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Today we've booked a full-day tour up over the Atlas Mountains to the town of Ouarzazate and the fortified city of Ait Benhaddou. We're picked up at the crack of dawn, and meet our guide and driver whose name is Abdul, and two young American men who'll be our travelling companions for the day. Issy's prone to car sickness so she asks if she can sit up the front with Abdul. The Americans are in the middle, so I climb into the back seat.
The first part of our trip is through flat, fertile looking country criss-crossed with irrigation channels. We cross some wide and almost dry river beds that almost look a bit out of place in the arid landscape. Even here outside Marrakech virtually all the buildings are the same earthy red colour as they were in the Medina, and we begin to wonder whether Moroccan paint shops only stock one colour.
We reach the foothills and start to climb. The road's very narrow and windy, and Abdul's not a great driver. He seems to particularly enjoy tailgating, passing trucks on blind corners, and driving with one hand on the wheel while talking on his phone. I'm
glad I'm up the back, and not getting the same closeup view that Issy's getting.
The views are stunning, and we stop a couple of times for photos. It's getting a lot cooler. Abdul tells us that we're now in Berber country and that most of the people here speak the Berber language which is apparently quite different to the language spoken in Marrakech. He says that in the Berber culture the woman do most of the work. The road we're on is apparently impassable in winter as it's covered in snow, which is a bit hard to comprehend after the stifling heat of Marrakech.
We stop again for a short break and Issy wanders into a stall and starts looking at jewellery. The storekeeper introduces himself as Ahmed, and Issy starts bargaining with him for a necklace. Ahmed starts at 400 dirham and Issy responds with 70 dirham. Issy tells him that she has to buy something from him because he's so cute. I'm not sure this is a great bargaining strategy. They converge at 150 dirham, which is about $20. I've got no idea what the necklace is really worth but I'm quite sure it's a
lot less than that. Issy tells me to take a picture of her with Ahmed. She urges me to hurry. It seems that his hands are starting to wander where they shouldn't, and I'm not sure that she thinks he's quite so cute any more.
The road get steeper and windier, and is now a continuous series of hairpin bends. Abdul's driving hasn't improved. We reach the Tizin Tichka Pass which a sign tells us is at 2,260 metres. I'm pretty sure that this is higher than Mount Kosciusko, and there are higher peaks all around us.
We drive on down the other side to Ouarzazate. Abdul says that our first stop here will be the Berber Museum, where we're greeted by a tall man in full Berber costume. We don't catch his name, but Issy says he bears a striking resemblance to Eddie Murphy, so we just refer to him as Eddie. He starts telling us about some of the museum's exhibits. We're then taken into another much larger room full of carpets, both on the floors and stacked high around the walls. We're served cups of tea, and Eddie lectures us on the different types of
Berber rugs. He then asks us which ones we want to buy, and starts trying to bargain with us. I'm pretty sure this is the first museum I've ever been into where the exhibits are for sale, and you need to bid to buy them. Eddie has bargaining down to a fine art. He starts by writing a number on a scrap of brown paper and showing it to me as if it was some deep dark secret that he can't possibly reveal to Issy, and the process then proceeds from there. He manages to convince Issy to buy a necklace for 300 dirham. I have no idea how much it's really worth, but again I'm quite sure it's a lot less than what we've paid.
We're all quite pleased to see that Abdul's taken the opportunity to have a nap. It's been a long and tiring drive to get here, and will be an equally arduous trip back. It's also Ramadan, so he can't even have a cup of coffee to help keep himself awake.
We drive on towards Ait Benhaddou, which we've read is a well preserved earthen clay city, or kasbah, and is a UNESCO
listed world heritage site. It's apparently been the setting for several movies including Gladiator, The Jewel of the Nile, The Mummy, and Kingdom of Heaven.
We stop for photos on a hill just across the river from the kasbah. As we get out of the van we're approached by a man in full Berber dress with snakes draped around his neck. He wants us to take pictures and then pay him for the privilege. We move away quickly. Issy gets back to the van first, opens her door and climbs in. Before she has a chance to close the door again the van starts rolling backwards down the hill. It seems that Abdul's forgotten to put the handbrake on. Issy screams, and I manage to jump out of the way just before her open door knocks me flat. Abdul sprints around to the driver's side, jumps in, and yanks the brake on. A few seconds later and the van would have rolled down a much steeper bank and into the river. Big disaster averted. Abdul's very embarrassed. He mutters something about a fault with the brakes.
We stop at a village for lunch, and then head off towards
the kasbah on the opposite bank of the river. It looks like it will be quite a hike with no shade. We stop to put on sunscreen, but then realise that we've left it back at the Riad. We go into a shop to try to buy some, but the shopkeeper has no idea what we're talking about. I don't think "slip, slop, slap" has hit Morocco quite yet. I tell Issy that the shop next door sells ridiculous looking straw hats, and that I'll settle for one of those instead. She tells me that I need to bargain, but we don't have time; we're holding up the rest of the group. She then makes the mistake of starting to look at clothes. The shopkeeper's very keen for a sale and starts bargaining with her for one of the dresses. He's very aggressive, and when she walks away he shouts something at her that we suspect is not particularly complimentary.
We can't see the rest of the group, so we wander down to the river bank where we find a series of stepping stones leading across the very wide channel to the opposite bank. Just as Issy's about to
complete the crossing, she slips and falls into the knee deep water. As she scrambles out we notice a large bridge a couple of hundred metres upstream which seems to lead right to the main entrance. It seems that we've come the wrong way. Issy's not very happy. She tells me that I'm a bad husband. I think she's joking, but I'm not prepared to risk it and laugh. We find another entrance, but as we go in we're told by some young boys that we need to pay a fee. Abdul told us that entry was free, so we suspect the fee is really a surcharge for tourists who are too stupid to notice the bridge.
We trudge up a steep path through the alleys of the kasbah towards the top of the hill. Issy's hot, tired, and not at all happy. She wants to go back to the van, but I insist we continue on. She says she wants to kill me but she's too tired, and my murder will need to wait until she gets her energy back. I climb to the top alone. The views of the kasbah are spectacular. All the buildings are made
of clay and straw, and sit amongst a maze of alleyways, some of which are in tunnels under the houses.
We get back to the van to find that Abdul's been sleeping again. It's a three hour drive back to Marrakech, so we hope he's had enough naps to stay awake until we get home. Sleep certainly hasn't done anything to improve his driving. We make it back alive, but the danger doesn't end there; we've still got a couple of hundred metres of Medina alleyways to negotiate. We think we know the way. We reach a tee intersection where we think we need to go straight ahead, but a teenage boy tells us that we need to turn left. Just around the corner some other teenagers tell us we're going the wrong way. They offer to show us the right way, which turns out to be the way we were going in the first place. As we approach the Riad they demand payment. I give them all the change I've got, but I'm told that this isn't enough. They get very aggressive. Fortunately one of the Riad's security guards is alert to our plight and comes out to
intervene. It seems we've been scammed. The scammers work as a group; one member points you in the wrong direction, and the others then guide you back in the right direction and demand payment for the service.
It's been a long day. Issy wants to stay at the Riad, but I convince her to go to a restaurant in the Medina near the main square. We're joined by some fellow guests, Mario and Sharon, from Mont Albert in Melbourne. After dinner we head off into the square. Unlike yesterday it's now ridiculously crowded. It's packed with food stalls, street performers, and people with an assortment of animals trying to get you to pay them to let you take pictures. It feels like total chaos.
We find our way back to the Riad and collapse into bed. It's been a very long day. Issy tells me that I have to read today's blog to her before I publish it. I think she's worried that I'll write that she told me that I was a bad husband, and that she wanted to kill me. By the time I finish writing she's asleep. I wonder whether I'll get into more trouble
for publishing it without reading it to her, or for waking her up. I decide to publish. That will at least defer my troubles until morning.
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maree young
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Loving your travel blog !! You're inspiring me to travel to places I have only read about & now feel informed enough to venture there !! Stay safe & continue to have an amazing time :)