I woke up late. My Baron was still being repaired and there were not enough jobs to take advantage on my next leg towards Africa. But suddenly, at about 13:00, I got a job, in the form of three passengers that needed relatively urgent transport to a military airbase next to Sidi Slimane, apparently due to some kind of medical condition (or they said so...). In addition, after checking the TAF, a huge front of clouds and turbulences was progressing from the Atlantic towards the Moroccan west coast.
So, after checking the state of my fixed Baron, I ran as much as I could to take off from runway 09. A heavy traffic was about to land on runway 27. That is, the same asphalt... but UNICOM was silent. Therefore, I communicated my intentions of taking off and left directly towards point Y.
After a turn to the south, I could see the heavy traffic, at about 4000 ft. over my position, doing a holding pattern. At the same time, an ATC opened the CTR, but I was already crossing the sea towards Ceuta, so stayed on 122.80.
My idea was to progress quickly through VOR navigation from Ceuta to Tetouan and finally to Sidi Slimane. I gained some altitude quickly, with the idea of recognizing the terrain from high, as well as saving some fuel.
But before reaching 5500 ft. I changed my mind. I could see the clouds coming quite fast from the southwest. Actually, my destination direction looked already covered by clouds, so I decided to descend and keep the Baron below the cloud ceiling.
The trip from Ceuta to Tetouan was quite beautiful. The change in the landscape and architecture is quickly noticeable. The long beach on the east makes a nice contrast with the inner hills. By the time we arrived to Rincón, the clouds were over us.
In Tetouan, important Moroccan city and former capital of the Spanish protectorate until 1956, beautiful city full of small white houses extended over the hills, I headed to 205º, expecting to follow the radial till my destination. But the clouds were quite low. The ceiling was at about 2400 ft. and the beginning of the Rif mountains was right over the radial.
Instead of climbing and changing to IFR, I decided to keep a low flight level as much as possible, to be able to see the landscape and villages. I left the VOR tuned as a reference but started a diversion that took me away of the highest peaks.
I headed towards 170º, starting a valley that allowed me to fly low. It started on Dar Ben Karrich and Zinat. I followed the main road and a river, passing through couple of small beautiful lakes. The terrain was ascending as I progressed, leaving less vertical threshold for visual orientation. I decided to switch off the autopilot, reduce the speed and and fly manually. At some point I was flying barely at 500 ft. over the ground, following some electric line...
Until I reached Chefchaouen, a city on an open area, where the valley finished and allowed me to leave that dangerous corridor I had been flying on. I had never heard of this small city, fully painted on blue. For sure, after this flight, I hope to come back some day to revisit the Rif and its beautiful valleys.
After couple of corrections, I was able to tune the VOR over Sidi Slimane, so I headed in straight line towards my destination. The mountains disappeared on the back while extense plains opened in front of us. Ouezzane was on our left, last waypoint of our route.
The clouds were lower than before, being the ceiling at about 2000 ft. I was flying at about 1700 ft. Luckily, that region is only about 200-300 ft amsl. The VOR was at 40 nm. At about 20 nm we flew over the Sebou, a meandering river whose source is the Middle Atlas and, after passing by Fes, heads towards the Atlantic Ocean.
According to the maps, the VOR was over the city of Sidi Slimane. But suddenly we were flying over the military base! It didn't actually showed up in any of our maps. My original plan was to fly towards the city and then head along the radial towards its estimated location. I could actually see the VOR next to the runway. I tried to get a METAR or contact the ATIS, but the nearest weather station was too far to give reliable data on our position, so I looked at the windsock as I made a pattern around the runway.
I would say about 15 kt from 270º, quite stable. So left downwind for runway 26... and easy landing (the new landing gear worked great). The cruise altitude was always lower than 3000 ft., so I didn't check leaning the mixture with the tuned injectors and exhausts, but I have to say that the engines looked reliable along the whole trip. The GPS also looks fixed, although I didn't use it.
Finally, a bunch of people came to my plane and took my passengers out, without any decent explanation. But anyway, I got my money and they offered a transfer to Sidi Slimane, so... let's wait here till the skies are clear again.
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Technical details:
LXGB - GMSL
Y CEUTA TETOUAN OUEZZANE SIDI-SLIMANE
Distance: 130 nm
Average GS: 180 kt
Average alt.: 2000 ft.
METAR:
LXGB 142050Z AUTO 08011KT 9999 // FEW100/// BKN170/// 17/15 Q1011
N/A on arrival
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