F**k-ups creating friendships (NSFC)

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Southern Iberian Peninsula Part 1

Prepare yourselves, this shit is long. Also, if these pictures don't post correctly, I'll use this site to upload them. Trying to link to my google drive account to get the placement of the pictures to flow better.

We meant to leave Lisbon southbound on the 10:50am train to Faro, Portugal, and then take the 6:00pm bus to Seville, Spain. It turns out Chegadas (arrivals) does not mean Partidas(departures). We looked at the wrong monitor, stood on platform five (the train arriving from Faro) and watched our train to Faro (platform seven) roll out of the station. Whoops. Four hours and €8 to change the tickets later, we left for Faro. Consequently we missed the bus to Seville so we decided to stay in a Hostel in Faro. Its funny how shit works out sometimes. If we wouldn't have missed that train, we wouldn't have stayed in the Hostel in Faro and we wouldn't have met these two beautiful fuckers


Turns out that Rory and Arndis' (Canadian/Icelander respectively) route for the next couple weeks was strikingly similar to ours. We decided to team up. Especially because we were all quite nervous about Morocco. It helped. I'll get to that in a bit. We bus'ed it from Faro to Seville, Spain, where we spent the next two nights hunting down Flamenco and drinking Port wine. Thick stuff. Strong.

Morocco

We took another bus down to Tarifa, which happens to be the southern-most point on the European continent. After consulting the internet, we were advised to stock up on hand sanitizer and toilet paper. I cannot stress enough how important this is if you ever find yourself on the way to Morocco. Do this. It will save your fucking bowels. The ferry to Tangier was pleasant. Thirty minutes. Windy on deck. You cross through the straight of Gibraltar - through one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. It was a trip to see a line of container ships/oil tankers fifteen miles long. The view rolling into the harbor in Tangier was spectacular.



Fresh off the boat, you are assaulted with offers for everything from walking tours to clothes and drugs. The latter are very illegal, despite what you may have heard about Morocco. The law doesn't seem to be enforced with too much fervor, as far as I can tell, though. We saw people smoking often. Never really smelled the ganj, though, which seemed weird to me. Maybe hash smells different down here? Who knows. Anyway, getting back to the hawkers and miscreants. There was a kid, no more than ten years old that we met less than ten minutes off the boat.

"My friends! English? Francais? Deutsche? Espanol? Where are you going? What hotel? I show you the way!" This kid spoke at least five languages. He was ten. Smooth as fucking silk. Smart as hell. Does it make me an asshole that I gave a ten year old polyglot the cold shoulder? Only time will tell. We ended up finding our own way to the hotel. Hostels are somewhat of a rare thing in Morocco. Hotels were just as cheap. $10 per night per person. Breakfast included. Not bad.

That kid's demeanor set the tone for the rest of our time in any city in Morocco. Constantly saying "No. thanks. No. No, I already have sunglasses. I'm wearing them right now. No, I dont need a weird henna tattoo. As you can see I have a real one. No, I don't want to eat at your restaurant; I just ate." The polite vendors would reply "OK maybe later?" Probably not, sorry.

We paid an old man named Bashir 20 Dirham ($2) to show us around the city for five hours. We knew that he would require payment at the end but we all decided that it was worth the expense, after some initial awkwardness. $2. For five hours of work. He was worth more. Oh and we also bought him the most expensive mint tea in town at a place called Cafe Baba. Look it up. Its famous or some shit. Mick Jagger hung out there, or so they say.

Also, this is a fairly devout Muslim country. Be prepared to be woken up at 4:30am by city-wide loudspeakers broadcasting prayers sung by an Imam that travels between mosques on a scooter at breakneck speeds. The first time was a treat. Use earplugs after that.

We were in Tangier for one night and one day. We left to take the overnight train the next evening to Marrakesh. We were literally going down the rails on a crazy train. I swear I woke up more than once convinced that we were out of control. And going backwards, inexplicably. Eleven hours later we arrived in what can only be described as a gigantic tourist trap. Tangier x100. Fifteen minutes after arriving, a bird shit directly on my head. The first time that has ever happened to me. The citizens of the city did the same afterwards. Metaphorically.

After a while, we became lost attempting to find our Riad (read: hotel with a courtyard in the middle and usually a terrace on the roof).


Luckily a group of three children took it upon themselves to help us locate our accommodations for 20 Dirham and a bunch of cookies. They were well on their way to success when an older gentleman (maybe 22-25 years old?) decided that they weren't qualified and attempted to strong-arm in on these kids. He walked us two blocks and then demanded the equivalent of five Euros for his services. We paid the kids and basically told him to fuck off. He hung around for almost 24 hours demanding to be paid outside of our Riad.

The riads were our sanctuaries. A place of peace and security nestled in the chaos that was Marrakesh. This place was scary. I aint gonna sugar-coat it. It was unnerving. Especially at night. We heard some shit I won't ever forget. Screaming. Audible signs of struggle. It wasn't pleasant. Even the vendors at night in the Souks (open air markets) threatened fatal violence when rubbed the wrong way. I do not recommend this place for children. In fact, we couldn't help but pity the women and children that lived in and around the old city (called the Medina).

Don't get me wrong, Marrakesh during the day was mostly a delight. Haggling with the locals over prices for their fake Ray-Bans was actually pretty entertaining, before it got old. But I would never live there. Thankfully our Canadian brother Rory spoke french (the most prominent language besides Arabic). And was good at the art of the haggle. If it wouldn't have been for him, we would have probably paid too much for almost everything.

Rindi's Do's and Dont's for Morocco:


• Do stock up on sanitary items before entering the country
• Don't make eye contact with a vendor unless you're prepared to buy something or run the fuck away (sunglasses help)
• Do enjoy the mint Tea. It's everywhere and it's delicious.
• Don't wait until after nightfall to figure out where you're eating or sleeping.
• Do enjoy the food prepared in a Tajine (traditional clay cooking dish) but be ready to be sick of it after ten days as it is only prepared one way.
• Don't be surprised when offered help from locals, but expect to pay them for their services.
• Do learn French or Arabic.
• Don't pay list price for anything except food.
• Don't expect to find a way to get your laundry done unless you do it yourself in the sink.



Two days in Marrakesh was enough. We decided that we needed to see the real Morocco and rent a Dacia Duster. We hadn't heard of Dacia or their famed Duster either. It was a fun little SUV, though. We put probably 800 kilometers on this brown bad boy.



We went south in duster for a couple days, over the high Atlas mountains, to attempt to find a way into the Sahara desert. Even though you are away from the cities and its much less agressive, you still have to wheel and deal for the best breaks when it comes to seeing the sands of the Sahara. We managed to find a deal through a hotel we were staying at for 840 dirham (~$84) for a day and a night in the desert. I'll post a link to all the Morocco pics at the end here so you can see everything. There is a folder labeled "Sahara" or whatever it is.

It was glorious. Sand dunes 300 meters high are deceptively difficult to climb. Even without shoes. Especially without shoes? I should have quit smoking before this trip. Watching the sun set over a sea of sand dunes in the middle-of-nowhere-africa is something I won't forget. We ate more Tajine (surprise surprise) and built a fire with our guides while they tried to coax songs out of us with their drums. It was magnificent. The sky was made of stars. Thousands and thousands of them. Go find a place with no light pollution now. Go and look at the stars. The tents we slept in were warm-ish. And it was very very quiet. Pretty sure there were bed bugs, though. Oh well. we were only there for one night.

It took three more days to drive the roundabout way back through the high Atlas to Marrakesh where we had to catch our flight on Friday. If you look at the following pics, you'll see images of little villages and the beautiful people that inhabited them that we saw on the way back. The deeper into Morocco you go, the more friendly and generous the people become. I highly recommend this country.

Just rent a car to see it.

Pics: Pretty pretty pictures!

p.s. our next entry wont take so long getting out. It will be all about Spain (Barcelona and Valencia)

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