how exciting to be able to click "africa" for the blog continent. and now i've been to 3 of the 7 continents, so i'm almost halfway there, or exactly halfway if we don't count antarctica.
so its been a little while since the amazing african non-safari, but i saved our itinerary so using that and my photos I should be able to relate the majority of the trip.
well the trip started off bright and early because we had to meet for the bus at 7:45AM all the way down by the river. so i had a nice little morning stroll before lots of time spent sitting on a bus, then a ferry, and then another bus. but no worries, the amount of walking i partook in during the next three days by far made up for all the travel time. although in an email and at our orientation the monday before, it was proclaimed strongly that the bus would wait for no one, we ended up waiting until 8:20 for a mess of a girl who couldn't find her passport at her house. isn't that the sort of thing you do the night before? not trying to be harsh, but this was the same girl who drank so much during our program-sponsored day trip to córdoba that she couldn't even walk. i was just going to be upset if we ended up missing the ferry because of it, but we arrived just in time, so enough about that.
one reason this trip ended up being really fun was that almost none of my good friends here were on it. since there are 80 kids in the program, half of the people went the weekend before (when my parents were in sevilla) and the rest were on my trip. my roommates for the weekend, jenna and sam, were the only people i had hung out with previous to morocco. so in the end i was very glad it worked out like that because we had so much fun with people we hadn't spent much time with and i found some new friends for the last four weeks here.
to get to the first city on the itinerary, tetuán, we took a two-hour bus to the port of algeciras on the southern coast of spain and then onto about an hour-long ferry ride, which was super. i had been picturing us sitting outside, on benches, on a big boat, but that was not the case what so ever. the inside of the ferry had two sections, one that looked exactly like rows of airplane seats, and the back of the boat (where we sat) that had pods of four seats around a table. so it was a pretty nice little ride. the boat docks at a one of two spanish cities (ceuta) in africa, so technically we had crossed no borders yet. from there we hopped on another bus (i got very good at this by the end of the trip) and went through border control (got a morocco stamp in the passport!) and then on to the hotel in tetuán.
so apparently the hotel is considered a 4 star accomodation, and although it was perfectly fine it was much more reminiscent of the hostels we have been staying in. our room with three twin beds did have a balcony though, which looked out onto the closed pool. as we entered the hotel and little "band" played traditional music for us and we were greeted with mint tea and date cookies. the morrocans drink about eight cups of tea a day (no exaggeration). so with fears of the water, which we weren´t supposed to drink, we sipped the tea figuring that it had to boiled at some point. after a quick run to the room to drop off our bags we hopped back into the bus to head into the city.
our first stop in tetuán was at an arts and crafts school, which i believe was for children. but they spend seven years there perfecting their craft, and we saw some pretty excellent carvings, paintings, and weavings. then it was on to lunch. we were still unsure how much of the food we wanted to attempt to eat, as salads and soup, and most dishes involve water. at least there were plates and plates of bread at each table (bread which i ate way too much of on the trip, either in anticipation of not liking the meal, although i usually liked it, or just because it was particularly tasty). either way my carb-meter was off the charts for the next three days. so at this meal i skipped the soup, and the kebab of beef, but then enjoyed a heaping dish of couscous (my favorite!) with vegetables and chicken. it was delicious. and it was followed up by a glass of tea, a cookie, and an orange. during the meal, which was accompanied by live moroccan music, a man from the street wandered in. he danced with a tray of lit candles on his head (i think there is a picture of this in my album).
after lunch we toured the city. we saw there main plaza, one of the king's palaces, and a few downtown streets which were nice. but then we entered the medina (a walled off, open marketplace) which were awful street stands of junk- random shoes, cell phone chargers, remote controls, etc. with so many dead hanging animals around that i claimed to be a vegetarian for the rest of the trip. finally that was over and we went to a three-story shop where we had a little "show" of them unveiling carpet after carpet and then trying to get us to buy them. an experience with the most bothersome, aggressive, unenjoyable salesmanship. mostly i just stood around because from my roommate i learned to only buy things on the second and third day. we wandered through the city a little more, saw its synagogue (for the 7 jewish people that live in the city), and then bussed back to the hotel. at the end of the trip i decided that i would have much preferred to skip this city and spend more time in the other two, but at least better places were coming up!
back at the hotel, we ended up eating dinner and then going to bed very shortly after. morroco is two hours earlier than spain, so it was technically later our time, but i think we were in bed by 10 and got an amazing nine hours of sleep.
breakfast was an assortment of breads and pastries (exactly what i didnt need) but also orange juice (which i had been craving). afterwards we hopped on the bus for a two hour ride to city #2, Tánger. the program kept us at the same hotel all three nights, i'm assuming because it was in the poorest of the three cities, so then we had to bus each morning to our day's location. this bus ride was great though, because it was the start to our bus ride tradition of singing famous boyband and classic 90s songs. way too much fun. at one point we considered using the microphone at the front of the bus to make it into kareoke, but i don't think anyone wanted their voice heard that well. after a pause at a café and some more bussing we arrived in the marketplace of Tánger and were granted an hour and half to shop. at our orientation session we discussed the art of bargaining because that is a must when in morocco. makes shopping a bit more difficult, but bearable once you get the hang of it. often people come back from this trip with large amounts of gifts and jewlery, decorations, etc. for themselves, but i successfully managed to not get mixed up in it all too much. once because we ran out of time, then because the third city didn't have what i would have gotten in the second city, and finally because i thankfully realized i wouldn't want to deal with transporting all that junk home. so in the end i purchased my brother a very cool tshirt (i'm actually kind of jealous of it and would keep it for myself if it wasn't so big) and two bangles for myself on the third day as time was running out and i realized i hadn't gotten myself anything yet.
after shopping we stopped at the american legation museum in tánger, which i believe used to be the embassy or for diplomats, or something. but a nice old american man runs the museum now with his wife and he gave us a cute little talk, before a sweet moroccon guide toured us around the place. there was not a ton to see, but it was a nice diversation into something american so far awar. afterwards we went to lunch. started out with bread and french fries (super) and as i had to continue the charade that i am a vegetarian i received a surprsingly delicious, and large, veggie pizza. it had eggplant, zucchini, tomatos, and mushrooms on it. i did manage to sneak a few bites of the actual entree, which was kind of amazing. it was a sort of phyllo dough calzone with chicken in it and a sort of cinnamony spice. and dusted with a little powdered sugar. kind of savory sweet, but really good. then we had our tea, cookies, and fruit to conclude to the meal.
the following was proabably the highlight of the trip. we went back on the bus and stopped at a dusty parking lot overlooking a beach and the atlantic. waiting for us were three camels and although the ride amounted to being led to one side of the lot and back it was still quite the experience. can't remember if i rode a camel as a child at the zoo, but for some reason i think that was david, so i'm going to claim this as my first camel ride. then we had a quick beach senior photo shoot, before dipping our feet in the ocean because i insisted (i'd never touched the atlantic before!)
next we bussed on to hercules' caves, which were filled with souvenirs and the like, but also had an impressive view. from straight on the opening out to the ocean is in the perfect shape of a backwards africa. and through some climbing and leaning and finessing my camera, i managed to make the opening into a giraffe (or camel, since we were in morocco). another stop at an outdoor café and then back on the bus for the 2 hour ride to the hotel. many more songs later we arrived at the 4 star, skipped dinner, and went to bed.
saturday morning had to get up for a 7AM departure from the hotel, earlier to grab breakfast. we packed all of our things back onto the bus and trekked to the third city of the trip, chaouen. the first half of the morning was a tour around the city - an amazingly beautiful city. first off, its in the mountains, and we were there on a gorgeous sunny day. and second, all the walls of the medina (central part of the city) are painted varrying shades of blue. its like walking into smurf land, but much prettier. the blue is supposed to represent god's love for the people and the residents sometimes paint the outer walls up to eight times per year. this city, actually morocco in general, seemed to have tons of cats and kittens running around all the time. so i tried to capture a few of my faves. after the tour we had time to shop, then went to lunch, then went back to the bus to head to the border. more songs. passport control. more songs. ferry, where we spent the whole ride playing a game where one person says the name of a celebrity and the next person has to name a celeb whose first name starts with the same letter as the first letter of the previous stars' last name. ok that sounded really confusing, but perhaps you get the gist. then the bus ride, where we played a game of one person giving the initials to a movie title and then people would try to guess it with as few clues as possible. finally we transitioned into the highlight of the ride, team 6 degrees of separation. where each team would give the other two actors and then we raced to see who could make their connection first. few more rounds of that and we were back in sevilla.
truly a great trip all in all. and once i was back i only had two days until leaving for spring break #2. i just calculated and since march 14th each of my classes has met four times. ridiculous
coming up: blog for feria - (budpest) berlin and prague
caio
Morocco's Flag
Map of Morocco