Campspot right on the road meant waking up a fair bit with passing lorries in the night. Woke up to a frozen tent and bike. No matches meant no hot dinner and no tea! Overnight oats worked well though!

Tried to wake up and pack up early, spent ages trying to scrape ice off the tent. Just as I was trying to leave farmer turned up to fill some Jerry cans with water. I hid in the bush for a bit but decided just to confidently walk out. He didn’t say anything!

Quick 20km and then a breakfast In Kenifres. Locked bike even though it was right in front of me, as usual. This time it wouldn’t unlock! Messed about with the combination lock for a while and eventually got it off, panic over! Saw a carrefour so popped in for novelty value. It was a real supermarket! Locked bike again, tested the lock, bought some supplies then tried the lock again, stuck again! This time it took me 20 mins to release the lock. Nearly asked some bloke with an angle grinder to get it off for me. Stopped for a tagine in random village with loads of goats hanging up and loads of tagines seemed popular, with the locals!

Stopped for coffee just outside Meknes and booked hotel. Fast ride into town. Realised I had booked my hotel right in the middle of the medina. Plus it was market day. Utter utter chaos. Google maps is hopeless in that place. Literally couldn’t move. Hideous trying to drag my bike through hordes of people and market stalls. Got stuck on a stair case as people were trying to buy stuff. Just had to charge through in the end. Even on a normal day it would have been a nightmare but this was ridiculous. Somehow managed to get close to the riad before a local guided me to the door. Lovely place. Only one staying there again! Owner loved it so much, gave me the full tour. Nice roof terrace. Went out for nice cous cous in the medina.

Decided to go for a local Hammam massage. I don’t really want to write about it on here for fear of conjuring up memories of the event. Hideous experience. I still have the scars to show for it a week later.

Went for another cous cous in the medina to recover from the experience. Should have gone to the McDonald’s I spotted as soon as I left the medina!

Lush climb out of Meknes through olive country. Some kid gave me his orange! Then a massive descent into orange growing area. Fairly flat but headwindy. I’d left really late as I only wanted to do about 60 miles to take me half way to Chefachouen. Got to sunset and started looking for a camp spot. Nice looking forest was absolutely covered in rubbish so carried on. Not much scope on the main road so decided to turn off onto a secondary road. Again it was just miles of either olive trees, on steep hills or fields of crops. All with houses all over them. Climbed a really steep hill and found a perfect patch of grass behind some bushes at the top with a great view. Just sat down to munch some bread as I was knackered and starving when some motorbikes turned up. Next thing about 8 locals had turned up to smoke and drink right at my spot. They hadn’t spotted me. However, I didn’t fancy cowering in the bushes for hours so I came out and said hi. They weren’t very happy! Told me I had to find a hotel in the next town. They couldn’t speak English or Spanish.