Driving to Agadir

December 25^th, 2025

I awoke to a lovely sunny Christmas morning on the seashore of Morocco.  My plan today was to drive to the city of Agadir, where tomorrow I had a ticket for a football match (soccer game for you North Americans) between Egypt and South Africa in the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) that Morocco is hosting. 

My route took me back through Essaouira and then headed inland.  It was a nice drive on some very quiet country roads with varying terrain.  At first it was relatively green with small, spread-out trees and then it became quite barren, at times looking like Mars-like.

The beach in Essaouira.

Driving through the lovely countryside.

Entering a town with a busy market area.  Seems like the locals didn't care much about vehicle traffic.

Unfortunately, I missed the busiest part of this market as I moved along at a walking pace behind a wall of locals.

That's quite the truckload of hay!

There were hundreds of holes dug in row after row on this hillside...not sure what it was about.

Hard to see in this photo unless you zoom in, but there were cool, curvy striations on each of those hills.

There's a man on a donkey spreading some seeds in the field.

Look at that landscape.

Now we're on Mars...

On some of these quiet roads, I passed locals who were hitchhiking.  I was reluctant at first to pick anyone up, but after I passed this elderly couple and didn’t stop, I decided that I would likely pick up the next person looking for a lift.  Surprisingly, the next opportunity was another couple, probably in their mid-60s but definitely younger than the previous couple.  These were the only couples I had seen hitchhiking during my time in Morocco; all the others had been single men.

 

I pulled over and then I had to quickly tidy up the van, so they had somewhere to sit as I had stuff strewn about.  They were very happy that I had stopped for them and since I hadn’t seen another car for about half an hour, that wasn’t a shocker.  I felt like I was spreading a little Christmas cheer…not that they observe Christmas in any way.

 

They both sat behind me on the bench seat even though I had cleared off the front passenger seat.  I tried to speak in French to the man, who I assumed was a shepherd (he definitely smelled like one!), but he didn’t seem to know French.  That surprised me as all the Moroccans I had interacted with so far spoke some French since it used to be a French colony.  Therefore, our communication was quite limited for the twenty or so minutes that they were in Octi.

As I mentioned in my previous post that I had seen 2 of the 3 wisemen yesterday on Christmas Eve...now I was with the shepherd on Christmas Day!

The man indicated that their stop was coming up but we seemed to be in the middle of nowhere.  I pulled over, they got out and then just disappeared into some bushes.  It looked like they were going to cross a dry riverbed and up a small rocky hill where there were a couple of buildings.  I was happy to have helped them out although I had to roll down my windows to air out Octi for a bit.

The shepherd disappearing into the bushes.

Less than an hour later, I hopped on a divided toll highway and sped towards some bigger, snowcapped mountains before coming down a pass into a large flat plain that extended to the ocean to the right and towards some other, smaller mountains on the left. 

Those are the Atlas Mountains on the left of the highway.

Heading down to the flatlands. 

As I was leaving the toll booth to exit the highway, I passed a dark brown, unique looking motorhome which I recognized from my second or third night in Morocco as it was at the same campground.  I had noticed it then as it shockingly had South Korean licence plates…now that’s a journey!

I've never seen cows on the top of a truck trailer before!  They get quite the view plus fresh air...but who knows if they're enjoying it.  I guess it depends on what their destination is...

I arrived at Agadir and even though I planned to stay at a campsite half an hour to the north of the city, I wanted to do some recon on the parking for the football match tomorrow.  The stadium is located on the edge of the city, so it was near the highway. 

 

The Adrar Stadium of Agadir (that bit of brown above the highway).

After speaking to some policemen at a roundabout near one of the entrances, I stopped at a big grocery store called Hyper U.  Who would I see in that parking lot?  Yup, that same big brown motorhome.  The Korean couple exited their vehicle and I said hi.  They recognized Octi too!  We had a short chat, and they have finished year three of a five-year trip!  Wow. They even plan on shipping the motorhome to North America so I gave them my contact information, should they end up near the flight park.

 

I bought my groceries and drove out to the campground that was nestled between a couple of barren hills.  I thought I would stay for two or three nights, but that turned into five as I had a lot of yearend bookkeeping to do for my paragliding business.  The day after the football match it was rainy for a few days, so it didn’t make sense to move on anyways.

 

My campspot at Camping Aourir.

It was an interesting and nice drive today.  Definitely a different kind of Christmas than my family and friends must be celebrating back in the Western world.

The Small Seaside City of Essaouira

December 24^th, 2025 

It was a nice drive from Marrakesh back to the coast.  I stopped for a late lunch on a hill with a view before descending to the city of Essaouira for a walk along its boardwalk and to check out its harbour and medina.  Numerous kite surfers were on the water but then a small squall rolled in from the ocean and killed off their wind.

 

Heading west in the plains of Morocco.

This hill was just outside of a town.  It has some Arabic writing in white on it, just to the left of the middle.

Looking down at Essaouira from where I had lunch.  Can you spot not one, but two camels?

Essaouira.  You can see a few small islands just offshore.

The islands off the coast from the beach.

It seemed like a nice place with a lovely sandy beach.  I walked a kilometre or so along the crescent shaped coastline towards a fortress by the fishing harbour.  Essaouira is renowned for its blue fishing boats…and boy, there were a lot of them.  Not sure why blue is the “in” thing, but they looked cool.

Heading towards the fisherman's wharf.

A fisherman painting his boat.

The big fishing boat is drydocked for repairs.

Part of the kasbah of the city.

Some wet dogs after the rain squall trying to dry out in the sun.

Many, many blue boats...

I wandered around the harbour, checking out the small stalls selling various types of fish, lobster, eels, oysters…pretty much anything edible that comes from the sea.  Seagulls were hovering around, diving down at any chance of picking up a morsel to eat.  I almost got hit by some bird shit, which wouldn’t have been the first time on this trip…I hit when I was with Naomi in Porto!

These tourists are sucking back some raw oysters.

Some stalls had quite the selection.

A cat hoping to get lucky.

The seagulls found a quieter spot where they could enjoy their lunchtime spoils.

This bigger, more dominant seagull stole this piece of eel (I think it was eel) from another bird and then proceeded to swallow it back in one go.  It was impressive.  He sat there for a minute before flying off, looking a bit uncomfortable during his takeoff...served him right!

This guy was brave and got quite close to me.

Next, I meandered into the walled medina, which not surprisingly wasn’t as impressive as Marrakesh, although it wasn’t as overwhelming on the senses which was nice.  However, I could see that a rainstorm was imminent as it rolled towards the shoreline from the ocean, so I began to walk back to Octi.  I had my rain jacket but stupidly didn’t bring my umbrella with me.

This older man was making small zurnas, a little wind instrument that you typically see snake charmers using.

A storm is coming...

There was a Fan Zone set up to watch some of the Africa Cup of Nations matches.  

A match between Algeria and Sudan had just started.

Into the medina.

The second Christmas tree that I've seen in Morocco, again in a hotel lobby.

Nice gate...not sure what was behind the door.

Part of the fortifications of the kasbah.

The rain started and that walk turned into a jog and although I did get wet, I just made it to shelter before the heavens really opened up.

My plan for the evening was one of two campsites near a small surf village just twenty minutes south of Essaouira called Sidi Kaouki.  Surprisingly, both places were full, and they weren’t small campsites either. 

 

It was passed 5 pm on Christmas Eve and sunset was around 6:30 so I had to come up with another plan quickly as I prefer not to be looking for a place to sleep in the dark.  I checked my app, but the next campsite was over an hour away, and who knows if they would have availability.

 

As I was driving past the little surf village to the full campsites, I had noticed a number of motorhomes and campervans parked by the seashore, but assumed they were just parked there for the afternoon.  However, doublechecking my app, it looked like you could camp there for a small fee.  There were no services apart from a few small shack-like restaurants which reminded me of the beach establishments in India, but I decided that it was my best option.

 

After I settled in, I couldn’t help but think that it was way better than the campsites.  It was cheaper, had a nice view of the beach, and I would fall asleep to the mesmerizing sound of the waves.  Perfect.

Octi's spot for Christmas Eve.

I sent this to my family and joked that I had seen 2 of the 3 wisemen.

Yup, that's a donkey receiving a treat from this traveller.

And he wasn't the only one.

The beach was mostly rocky, but there was some sand.  It did have some good waves for surfers.

What a great cloud ceiling.

I watched some surfers for a bit from this derelict building by the shore.

Some motorhomes went off roading a bit.  I didn't want to risk it with Octi.

A nice sunset to boot!

It didn’t feel too much like Christmas Eve, but that was fine with me.  It’s a small price to pay for this opportunity to drive around and explore Morocco.