Driving to Northern Morocco

January 12^th-14^th, 2026 

Happy with my Moroccan desert experience, it was time to start to head north to close off my big counterclockwise loop around Morocco.  I had originally booked my ferry to leave on January 13^th, but I backed that off.  However, I’m getting close to being ready to head to Spain.  Don’t get me wrong, Morocco’s been fantastic, but I don’t want to shortchange Spain.  Plus, I also want to spend at least a week in France…time’s a tickin’.

Heading north.

A lake made by a dam.

An old kasbah.

My first day of driving north, I was going to drive at least four hours to a town called Missour, which is kind of in the middle of nowhere, at least as far as tourists see it.  If I still felt good, I’d continue for another hour and a half to one of the few campgrounds in the region.

I should have waited until this truck was closer, but I love how much hay they stack on them.  The bails hang over the front of the cab and the sides, like an upsidedown pyramid.  I saw this numerous times in Morocco.

Into some different terrain with some coniferous trees, grass and snow on the mountains.

It was windy at this spot.

This mountain range was probably 40-50 kilometre long.  This looked to be the high point.

I made it to the campground after a little over 6 hours of driving.

Uh, yeah, I didn't go swimming.

On the second day, I reached the Mediterranean coast near the small city of Nador.  I avoided the city, but decided to drive out on this 6-7 kilometre long spit that protects the Mar Chica Lagoon.  It was a bumpy gravel road on the spit but I was rewarded with a beach covered in thousands of shells.

Google Maps took me on a rough road here...

Arriving back at the Mediterranean.

Seeing a couple of flamingoes at the start of the spit.

Looking back to the mainland.

Yup, those are all shells...not sand.

Sadly, there was a fair amount of plastic on the shell beach as well as the shoreline on the lagoon side.  I did see a group of 4-5 guys picking up garbage which was nice to see.  Unfortunately Morocco does have a lot of garbage besides roads, on the beachs, in the forests, even some in the desert.  I witnessed numerous locals being litterbugs.  Hopefully they will change their ways in the future.

I didn't get a good video of it...but I was passing a factory that makes the blades for wind turbines, which I thought was cool to see.

As I say in the video, "A beautiful drive along the coast..."

The terrain changed yet again.

I tried to snap this photo, while driving with the window down, I dropped my phone.  I watched it bounce along the road behind me, thankfully landing by the curb (one good thing about driving a right hand drive in a country that drives on the right).  Luckily there was no traffic.  I stopped, ran back and grabbed it and was impressed that it looked no worse for wear and still worked.  Later on I found out that I actually had put a nice spiderweb of cracks on the back side of the phone, under its protective case...but who cares about that! 

Look how calm the water is.

Some cool rock formations along the coast.

Gorgeous!

I ended up at a campsite near a small village called Cala Iris.  It was situated on a cliff overlooking the ocean, and I was the only one staying there so I had a lovely peaceful evening.

Octi's resting spot for the night.

My view for the evening.

The morning was a little bit grayer.

The road headed inland and started to climb.

That's the ocean in the distance, a bit on the right side.

It was a day filled with curvy roads with 60 km/h being the speed limit most of the way.

Got into some coniferous forests along the way.  Sadly there were some areas with lots and lots of garbage.

I was in and out of fog in the latter half of the drive.

I pulled into the campground at Chefchaouen in the mid afternoon.  It was grey with occasional rain and the forecast looked better for the morning.  Even though I was only staying one night, I decided to wait until the morning to check out the “Blue City” before heading to a spot close to the ferry back to Spain for my crossing in a couple of days time.