Oureka Valley

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Music

Woke up a little later this morning. It wasn’t raining, but it was very chilly!!! We arrived at Sahara Expeditions and there were only 2 other people on this trip, Ken & Josie from Nottingham. The journey wasn’t as long this time, and the driver was nice enough to make a few stops for us to take photos.

When we arrived at Ourika Valley, again we were asked if we wanted a guide, and we said yes. His name was Hassan and we called him the “Jumping Man” because he was forever jumping from place to place whilst we were struggling to climb sometimes! Sometimes it even looked like he was jumping to his death. Okay, that’s a bit dramatic, but from where I was sitting, it looked quite scary. Anyway, the views were amazing and when we got up to waterfall view, he told us to wait a minute, and he disappeared down the cliffs and then a minute later he was at the bottom of the waterfalls. Then he climbed up where the waterfalls were to come to level with us and I could see him washing his hands and face. The things people do to wash their face!!! SHOW! OFF!!! He kinda reminded me of the guy in the new James Bond movie at the beginning when he was jumping on top of buildings and everything else…

On the way back he showed us his village and walked us through. There were loads of children playing, I thought great photo opportunity, but they asked me to stop, so I did. Guiltily, I managed to get a few shots in there! When we finished with Hassan, we stopped off at a café for some mint tea and chatted with Ken & Josie about their travels and then made our way back to Marrakesh.

We got back earlier then expected, so we decided to walk to Kasba and see the town and Saadian Tombs. It was quite different to Marrakesh. I didn’t find it as busy, except when we were at the Tombs. I only saw one restaurant and loads of cafes and small stalls, but hardly any visitors. When we were at Saadian Tombs, it was very hard to see everything because there were loads of tour groups blocking the entrances to the tombs and it’s like they didn’t want to acknowledge that there might be other people wanting to see it. We left there pretty quickly.

We then started making our way to Mellah, or what we thought was Mellah, but realized we got lost, so we just headed back to Ell Fena to get some lunch. We decided to go back to Chez Chegrouni and this time we went upstairs to look at the square. It was stunning!!! Especially because the sun was starting to set, so the view was great!!! One the way back home, we went through the souks and markets and did some shopping.

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