Our trip around the world includes one stop in Africa. I know we're just barely touching the continent, but at least we're not completely neglecting it. Poor South America didn't make it on our itinerary. I remember a professor of mine pointing out that South America is always the last continent people remember to list, and I feel so badly about that. But, we're not neglecting South America forever; I have plans...
Anyways, Africa.
I realize, while Morocco is an Arabic culture, it is not Arabia. However, there are a lot of allusions to it. There are magic lamps in all the shops, we ate at a restaurant called Aladdin, there were references to 1001 nights, and Matt was often nicknamed Ali Baba. Arabian nights seems an appropriate title.
So, we landed in Tangier and weren't sure what to expect. Everything you read makes it seem there are aggressive hawkers everywhere. If you allow a person to help you, even just giving directions, it seems you should expect to give a tip. We were anticipating the worst as we got off the ferry. However, the dock was fairly empty. So, we walked off and headed to the bus station. We easily (another uncertainty before we arrived) got a ticket on the safer bus company and headed to Chefchaouen.
Chefchaouen (which we called Chef, but it seemed the locals called it Chaouen) was a small town built in the hills. It is the Blue City because the buildings are painted blue. The alleys in the medina or old town are narrow and shady. They drink delicious mint tea. There are colorful Berber rugs hanging on the walls outside the shops. I loved Chef.
We just wandered around the whole time in and out of alleys, kind of losing our way. But, it was such a small town, it didn't matter.
Before arriving in Morocco, there were two things I had thought of buying. They were my final major purchases for the trip. One was a Moroccan wedding blanket, or handira, and a leather pouf.
When we arrived I found that the nomadic Berbers wove beautiful rugs, so that was really hard to resist. Like, I had to have several conversations with Matt both expressing and trying to control my covets. We decided the leather pouf was our main goal. Matt, correctly, noted we had enough rugs, and he wasn't super crazy about the handiras, although he was open to it.
While we were in that city, I definitely debated where I would end up wanting to buy an international house: Turkey or Morocco.
I felt it would be a hard decision. Then we went to Fes.
Fes is extremely old. The New Medina is extremely old. So, the Old Medina is nearly ancient. There are supposedly 12,000 small streets winding their way through the medina. And by streets I do mean alleys. We found our hotel fairly easily and weren't sure what to expect from the outside, but you step into a complete oasis. It was beautiful.
We thought we would wander a bit in Fes, but we ended up never going into the Medina without a guide. We made reservations at a restaurant and they sent someone to pick us up and bring us back. That is how crazy the medina is.
The next day, we took a tour. We just walked around and saw the markets, some mosques (which we couldn't go into). Matt practiced his Arabic- many people complimented his accent.
Fes is known for its tanneries, which are a UNESCO World Heritage. We got to visit and see the process of treating the leather. It looked like very hard work. It also fueled our desire to find a pouf. I don't know if Moroccans have poufs in their homes, but they have them in their shops, so we were on the hunt.
However, we cut our tour short as Morocco had seemed to have gotten into our digestive tracts. It wasn't quite as bad as Nepal and Vietnam, but still, wandering an ancient Medina wasn't that attractive at that point.
So, we relaxed and got ready for our early departure the next day. We had wanted to go to Marakesh as well, but the bus between Fes and Marakesh was just too long. We had also wanted a night in the desert, so we connected the cities with a two-night tour. It was a lot of driving, although, it was wonderful seeing the countryside.
Our first night we reached the dunes of the Sahara desert. They are beautiful. Absolutely breathtaking.
We arranged to ride a camel out to Berber tents where we would spend the night in the desert. Obviously, animal riding is not my favorite activity. But, while camels are more difficult than horses, I thought, being a tourist riding a camel is probably easier than riding a horse. My reason is this: camels are challenging, so they're not just going to set us on one and hope we can get it to camp.
I was right. Our camels were tied together and a guide walked the camels through the dunes for us. There was no work invoked apart from holding on, which was the trickiest part, especially as the camel stands up and lies down.
Also, my camel was way better than my horse. He was so sweet. They're ugly, but sweet. I mean, look at that smile.
So, we sauntered through the desert and arrived at our camp. I wasn't expecting anything luxurious, but it was really quite nice. The tents were lined with rulings, keeping the sand out, the toilets flushed, we had a bed in our own tent, with an electric light. Not bad at all.
We drank tea as the sun set and shared dinner in a large tent. It was a really beautiful night.
We woke up early and walked to the top of the dune above the camp for sunrise. The color on the sand is just too beautiful. I found I really loved the desert.
After the sun was up, we rode our camels back to the edge of the desert and continued on our way.
We drove through several valleys, which were interesting as there is more water than one would think in Morocco. The floor of the valleys are covered in greenery drinking from the rivers that run from the mountains.
The next day, we drove through the Atlas Mountains, which were wild and beautiful, as mountains usually are. We also stopped in Ourzazate. These are popular for filming with several well-known movies being made here.
Ourzazate is a very old city and quite interesting. There were several kasbahs, which are square homes with courtyards in the middle, and a mosque and a synagogue. Our guide pointed out where Gladiator and Lawrence of Arabia, amongst others had been filmed. I think he had been in the movies too.
After our long drive, we arrived in Marakesh. While there are many alleys in the medina here, it is not quite like Fes. It feels more open and there are more direct routes.
We had one full day here and we were using it to go shopping. We had researched the shopping process and decided what we would spend in various items. We headed out to the souks and started checking out poufs and prices. Every shop pretty much has the same pouf. But, we were looking for the right size and the right color. It's hard to know if it's sheep, goat, cow or plastic. (Well, some plastic is pretty obvious, but some less so.) we found one shop where it seemed they were actually making the leather products, but it was just above our price range.
We took a break in the main square, had the most amazing banana shakes and headed back into the souks.
We probably out more thought than we needed to into this, but we wanted to be happy with it. We finally found the perfect proud and bartered down to the price we wanted. We walked away only once, when he called us back. We did it, we found a pouf. I love it, and Matt really likes it too, which is a bonus. We looked at a few wedding blankets, but never found one we both agreed on. I found a DIY tutorial for a wedding blanket Christmas tree skirt, so I'll settle for that.
We wrapped our pouf and happily left for the airport. I loved Chef and the hinterlands of Morocco are stunning, but I think we've seen what we wanted to see. I've decided to stick to Turkey for our international home. So, farewell to handiras and berber rugs hanging on blue walls. I found a shop in Chef with an Etsy shop, so if the need for Berber textiles becomes real, I'll still have that option.
