Taking your van and your dog to Morocco – everything you need to know
We recently went to Morocco with our 4 year old, our dog and our van.
In this post I’ll go over what you need in order to bring your van to Morocco and to take your dog with you.
We took the ferry from Algeciras to Tanger Med, so this blog post will be from that point of view.
How to bring your dog to Morocco
To take the ferry to Morocco your dog needs to have the rabies shot, a microchip, you need to have a titre test made in the EU, and a health certificate to prove your dog is in a condition to travel.
If you don’t have the titre test made in the EU it won’t be valid and you might not be able to bring your dog back with you. So this is crucial.
Where to get your tickets
I recommend getting your tickets from Carlos. “Carlos, who the heck is Carlos?” you might think. Carlos is someone who sells ticket. He will give you an open ticket, which means you don’t have a certain date you need to take the ferry or a certain date you need to be back – this is so nice, as it is very flexible, and you donøt have to stress about leaving a certain date or take the ferry back on a certain date. You just go when it suits you. Just know, that you only have 3 months in the country, while your van has 6 months, this means that you can drive to Ceuta for a day, and drive back into Morocco and renew your visa.
If you have any issues Carlos is also available to help, for these reasons I like to get my tickets from Carlos.
Carlos is also your man, if you need your drone stored while you’re in Morocco (drones are illegal to bring into the country).
You can find him here:
C. Fragata, salida 1113, 11379 Los Barrios, Cádiz, Spanien.
Crucial things you need to remember
We’ve covered what papers your dog need, but what about yourself and your van?
Most countries can enter Morocco without a visa, but if you need a peace of mind you can check this list, and if your country is on the list you do not need a visa: https://www.consulat.ma/en/list-countries-whose-citizens-are-exempted-entry-visa-morocco
The papers you need for your van is your registration, and a green card (insurance in their country – this was provided with our own insurance but can also be purchased at the border)
I recommend getting to the harbour around 3 hours before departure. Once you’re on the ferry you need to have your passport stamped on the ferry, this is crucial. If you don’t do this, you won’t be allowed access to the country.
Afterwards you get a small slip that you will need to keep for your entire trip, this is your car’s ticket. Without it you won’t be able to take your car back.
The ferry is about 4.5 hours long
The ferry we were on there wasn’t a lot of activities or places to be with your kid. There was one small, not clean room. It was not fun. In general the ferry was very dirty, and for that reason I would never order anything from the kitchen.
What did we pack?
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- Lots of toys and activity books
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- Water
- Water
What did we wish we had packed?
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- iPad
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- Food as we were delayed two hours
Places to sleep near the harbour in case you come in late at night:
When arriving after dark everything always seems sketchy, we didn’t feel unsafe in Morocco but near the harbour you’ll find a lot of beggers who aren’t afraid to try and open your doors, so I recommend driving a bit and sleeping outside the city. You’ll have to pay most places and cash is important to have on you.
So I recommend getting to a campground like this one: https://park4night.com/en/place/14092 Or
https://park4night.com/en/place/382729
Other recommendations:
I recommend never doing anything at the border except crossing it. Don’t get your simcard there, don’t withdraw money there. Its a scam.
I recommend getting your sim-card directly from the provider in town, and not at the border. The price at the border is way more expensive than at the provider, and often times they will not put the correct amount of data on your plan.
The exchange rate is also crazy high at the border, and its just not worth it.
Don’t forget that everything operates in cash in this country so I recommend finding a gas station quickly after the border where you can withdraw some money.
We followed the A5 to a Total Petrol Station, we bought our first simcard here. 10 GB which cost us 100DH, it was great to have this for our GPS. I have forgotten if you can withdraw money here as well, but if not you can go to a supermarket like Supermarché as they usually have ATMs or bank.
From here we went to a inwi provider, make sure to bring your passport when you buy their unlimited data plan (you pay cash if you want)
The unlimited will cost you 350DH
Conclusion
So now we know that in order to take your van and dog with you to Morocco, you’ll need some specific papers. For your dog its proof of rabies shot, a titre test made in the EU and a health certificate to prove that your dog is in condition to travel.
You need to bring your passport, your registration of your vehicle and a greencard.
And you learned about the crucial things in order to enter the country and to bring your van back with you.
What surprised you most in this blog post?
Hvor er det bare godt skrevet og du skriver, så man virkelig får lyst til at rejse♥️
En tanke jeg fik: Kan du fremhæve Donts…
Så man virkelig får den besked ?🙏🏽
Du skriver så fantastisk🌸🙏🏽
Ej det er en god idé, det gør jeg med det samme.
Tusinde tak for de søde ord!
Wow I didn’t know any of that , thank you ☺️ it’s given me all the answers and confidence to head over there ❤️. Not surprised about the boarder been a bit dodgy 😑
Ohhhh I’m so happy to hear that you enjoyed the post and that you got your answers. Please let me know if you have any other questions!
Best,
Nat