Dear all,
After a few years of bike touring and meeting some wonderful people all over the world I decided to create an online place to share my experiences and inform other people about bike touring. I will be focusing on touring in Morocco, the country the most I know and where I was born.
As far as I know there is no specific online source dealing with bike touring in the country. There is a lot of information thou on sponsored competitive cycling but no specific sources answering the needs of the foreign and local bike tourer in terms of hospitality and reliable news.
I have not yet decided what kind of online place it will be. But I think a website could be a good start. I am hard thinking about details and realization. I have no sponsors and may probably have to do all the work by myself.
Once done I will certainly talk about and recommend warmshowers.org as a reliable source of information and hospitality worldwide as I have experienced by myself. In doing so I hope the idea will get more support locally.
So if you are Moroccan or a bike tourer with some affiliation with the country or just want to help, please feel free to contact me. Together we may have more ideas to share and inspire each other and others.
For the moment I just opened an Twitter account to select and share relevant information with the community.
For any contact please feel free to use this forum or my other accounts below.
Thanks
Album photo: http://www.flickr.com/souss
Newsletter: http://tinyurl.com/7se36d7
Twitter: @MarocCycliste
Hello Han,
You probably know this Dutch federation, that also has this country info. Maybe it helps you what kind of things you could write about on your website: http://wiki.wereldfietser.nl/index.php?title=Marokko
Last year I used for cycling routes in Spain this site: http://www.fietseninspanje.nl/
(only in Dutch), but it gives an idea about possibilities, too. For me it was very useful.
I already cycled in Marocco, it was really great.
Groetjes
Astrid
Hi Astrid,
I visited the Dutch website, it has a forum too which is great.
I will certainly mention them.
The idea of a Wiki is also worth considering.
Thank you for the information!
Hi, I'm not sure where you want to go with this but I'd be happy to help.
I spent one month cycling in Morocco. It was an interesting experience to say the least!
Hi Jeffrey,
Thank you so much for the offer to help.
It will be a non commercial website containing practical information a bike tourer may need when visiting the country:
- planning a bike tour
- roads, maps, GPS tracks
- food & water supply
- weather & climate
- health issues
- (warmshower) addresses
- addresses of bike shops
- roads, traffic & security
- cultural issues & communication
- administration, visas, insurances...
- stories, diaries, photos, videos ... of bike tourers who visited the country
It may seem a little ambitious to start. But I will give it a try and some time to mature.
Meanwhile I am gathering information online, from existing publications and via personal contacts,
including from persons contacting me on this website.
I already registred a domaine name for the website.
Because I dont master any script or web language I may need some help to go online once the basics are ready.
Editing the website afterward will not be a problem as I entend to use a simple web editor like Joomla.
Please keep in touch if you think you can help to go online!
Thank you.
No need for that there is alreay a website about that but it's in German.
The best website about cycle touring in Morocco is http://www.marokko-per-rad.de/. We contributed a lot for it as we have been 12 times in Morocco under the name Blanche. The name of the owner is Jan Frank , say hello from me to him! So it has been done already! ;-)
On our personal website you also can find lots of Morocco videos ;-)
Hi Blanche,
What a huge website, I wonder how many years it took to build it.
Its informative with a rich content, exactly what I would like to do in English, French and or local languages.
And yes indeed no need to do it again in German!
Thanks
It's not my website but Jan Cramer's and he's done the work. I only added our personal stories.
He lives in Germany. (sorry I mentioned Jan Frank before, another German friend of us) Why don't you contact him?
I don't think he's a member of Warmshowers but I did send him an email to show him this link.
You can find his contact details on hi website.
Ham are you living in the Netherlands?
Good to know, I may add his work too and contact him when needed.
Yes, ik ken Nederland en heb daar ook gefietst maar niet altijd gewoond !
Thanks !
I would contact him First to ask if he is ok with your plans to copy the information on his website. You know he has done quiet a lot of work on that. ;-)
But why do the work anyway , when you use google translate it's open to the whole world anyway.
Here are my Morocco Videos http://vimeo.com/channels/traveltheworldonabicycle
Of course I wil ask first. I am well aware of the copyright issues.
Thanks and keep in touch!
Finally some time to put the first version of the website online.
There is still a lot of work to do. For now it s in French and we hope
to publish in the future in English too:
http://www.maroccycliste.blogspot.com/
Have a nice tour where ever you are!
Thanks for reading
Maroc Cycliste
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The Plage Blanche video is simply stunning - it has made me even more keen to get there. Thank you.