Blogs from Morocco, Africa - page 204

Roman Ruins and Medina Blues As they seem to say in show-biz, “The Show Must Go On.” Despite our love of Fes with its gigantic medina, its friendly cultured population and views of the Arabian/Berber lifestyle of yore, it was time to go. It was sad to move on after a beautiful day exploring, but the time had come for us to move on to new sights and sounds. Volubilis: Roman Border Town Only a few hours drive between Fes and Meknes lies the ruins of one of ancient Rome’s garrison border towns. Situated in a fertile valley between mountains, Volubilis seems an idyllic place for a successful town on the edge of a gigantic empire. For over 400 years, Romans lived here at the edge of “civilization” living off the food grown in the ... read more

Moulay Idriss is a smaller city of about 20 000 people that dates back to approximately 780 AD, from my recollection of what the guide was saying, the King has a special fondness for Moulay Idriss, and therefore prohibits the people from making any changes or upgrades to the city. It was founded by a descendant of the prophet Mohammed. When our big truck arrived in the tiny market place square, it had only a little trouble backing up in to a parking place. Immediately there was somebody at the truck door offering to be our guide to show us around for 20 Dh each, me and Jordan and a couple others opted out, and just sort of wandered up towards the direction the look out should be. Some old guy kept following us and pointing ... read more

Out Of Europe And Into The Frying Pan It really was time to leave when we woke up at 4am to catch the first in a series of flights that would end in Casablanca, Morocco. There is only so much time you can spend and so many sights you can see before Europe begins to be, just a little, monotonous. You really do become Old Town/Castle/Museum fatigued after close to five months (out of one year) spent in Europe. The food, the sights and the countries were starting to blend into one long stream of memories which were indistinguishable from each other. That’s really how we decided to spend most of our remaining time outside of Europe. Eleven days in Morocco, a week in Jordan, ten days in South Africa and a few days in ... read more

During the summer 2007, this was with Asilah that I started my trip around Morocco...This is a GREAT alternative to Tangier when you get to the country by ferry! It's a really beautiful town, with blue and white tones, by the ocean, quiet, nice people,........ read more

The Royal Air Morocco flight to Marrakech was smooth and well serviced... Our long weekend of bartering and practicing French and Arabic started as soon as we stepped out of the airport in Marrakech. We were getting to an agreed fee with one taxi driver when he suddenly just walked away from us... Lucky for us as soon as he walked away another taxi driver stepped up to go through the whole barter conversation again! We quickly agreed a fee he was happy with and jumped into his car. We were dropped off at our hotel, Atlas Medina & Spa. The lobby area looked fantastic, all shiny and clean, quite modern... not at all like the traveller reviews we read about on tripadvisor! We went up to our room which was also spotless. The next day ... read more