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The adventure begins
Morocco 2008- Leah, Cynthia and CourtneyAfter a week to reflect, im finally sitting down to share my Moroccan adventures. My entry might be a little slim this time because I uploaded and labelled my pics first so I feel like I already covered a lot of the basic things that we did on the trip. The other thing is that unlike almost everything else I have done this year there were not the crazy stories to tell..it was just a wonderful, relaxing vacation.
Our flight left at 830am on Friday morning with not a hitch. We were there early, had a starbucks in the airport and a lovely breakfast on board. I sat beside a Morrocan lady who had been living in Toronto with her husband who she had just divorced! She spoke some English and French, so I was able to ease into my week of French-speaking. Morocco is a 45 min boat ride to Spain and has a history of French influence, so the second national language is French. This turned out to be really fun for me because both my travel partners don't speak any French, and obviously our Arabic is limited.
We arrived in Casablanca and took the train to Marrakech for
moroccon coffee break
waiting in casablanca for our train to Marrakesh the first 3 nights of our trip. Unlike the majority of my cab experiences this year, the driver new exactly where to go! Although he told us that Moroccan drivers are crazy, we were too busy marvelling at how people were actually using the lanes on the road and STOPPING at the stoplights..that actually worked! We had to wander through the tiny streets of the Medina to randomly find the Riad where we had reservations. A Riad is something like a hostel and a bed and breakfast. We reserved a private room but slept in bunkbeds! There was a lovely Moroccan couple who ran the riad and served as our breakfast cook, tour guide and Hammam guide.
Marrakech is divided into two sections. The medina, which is surrounded by a huge castle-like wall, and new Marrakech. The medina is basically the downtown, filled with tourists, gardens, shops, Riads and taxis. New Marrakech has the higher-end shopping, the nightclubs and the big hotels. The center of the medina is a huge main square and marketplace that really is the heart and soul of Marakech. By day, its relatively calm and open. The usual tourist touts of fresh juice and nuts, snake
Here we are..
the random door that was our Riad charmers and henna artists set up to make their days wages..which by the prices they charge, I would say is better than you would think! We spent all day in the market shopping like crazy women! I wanted to buy EVERYTHING! The stuff was just such better quality than in Egypt and I think I just really really like the moroccan-style. We had a lovely day shopping and people watching in cafes.
By night, the main square transforms into something else entirely. As you approach the square you can see the outline of the heads of thousands of people in the glow of the streetlights. There is a huge cloud of smoke above the crowd that smells of delicious bbq meats.
The afternoon workers were replaced with rowdy performers of various music, dance and acrobatics that people crowded around and applauded. But the cool thing about the square, and really Morocco in general is that we always felt safe. On average, there are probably more veiled woman in Morocco, yet they are much friendlier and accepting than in Egypt. We were constatly making comparisons to the two countries and Morocco came out on top everytime.
The second night, we decided
Main Square
by day, a lovely tourist center full of entertainers to check out the night scene. We had heard of a couple places from some of the shopkeepers and the Lonley Planet also suggested a few, so we had a couple beer at the Riad and then chose a place called la Bodega that the Lonely Planet recommened. However, when we got there, the place no longer existes (Lonely Planet 2007 was apparently out of date) So we wandered around a bit and then settled into a hotel bar for a drink. After some weird interactions with a guy who was hired to "get the party started" and a lady who was drunkenly speaking French to us and trying to convince us to let her read our palms....we decided we needed to move on. So we wandered somemore until we stumbled upon African Chic. The place was pretty chic and we ordered some food and wine and sat back for some serious people watching. One thing that both Egypt and Morocco seem to have in common is rich caucasian men who go to bars looking for prostitutes. So we were able to observe some "interesting" interactions happening between some young provocatively dressed girls and some older men...weird but entertaining. We
Main Square
the view from a cafe terrace ran into one of the guys who had sold us about 6 pairs of shoes earlier that day after we spent over an hour in his shop and he suggested we go to a bar that had dancing...so we did. However, as with Egypt, the music was Trance/House crap and we left shortly after.
The next day, I really wanted to hike the Atlas mountains, but Courtney and Cynthia's shopping urges were not yet satisfied. So we split up. The man at our Riad was a guide who took groups up to the mountains for the day, so despite being out late the night before I woke up at 730am to get on this tour. We stopped at a bunch of Riads until the van consisted of 2 swiss-german girls, 2-mexican girls, 2-american guys living in Spain, and besdie me...a guy from Calgary who was apparently sitting across from us at African Chic the night before. weird. We drove for about an hour, checked out a traditional Moroccan home for some tea and then began our hike. I was pleasantly surprised that it was actually a hike and not a walk in the park. We were climbing for a
Main Square
juice stands, snake charmers and Henna tattoo artists galore good hour until we reached the waterfalls for dip. Check the pics, it was a strange feeling to be hiking in hills and scenery that really just seemed like peterson creek. You really realize how lucky British Columbians are when something as famous as the Atlas mountains compares to your hometown park!
We had some classic Moroccan food for lunch after our decent. Tajines are these delicious stews that have meat, veggies and couscous..and of course bread! YUM!
I had agreed to also go with the woman at the Riad for a Hammam, so after the hike I took a quick shower and I was off again. (the girls were still out shopping!) Hammam means bath or bathouse. It is an extreme body scrub down that happens in a Roman-style public bathouse. For about 40-50 bucks you can go to the touristy ones that are basically a spa just like at home.. But i signed up for the authentic experience and went for the 16$ real Hammam. On our way to the Hammam we had to stop at a little shop to buy the black soap and rock scrub that they use and then we were off. The place is
Main Square
by night, a loud, bustling place full of sights, smells and sounds a big open change area wih two side rooms off of it where people are scrubbing down. You walk in and there are women and children everywhere all hangin out in the nude or near nude. No sooner do we put our bags down and she starts whippin her clothes off and says ok, just leave your bathing suit bottoms on! So Im standin there amongst all these strangers in half my bathing suit! We walk over to the other area to fill up a bunch of buckets from the taps on the wall and we get started. Everyone is sitting on the wet granite floor or on a small bath mat, scrubbin away at themselves or someone else. There were mothers scrubbing down their children, there were grandmas and young women all chatting away with each other as they scrubbed off layers and layers of skin! EWWW! Talk about a culture shock! So I do as I'm told and self-consciously sit down on the floor and try to "relax". Just my luck the power went out while we were there, which on one hand was freaky because it was pitch black..but after a few candles were lit, I found
Food vendors
these vendors set-up shop after sundown and try to lure tourists to come eat at their stand which is sooo much better than the one beside them and will offer you "CHEAP PRICE" it much more relaxing and less uncomfortable with only a couple candles lighting the bathouse. I'll spare you the details to avoid the risk of getting to graphic...but after an hour and half of scrubbing, soaping and some back massaging, I was quite relaxed and my skin has never ever felt so soft!
The next day we took the bus to Essaouira for the next part of our adventure. The bus station was a little confusing, and luckily this sweet moroccan girl came over and helped us out. She was so nice and helpful, we chatted quite a bit during the bus ride. We exchanged numbers and met up with her the next day. Essaouria has a very relaxed, surfer town feel. Its a very, very small town and its all within walking distance of a beautiful beach that goes on for miles. We stayed at a gorgeous Riad (check the pics) and thoroughly enjoyed Essaouira the most. We shopped some more, we wandered, we ate breakfast and drank coffee on the amazing roof-top terrace. I got up the next morning and went for a barefoot run on the beach. This turned out to be a bad decision for
two reasons. One: My flip-flops were gone when I got back to my starting point so I had to walk back to the Riad in my bare feet and Two: It was soo beautiful that I just couldn't turn around so I ran for an hour and a half...which normally wouldnt be so bad, but I had hiked the mountains the day before in bad shoes and Im definitely not anywhere near as in shape as normal, so I did something to my foot and was kinda limping the rest of the vacation. This unfortunately meant I didn't get to tryout Kitesurfing or windsurfing..but we walked along the beach and watched.
We met up with our Moroccan friend, FatmaZarha for tea in her home the next day. Her mom was so cute and they brought out the silver tea set and some delicious cakes and treats. She is a very progressive, western-minded young girl, that luckily has a fairly progressive family supporting her. But she is looking to go to film school in Egypt, France or the USA so we invited her to come visit us in Egypt soon.
When the sad day came that we had to
To-Go coffee..morocco style
random plastic cup and some paper... leave Essaouira we discovered that there was not train directly back to Casablanca and we would have to do the bus/train combo through Marrakech (7 hours!) we decided that it would be worth the little bit extra to hire a driver to take the coast road straight to casablanca (3 hours). We were pleasantly surprised when the driver showed up in a spacious van and we enjoyed the comfortable ride to Casablanca. Unfortunately, Casablanca is very similar to Cairo and we were not overly excited to be there for 24 hours. We arrived at our hotel (which was recommended in the lonely planet) to find it looking like a hotel straight out of a 1920's arabic movie with the strange bell-hop to boot. It was late at night and all we wanted to do was collapse on the bed, but when we were showed to our room, we were overcome with the stench and courtney saw a cockroach in the bathroom. So back downstairs we requested a different room, hoping for somethin better..the next room was much better, but only 2 beds...so finally we got a third room with three beds shoved in there and no cockroaches. The poor bellhop
lugged our stuff up and down those stairs 3 times! he was soo grumpy with us until we finally found our final room and then it was like a switch turned on..he was smiling and making jokes and asking if we were married...(our answer was yes of course!)
Our last day in Morocco was sooo incredibly long! We got up in the morn and decided to pass on the free breakfast and check out a patisserie recommended by the lonely planet. We stepped outside the hotel to decide which direction to go, and all of a sudden I felt like someone had hit me in the shoulder with a rock!!! I look on my shoulder and there is the LARGEST piece of bird crap I have ever seen. Bigger than a golfball! I went back in the hotel and the bellhop thankfully wiped it off for me! GROSS!! I changed and then after wandering around and feeling like we were back in Cairo with all the catcalls and stares we found it only to discover the place was similar to one of the all men cafes that you see in pictures of the middle east. Shisha, metal chairs, ugly
decor. However, we were hungry so we had an assortment of pastries and some decent coffee and then went back to the hotel to pack up and store our bags at the front desk. We decided we would check out the Zara and the Mango shops and then head to the beach. The mall was a major disappointment and the beach was ok. We had some good seafood and then some icecream and then we went early to the airport. Casablanca just really didn't do it for us. OUr flight didn't leave till 11pm so we hung out in the duty free shop etc until our plane left. We arrived in Cairo at 8am extremely tired and happy to be home!!!
Next trip: May 21st 7 hours of flying each way for a 90 minute soccer game in Moscow..but its all free and I miss two days of work!
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shirley
non-member comment
Moroccan magic
Wow another wonderful experience. Maybe you stayed at the hotel where the famous "Casablanca" movie was made. Great pictures. And now off to Moscow. Kamloops will seem so boring. Lots of Love, Grandma