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Published: October 12th 2018
Abdel Aziz our very gentle taxi driver picked us up from the Riad at 10 am.
It was hard to say goodbye to Rabat. In 4 days we had grown accustomed to its hustle and bustle
The Riad the local souk the old Médina and more importantly to Fatiha.
She is an angel.
It was quite the ordeal to leave Rabat as mentioned before it is quite dense.
But we got to the autoroute in about hour and half. The trip to Casablanca took about another one and half hours.
Casablanca even denser
Abdelaziz had the forsight to ask the local taxi drivers the way to the grand mosque Hassan II
We drove thru all the narrow streets and voila we were next to the mosque.
The buildings along the way mostly white washed and In the art nouveau style. Mostly dilapidated but one can imagine their glory days.
Hassan II mosque impressive in scale in situation in location and in detail
It is next to the Atlantic Ocean.
And It can house up to 35000 worshippers
The minaret visible from afar.
The tile work is impeccable detailed and precise.
The scale of the mosque is overwhelming
But one interesting aspect
of it is that the top is open and brings in light
After the mosque we drove to the port of Casablanca had some amazing fresh fish and witnessed the fishermen auctioning their catch of the day
The whole exchange is very entertaining and sounds very passionate.
Casablanca is a very busy city
Mixed modern and traditional new and old kept and unkept all next to each other co existing harmoniously chaotic.
The dance between the motorcycles donkey drawn carriages pedestrians automobiles.
It all appears chaotic at first glance, but dig deeper there is an unspoken understanding speculation between all these components.
One cannot overlay/ impose a logical mathematical system on it. I don’t think it will work.
It would be worth the try.
Morocco I feel is a natural culture
It has a lot of tourists but it does not cater to them.
It takes them as part of their own. I feel that is what is special about this country. Unlike any other place.
It took us about another one hour to get out of the city and into the autoroute towards El Jedida “ the New One”. Originally a coastal Berber settlement then occupied and fortified
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Dilapidated Art Nouveau buildings of Casablancaby the Portuguese taken back by the Arabs/Moors. My husband and I wanted to check out the Portuguese Bastions and Cisterns.
If ever in Morocco make time to visit the Portuguese cisterns.
They were built mainly as armories and were later
Reused as cisterns to harvest and store fresh rainwater in case the fort was under siege.
The cisterns have been abandoned since. The thin layer of water on the brick floors reflects the beautiful archways. The single oculus gives light to the entire space.
It was quiet solemn and eerie.
The entire city feels depleted thru the ages.
The cannons along the ramparts are all scratched with initials and names
The youth of El Jedida gather here to mingle and get a glimpse of the ocean and the ramparts.
We left El Jedida to Marrakech thru a highway. The journey took about 2.5 hours thru mainly farmland.
We got to the Old Médina of Marrakech by 9 pm
Abdelaziz had a hard time finding our Riad. A car window was rolled down and so one aggressive and very eager young man decided to jump in and show us our Riad.
Less than a minute later we were
at our Riad.
The young man became aggressive in asking for a tip. He was not satisfied with the 2 euros. He wanted more.
it felt there was a momentary chaos as someone else picked our luggage dropped it at the door of the Riad and asked for a tip as well
We didn’t know who was who
Until we got inside and it was calm again.
So that was my first impression of Marrakech.
My husband and I settled down and were served mint tea on top of the roof terrace overlooking the Médina.
It felt like a page out of the 1001 Nights.
It felt good.
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