In January 1964 we set out as part of a tiny group of passengers on a Yugoslavian freighter out of New York crossing the Atlantic to the port of Casablanca in Africa. In trying to find the actual distance in miles of this voyage, I discovered to my delight that none other than Jack Kerouac had taken the same trip just seven years earlier in February 1957, though his ship took him straight to Tangiers where he was going to meet with William Burroughs. Apparently, this was a common way to travel this route inexpensively at the time. Like him, we had a stormy midwinter crossing that took about nine days.

The ship entered the port at Casablanca at sunrise and a small boat glided straight down the path of the sun to the ship to sell fish. There were men in long white robes squatting on the docks in the habitual manner of sitting here. From Casablanca we caught a bus to Tangiers that passed through desolate countryside where I could see campfires burning in the distant night and once had to stop for a large herd of animals to cross the road. After a brief overnight in Tangiers we crossed by ferry to Gibraltar and headed along the southern coast of Spain by train. Felix had a haircut that resembled the new fashion set by the Beatles (though we didn't hear their music for the first time until we reached Ibiza) and along the way we heard calls of "existentialisti" as the small dark Spanish people tried to figure out what two tall blond nomads were up to among them. Eventually we reached Barcelona where we got to see the incredible expressionist architecture of Gaudi before we crossed by ferry to Ibiza on the Balearic Islands.