Driving in Morocco – How to Guide

My family and I just completed a five week tour of Morocco in our 2012 Ford S-Max.

I wanted to share with you our experience so you can be informed as to whether you want to attempt a driving trip in Morocco. It may not go the way you see most of the YouTubers represent the country. While I have my own YouTube channels, I can see that you must generate clicks to get the views to get the revenue.

Driving to and in Morocco

If you plan to fly to Morocco and hire a car then some of this blog post may not apply to you but I’m starting out with how to get there if you plan to drive in your own car.

You do need to book a ferry ticket of course. I recommend you read the blog post from Away With the Steiners who give the best advice about buying your ticket in person from Carlos.

Please beware. I’ve driven all over the world and am currently driving all over Europe with my family in our own car. For Morocco, you must plan carefully or you could find yourself in a dire situation with no help available. Although you are a short trip to Europe you will find that Morocco has none of the safety nets you will find elsewhere such as:

• Breakdown lanes on motorways
• Cellphone signal
• Emergency phones by the road
• Nearby houses or shops
• Places that take credit cards

I’m not trying to put you off here but you may feel quite confident while driving elsewhere and decide to get the car ferry over to Morocco only to find yourself in a bad situation.

Golden Rules

If you don’t want to read the entire blog post then please just read my golden rules for driving in Morocco.

• Ensure your car is serviced
• Take breakdown tools, equipment and spare tire
• Do NOT drive at night possible
• Take a large amount of cash in local currency
• Arrive will a full tank of gas
• Carry food and water at all times
• Do NOT pay people cash at the Spanish port (scammers)

Moroccan Roads

You may well be shocked at the standard of the roads in Morocco. I’ll go into more detail later but they are not well maintained. The road markings are often worn away or absent. You could well have to swerve at high speed in order to avoid massive pot holes, camels, donkeys or even people running across the freeway where traffic is driving at high speed.

If you are not an experienced driving with good defensive driving skills then I do not recommend you drive in Morocco. I’ve been driving for decades now and completed police training driving courses and even after this, I had several near ,misses and found the entire experience very stressful.

After a few cities we decided to stay in small towns and walked whenever possible. I’ll go into more detail below.

Before You Leave

Driving in Morocco requires careful planning. You can check out a few of the van life YouTubers such as Living the Van Life. In this video he prepares his van for an arctic trip after learning some painful lessons during his last attempt.

Please don’t ignore my words. You won’t freeze in Morocco but you can easily find yourself broken down with no cell signal in a desolate area in extreme heat. This is just as bad as Chad from Living the Van Life breaking down in extreme cold.

Get your car serviced and ensure all your fluids are topped up. Unlike Europe, you don’t need to carry first aid kit, warning triangles, spare tire, snow chains etc. but an emergency kit is highly recommended. The authorities only concern themselves with your car documents (see below).

Here is a list to get you started:

• Warning triangles
• Flashing amber lights
• High visibility vests
• First aid kit
• Spare water and food
• Cash (dirhams)
• Spare tire or repair kit and jack
• Spare bulbs
• Basic tools
• Spare fluids (oil, washer fluid etc.)

Some basic car maintenance skills would be very useful. I drove past many Moroccans by the roadside carrying out repairs on their cars or tuk-tuks. There is a breakdown service of sorts but it’s nothing like the AA or RAC and there is no way to easily contact them as a visitor.

Avoiding Scammers

Apart from the driving hazards, constant scammers came close to ruining our Morocco experience. They come in several varieties you need to know about.

Fake Officials (Spain Side)

Luckily we were warned about scammers in the ticket office as we bought the tickets for the ferry crossing from The Port of Algeciras to Tangier Med.

When you get through customs into the car waiting area for the ferries you may well be approached by people demanding payment to reserve your place on the ferry. I’m extremely cautious of criminals and scammers in every country, especially as I travel with my children.

These scumbags carry slips of paper and demand to see your passport. Of course, people are expecting to be asked to hand over their passports but the scammers don’t wear any uniform and don’t have any ID. I asked for ID but they became irate and demanded to see my passport.

Eventually they wandered off to the next person in line. Almost everyone handed over money and was given a meaningless slip of paper in return. I did try to warn others but most didn’t speak English.

If you are wondering why the police don’t intervene I have no idea. I also have no idea how these scumbags get access to the port but nobody stops them.

Car Park Attendants

Find a public car park and then stop every motorist coming in and tell them it costs money. This is basically every car park in Morocco. These people may even have made their own badges to make it look official. They offer to watch your car for you.

Parking Attendants

You are looking for a space in the street and somebody points at a free one. You may well have seen it already yourself but they start giving you signals to ‘help’ you park. Once you get out you can guess what’s next. They stand there with their hand open asking for money. Either that or when you get back into your car.

Street Parking Guides

When I drove into a mountain town I saw people standing at the side of the street waving sets of keys at me. I didn’t understand until they started shouting at me.

These people are the same as the self appointed car park attendant. They are trying to show you where you can park and then charge you. The worst of it was that they told me certain roads had no spaces for parking or were closed but when I drove up there was plenty of parking space!

In one street alone I counted around 20 or so of these people.

I recommend you book accommodation in advance and try to get parking space included. Many will stay there is free street parking but you will be left to run the gauntlet of these parking touts.

Friendly Tour Guide

I fell for this once in Turkey but to my shame, I fell for it again in Morocco. Twice in fact!

With zero exceptions, every friendly person who came up to talk to us and ask us where we were from turned out to want something from us. It was a very bitter experience after having travelled to so many countries. They will either want to take you to see their ‘uncles’ restaurant or show you around.

The problem is that you get the free tour or are shown the shortcut and they they turn nasty and start demanding money. They often tell you that it would have cost you X if you took the official tour and they will only charge you Y. Many will catch you going into the very large markets (souks), and warn you about how easy it is to get lost and you should take their help.

One guy told us we were going in the wrong direction and followed us for the next 15 minutes trying to talk to us. We sat in a coffee shop for another 15 minute and he stood nearby waiting for us. It really made our trips out uncomfortable.

Advice

My advice it to be friendly to all those who approach you but firmly tell them that you don’t need their help. For the car park attendants you can either drive off without paying which I usually did or pay them for watching your car. For seven nights in one car park it cost me $5 and the guy there walked around the car park all day long offering some sort of security.

Parking further away from the main car park carried more risk for break ins and of course inconvenience for me.

For the tour guides you can pay for the official tour, do your own thing or agree a price up front. Of course, the fake officials at the port should be throw into the sea.

Documentation

When you arrive in Morocco you will be stopped by customs and border security. You will be asked to hand over the vehicle registration, your driving license and your passport. They don’t ask for insurance at this point. You do not need an international driving permit.

Customs in Morocco is organized chaos and should indicate what is to come once you officially enter the country. Officers bark orders at you in Arabic and you are expected to comply. If you speak French then you can communicate but otherwise you will have to do your best or use a translation app.

Expect your car to be searched. Many drivers had to empty the entire contents of their car onto the ground for the search to take place. This included drug dog searches.

Your documents will be taken away into an office but nobody will tell you why. I had to wait 30 minutes and was eventually given them back but told nothing. I reached the next barrier and was told to show my ticket by the security officer. I had no clue what he was asking me for.

By sheer luck, my wife suggested to check inside my passport. In there was a small white slip of paper which was my certificate to drive for three months. Nobody had informed me it was in there!

Without this document you won’t get through the second barrier. If you are stopped by the police and can’t produce it you will have serious problems and you must show it in order to get out of the country. As you can see, the ink isn’t good quality so best to keep it safe inside your passport or a plastic wallet as the ink will run onto the facing page if it is inside other papers.

Check that your car insurance covers Morocco. Some do and some don’t so check with them if you are unsure. If you are stopped by the police, you may be asked to produce your proof of cover.

You can buy Morocco car insurance at the customs port. After you leave the checkpoint you will drive past several white cabins and one of them is called CAT Assurance and Insurance.

They only accept cash here so this is why you need to carry cash with you at all times. There is a cashpoint to the right where you can withdraw some. It was very expensive and they only sell third part cover here. I paid 200 Euros for three months cover.

They will print off your cover document and you can carry it with you. I was stopped during my time in Morocco several times and was asked to produce my insurance once. It’s printed in Arabic so the police officer understood it.

Pre-arrival

You must plan in advance. We left early but the ferry was delayed and there was a very long wait at the customs terminal so day turned into night. We were tired and stressed and faced a drive into Tangier which is over an hour away from Tangier Med port.

Do your best to catch the earliest available ferry from Spain to Morocco. This way, you will still have daylight for your drive to your accommodation. We had to drive in the rain at night and it was a terrible experience. I had no idea how bad the road quality was, even the highways. Getting into Tangier, there were no road markings showing where to give way or stop.

I’ll go into the standard of driving later but it’s like something out of a Mad Max movie. You will have to deal with aggressive drivers, everybody beeps their horn continually so you have no idea if you are making a mistake.

As well as getting their early on, you must ensure your fuel tank is full. I always make a point of filling up again at three quarters full. I learned this in Iceland when we drove to the north in bitterly cold conditions and didn’t see a fuel stop for three hours. I had the same experience driving in the south island of New Zealand.

There was no fuel stop between the port and Tangier. We had to hurry to catch the ferry from Spain and I missed the turning for the fuel stop there but I thought we’d find one at the other side in Morocco. Not so!

Please also get a fair amount of cash in dirhams before you leave if possible. You will have to pay a road toll as soon as you get onto the highway. They do not accept foreign credit cards here for some bizarre reason so it’s cash only. It’s about two dollars in the local currency so get some small and large notes.

You will also find that some fuel stations are cash only so you will need cash for that.

Filling up at Fuel Stations

Petrol stations in Morocco have attendants who will fill up your car. Just tell them if you want to spend a certain amount of money or fill it up.

They all sell unleaded or diesel but ensure you check which they select as it’s down to you to get the right fuel. Diesel is called gasoil or gaz oil and unleaded is sans-plomb (without lead in French). The bigger stations should accept credit cards but check first.

You usually get your car windscreen cleaned for free so don’t offer to pay for this.

As you get out into the countryside the large fuel stations are few and far between so ensure you have a full tank. Here is a tiny pump in a small village so you know what to expect.

Police in Morocco

There seem to be a few varieties of police in Morocco:

• Traffic cops
• Local police
• National police

This is just from my observations by the way so do your own research.

My first experience with the police was pulling out of a gas station I was quickly chased by a traffic officer on a motorcycle who told me it was no left turn. I wasn’t particularly impressed because the road markings were completely worn out.

I had to produce my license, insurance, passport and the car ticket I was given at the port. The cop demanded 400 dirhams. I told him I only had my credit card but all fines in Morocco are cash only so I had to follow him to a cashpoint.

The fines work out at $40 USD and of course you can’t get any demerit points as you don’t have a Moroccan driving license. The police officer will write you a ticket for the infringement and you have to hand over the cash. This is another reason why you need to carry around 2000 dirhams at all times.

My second ticket was for speeding. We had just gone through a road toll so I started to drive up to the national speed limit. It turns out that this toll had a graduated speed limit as it led to a roundabout. Cops in white tunics were there with radar guns so I got another fine.

He asked for 400 dirhams and I insisted on a ticket from him so he took me to his car and wrote one out. I can’t tell you if he was trying to scam me or not to be honest. Either way, ask for a ticket and pay the cash and be on your way.

Cops are everywhere in Morocco. I saw them hiding behind bushes with speed cameras and went through countless road checks. It was reassuring to be honest and strangely, I wasn’t pulled over at any of the road checks. The police seemed more interested in stopping local drivers for some reason.

Note that just because you go through one road check doesn’t mean another one isn’t just down the road a few hundred meters. They must do this on purpose.

As you drive into cities and get near any of the royal palaces or diplomatic buildings you will see that there is a much heaver police presence and also military. Here you will also see that the road quality is dramatically improved and there is landscaping. Cleary the Royal Families presence requires a high standard for the surroundings.

Driving in Morocco

As I said earlier, I’ve driven all over the world but Morocco is by far the most stressful.

I’ll give you all the information here but I recommend you only attempt to drive in Morocco if you have several years experience and are prepared to risk damage to your vehicle AND have the equipment to deal with breakdowns or blown tires.

Road Traffic

The standard of driving in Morocco is chronic. The drivers in the cities are extremely aggressive and think nothing of forcing you into the side of the road or into oncoming traffic. Anytime a traffic light changes, most drivers will sound their horn, even if you were moving away anyway. I don’t know why they do this.

Drivers appear to give no thought to potential damage to their own vehicles. In fact, the majority have large dents in already. You will find yourself driving along and then sandwiched between two vehicles giving you nowhere to go.

Moped drivers are everywhere but give little or no thought into their own safety. You will have to drive defensively in order to avoid hitting them. If you do, it’s unlikely the police will take your side. Moped drivers will often carry two or three other passengers including their wife and children. Others will be carrying heavy loads giving them zero visibility.

Speed limits appear optional for drivers so you will have tailgaters or people overtaking you at dangerous road bends.

Pedestrian crossings are ignored. Even if there is a green light, the pedestrians will have to run across the crossing in order to avoid being hit by cars. It’s very annoying because in the middle of this you may well find that you get a police ticket for a minor infraction.

Drivers will all be on their mobile phones, even the police do it. I followed one who was on his phone and throwing litter out of his window into the street.

Road Hazards

The roads in Morocco vary from good quality to extremely poor.

Even on the new highways you need to stay constantly aware because they are used by extremely old vehicles including lorries. I often had to swerve to avoid blown tires that had been left on the road or pass slow moving vehicles.

I’m sure there are rules and laws in place about vehicle safety but few people seem to follow them and I’m sure many others simply can’t afford to replace worn parts. I followed several heavy vehicles with bald tires carrying huge loads which were not secured to the vehicle. Things you may never have seen in a more developed country.

Pot holes were a constant threat to my tires, even in busy cities. As you drive out of the city it only gets much worse.

It was so bad in places that I had to drive at walking pace. If it’s been raining it makes it doubly dangerous as you may mistake a huge hole for small one. If you blow a tire here you will be in a very bad situation.

You also need to avoid all the other road users who may be travelling on foot, moped or donkey. This is more common as you leave the towns. Here you will see genuine poverty.

Car drivers are a real menace. They will overtake on blind bends, cross double white lines and overtake lorries into your path. There is nothing you can do but drive defensively. This makes a leisurely drive extremely exhausting so you need to plan shorter trips if possible.

Road Quality

The highways are generally in decent condition but you still need to have your wits about you.

I was shocked to see road workers spraying weeds and collecting trash by walking up the fast lane of the highway. They had no protective equipment and there was no warning. Morocco roads in fact, have no electronic signs warning of hazards ahead such as road workers or a blocked lane.

Pedestrians regularly run across the road to take shortcuts and everywhere along the highways, shepherds are grazing their sheet and goats.

This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t care about the things or people you might lose, but rather that you appreciate them fully while they are present. Practice mindfulness to stay in the moment and relish what you currently have, rather than constantly worrying about potential loss.

Town Driving

We drove in the major towns of Rabat, Marrakesh, Casablanca and Tangier.

Generally, each town had some nice tourist areas to visit but each one was a nightmare to drive in for all the reasons above. We found ourselves avoiding it if possible but there isn’t much in the way of public transport or Uber.

We took a taxi once to avoid a long walk home. You can find small cabs which fit three passengers, these are called blue cabs. You can flag these down or find them parked near any busy location. Larger taxis are usually very old Mercedes and fit maybe five passengers. Ensure you tell them where you want to go and agree the price up front. It is cash only.

I recommend you avoid the large towns and instead visit the charming small ones. Essaouira is a must visit town as is Agadir and Chefchaouen. You can drive up to Martil on your way back to Tangier Med and chill out by the beach for a few days.

Final Words

I’ve done my best to spell out the potential hazards of driving in Morocco.

Having your own car is certainly convenient but you need to plan well ahead for a Morocco driving trip. Don’t feel that you have to visit the big cities, there are hundreds of charming towns full of surprises and wonderful people.