there. I looked at him with a certain sense of admiration so maybe others might see me that way too. So the surf thing has crept up on me and that's good. It would be a shame to spend so much time with the Atlantic ocean on my doorstep and not intereact with it in some way.
I also bought a USB key modem dongle thingy today so now in principal I will be able to log on to the internet from the comfort of the van or from the shade of my awning which incidentally I deployed for the first time today. And internet means another important thing, listening to BBC radio. The world service is good but the content gets repeated frequently and the wandering shortwave signals is frustrating to say the least
