Where to sleep?

Wild camping is one of the highlights of our tour. It’s a time when we can be on our own in nature and spend the night cosy in the tent. In some places, wild camping is easy, especially in Europe where there are forests to hide in, hedges to tuck behind, and fewer people out and about (except for those pesky dog walkers…). Usually people don’t have a problem with us when they encounter us but it’s much simpler if no-one comes across us.

We really enjoyed wild camping in Morocco when we were first here between January and March and found some really excellent spots. Though those paying attention may recall that we also struggled to camp then.

This time we’re travelling north eastwards through Morocco and its prime agricultural land. It’s not just the shepherds we are looking out for, but the fields are covered with recently harvested crops. At times it’s absolutely stunning but not that conducive for a night’s stay.

A further challenge has been that the maps I usually rely on have been less than helpful. I check the maps to try to determine how far we might have to travel in the day to reach somewhere where there may be cover, or it’s rural enough to have a peaceful night. However, the combination of Komoot satellite maps and Google satellite maps have not been very useful for this region.

Komoot imagery is out of date for Morrocco which means sometimes I miss things. For example we stopped off at a petrol station recently that was nowhere to be seen on the Komoot map, but we were able to get a tea and coffee and use their facilities before heading on our way.

Google Maps, which is usually reliable, has some kind of funny yellow-ish tinge to it across this area. This means that I can’t see the detail that I often use to plan our day. I totally missed a huge abandoned quarry the other day that we stumbled upon and actually had a great night at. No big loss in the end but we find it is good to have some idea of the distance we’re aiming for each day.

We often start to look for places to camp in the late afternoon. We’ll then stop to assess spots from time to time and if we find one we think is a goer, we will put our chairs up and hang around for a bit, eating some grub and sussing it out more. The issues with mapping and the landscapes we’ve been passing through have resulted in us cycling later into the evening before coming across anywhere suitable. We’ve done longer distances than we might normally on mixed, often off-road and even crazy off-road sections. Nevertheless, it has all worked out fine! And it has even resulted in some really kind people helping us out when we failed find a suitable wild camp spot at all…