The Beach at Diabat

Dunes and the Atlantic Ocean just south of Essouira.

A good place for surfing and a camel ride on the sand.

A good place for sandcastles and pondering mortality.

Jimi Hendrix supposedly wrote "Castles in the Sand" here.

Our little castle is swirled away by the tide.....

Beach at Diabat

Dunes at Diabat

IMG_1517.JPG, originally uploaded by schmidwix2.

The sea is behind us.
What a lot of sand in front.

The Beach at Night

These are really poor quality pictures but rather fun nonetheless.
They were taken from the Sea Chalet fish restaurant right overlooking the beach at Essouira.
In the distance are the lights of the harbor itself
Something magical about the water at night.........when the sand itself is deserted.


.......with the lights from the dock reflected in the water.
Lights too from fishing boats in the water.



The wind drops at night giving a wonderful calm leaving rippled water, rippled sand and a lovely tranquil feeling.

Last Summer at the Beach

One thing about the beaches in Morocco is that they're huge, and it's very easy to get away from the crowds.
Here at Sidi Kaouki some 14km. south of Essouira a mist came in off the Atlantic shrouding everything in a romantic miasma.......out of which emerged the usual salesman selling "Rolex" watches.......



At Diabat, camels head towards Essouira and are about to ford a little stream which crosses the beach,



Fairly lonely young men with bicycles also going towards town.
Also at Diabat.




This castle in the sand will only last a few more minutes.

Edmund Spenser wrote:

"One day I wrote her name upon the strand"

One day I wrote her name upon the strand,
But came the waves and washed it away:
Again I wrote it with a second hand,
But came the tide, and made my pains his prey.
Vain man, said she, that dost in vain assay
A mortal thing so to immortalize!
For I myself shall like to this decay,
And eek my name be wiped out likewise.
Not so (quoth I), let baser things devise
To die in dust, but you shall live by fame:
My verse your virtues rare shall eternize,
And in the heavens write your glorious name;
Where, whenas death shall all the world subdue,
Our love shall live, and later life renew.

Moulay Bouzerktoun

One of my absolute favorite places in the world is Moulay Bouzerktoun which we first visited ten years ago. It is a tiny village on the coast some 25km north of Essouira. Now it has a tarmac road leading to it - then there was just a cart track.


It might be nice to live in a miniscule cottage there.



The beach is huge and desolate and we collected sea urchins. A farmer and his sheep and goats walked behind us towards the village. There are perfect sand dunes.



The mosque and the tomb of the saint seem almost to tumble into the Atlantic.
The three fishing boats are the very traditional blue.



The water was good for paddling but it was too cold to swim.



There is a rather lovely cafe high up overlooking the ocean and all the wonderful buildings.
Surfers come here in RV's - but not very many of them.



I wonder what it will be like ten years hence? One hopes it stays the same. This picture is looking south towards Essouira.

Sea Side

We will get back to Marrakech next Sunday, after visiting family in England. (To buy tea-bags and Marmite)
So this week it's all file photos. Sorry.

IMG_1455.JPG, originally uploaded by schmidwix2.

However this beach is amazing. Atlantic waves, hard packed sand, weird fish in rock pools, and a cafe atop the cliff.
It is 25 km. north of Essouira and I gather a film crew were there in the summer for British TV. But they are long gone and we'll get back there at the end of April - Inshallah ( God willing).