Salt

We are locked down. We are at a small campsite in Imsouane, a tiny village on the Moroccan coast north of Agadir. Life here is very quiet and isolated. There are some other Brits on the campsite and indeed the campsite owner is British. This means we have a few people to talk to, albeit loudly and at a distance. The campsite is basic but sufficient. Water comes from a well and is saline. We can use it for washing but it leaves your hair feeling a bit icky. I worry that it will leave deposits inside the water heater. The campsite has WiFi that works as well as any Moroccan campsite WiFi and is fine so long as you don’t try and live stream anything. Power comes from our solar panels. The roof of Baloo is covered in them. In the blazing Moroccan sun, they have really come into their own and easily provide all the energy we need for heating, lighting and cooking. On the whole, life is quiet, safe and comfortable.

We can walk down onto the beach and the other day, at low tide, an irresistible opportunity presented itself. We were just about out of table salt so I thought I would have a go at making some myself. The process I recalled from the very first chemistry lesson I had at secondary school. This was a while ago but it clearly left an impression on me.

First, we collected salty slurry from rock pools. These hollows in the rock had filled with seawater at high tide but now, some eight hours later, they had mostly dried out in the hot sun leaving a mix of sea salt, water, mud and generally unsavoury things from the sea.

Next step was to purify the slurry. We dissolved it in a little water heated to boiling point and then filtered the solution through kitchen paper. Boiling will have killed off any germs and filtration removed anything insoluble. This left a saturated salt solution. Pure salt in water.

Final step is to evaporate off all the water. Gentle heating in a pan for an hour or so. Eventually I was left with was a pan filled with white, soft, pure salt. Once this has cooled, I packed it into a sealed bag leaving just a little out to refill the saltshaker for the table. My work as a Salter was done.

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