I was looking forward to the ‘buffet’ breakfast at the hotel. It was terrible. Good WiFi though so caught up on 6 nations highlights.

Asked around in about 5 hardware shops for alcohol, eventually found white spirit. Amazing! Stopped at a modern looking motorbike workshop, asked for some lubricant, he gave my chain a good spray, no more squeaky jockey wheels!

Not much climbing today, fairly boring main road, made good time so early lunch stop in Scoura. Man had to go buy me a sandwich as their kitchen was closed! Nice coffee.

Loads of shops selling ‘rose water’ products. Valley of the roses apparently. Need to read up about that. I couldn’t see any roses. Made it to my destination by 4 so decided to keep going to get some of the climbing out of the way for the next stage through the Atlas Mountains looks like a monster. Amazing road, really nice views. Hotels everywhere. Kept pushing on and then found the Dades Gorge itself before I knew it. Great switchbacking climb. Through another small gorge, some nice looking auberges there. My map said there was accommodation all the way up the gorge so I decided to push on for another 30 mins. No more hotels or shops anywhere. Luckily I had supplies and the river was always near by, a river that’s actually flowing too!

Had to camp. Found some really nice spots but kept going and found a pretty good one next to the river. Didn’t really want to camp as it’s going to get really cold!