After sending Chris and Anna off in the evening, and Robbie, Jill, John, and Laura the next morning, I set off on my own exit.
I had booked a plane ticket from Gibraltar to London-Gatwick. I knew I could take a train as far as Tangier, then I hoped to go on to Ceuta, a Spanish enclave in North Africa, and take a ferry from there to Spain proper, then head over to Gibraltar.
Armed with at least four currencies, what looks like three passports, and an international cellphone with SIM cards from Morocco, the UK, France, and Estonia, I set off, in Jason Bourne style, for Spain.
The train took about 5 hours, so I ended up getting to Tangier later than I expected. About halfway through the trip, some guy entered my cabin and started a conversation. I answered in Arabic, he pretended to be impressed that I could speak Arabic. Turns out, he was trying to hustle me. Gotta give him credit though; he really did have quite the repertoire. First: are you staying in Tangier? An effort to get me to go to his friend’s hotel. Then, once I said I was leaving immediately to Spain, he asked if I had already bought my ticket. I followed the guidebooks’ advice and said that I had indeed already bought my ticket. He claimed he was going to be on the same ferry, heading to Spain on business tonight.
He contemplated for a while, trying to plan his next move. “I have only bought my train ticket as far as Sidi Ali. Maybe you can give me money for the rest of the ticket, then once we get to Tangier, my friend has a hotel and we can go there and I’ll get you the money I owe you.”
Well, I started playing dumb, pretending like I didn’t know enough Arabic to understand his request. He simplified his language, there’s no way I could feign stupidity anymore. I explained that I didn’t have any cash left, I was leaving the country immediately so I had spent the last of my Moroccan Dirham.
“Ah, so you’ve converted it to Euro?”
“No, I don’t really have any Euro either. Maybe 5 Euro.”
“Ah! Perfect! Because the fare is only 5 Euro!” (It’s not.)
“Look pal. I can’t help you.” I turned back to my book and ignored him. I left him with a “May Allah help you.”
He then made an ostentatious display of pulling a Moroccan youth out of the cabin into the corridor, returning and claiming that all was well, his “brother” would help him. Of course, I saw their transaction and there was no money changing hands. At the next station (not the one he claimed was the end of the ticket he had paid) he got off the train.
Anyway, I got to Tangier, walked along the coast to the bus terminal.
I found out that there was no way I could get to Ceuta until quite late at night, and that only after taking a bus to another city, then taking a taxi to Ceuta. I decided to look into taking the ferry direct from Tangier to Algeciras, Spain. That ended up being the best option, but my ferry didn’t leave for a few hours. So I walked around Tangier, found an internet cafe, wrote and mailed some postcards, then headed to the port.
(I didn’t slip in fishguts getting this picture.)
I had my last Moroccan orange juice (best in the world) and cafe au lait (you never, ever, get the same thing twice when you order a cafe au lait in Morocco. So it’s always an adventure)
I asked the guy how much it was going to be. It was lucky that he said 20 Dirham. Because that’s all I had, and that’s all he was getting. I ended up leaving Morocco with only 20 Sentimes, pretty good I’d say.
I watched the sunset from the relatively empty ferry as we headed to Algeciras.
Like I said before, we were excited about eating dinner at the Chinese/Vietnamese restaurant in Rabat.
We walked through the door, and Chris was greeted by the waiter rubbing his belly. OK, so that’s just a good-luck blessing. No big deal.
We’re shown to our table, have a seat. The waiter sort of stumbles in, and we ask him if he can get us some water. We ask in French. We ask in English. We ask in Arabic. He just stands there, not responding. Weird. He walks away, and we all just exchange an uncomfortable glance.
He returns again, still stoic. Another waiter eventually gets us some water and brings us some complimentary “sangria”. (It tasted like grape juice, at best.) Jill turns to ask him what he recommends. He starts talking, hiccups, and slurs, in French, “I… I rec…. I recommend…. the Chef.” Uh. Ok. He sort of stumbles out of the room. Everyone is pretty uncomfortable at this point.
Our star returns once again, this time Chris asks him a question about a dish. He turns his head away, covers his mouth and seems to wretch. He leaves through a service door next to our table. At this point we figure that he is either sick or drunk; either way we’re convinced he shouldn’t be serving us food. We discussed what we’d have done if this were America: it would include complimentary meals, walking out on the ticket, and speaking directly to the manager. But, It’s not America. And the customer is never right.
Everyone is generally uncomfortable. Robbie is shooting daggers with his eyes at this guy, who is aware enough to realize that something is amiss. When on the way to the restroom, Robbie witnesses the waiter nearly fall down the stairs. Robbie throws up his hands and looks to the head waiter for some sort of explanation, consolation, apology. The head waiter looks sympathetic, even slightly ashamed, but does nothing.
After our waiter’s most recent stumble past our table into the supply room to, presumably, wretch more, everyone at the table is uncomfortable to a new extreme. Robbie has been asking if we can leave since the waiter’s first appearance. But at this point, even Anna, the most accommodating and least-easily bothered member of our expedition, is asking if we can’t just leave. That’s when this picture was taken:
I decide to set up the video feature of my camera, hoping to catch just how uncomfortable we all were.
Notice his the slight swaying in his gait, the door he disappears into, and the general attempt of everyone at the table to pretend like nothing is wrong…
Unreal. So, we set the camera up for another clip. We couldn’t believe what happened next.
Notice the looks of terror on our various faces…
For the guy to pick out Robbie, the person among us who was most uncomfortable and was most upset/angry about the whole situation… wow.
We set out from the Kasbah towards Ouzoud, where we sought out a set of cascades.
At one point we got lost….
We checked into another beautiful Riyadh and walked down towards the falls.
And some fighting Barbary Apes:
After checking out the falls, we decided to go for a swim:
We woke up the next morning and did a bit more swimming in some of the pools further down. After a lunch of brochettes that we’re pretty sure they put back on the same plate they’d used for the raw meat, we left at 3:30 for what we thought was going to be a three-hour drive.
Not only did it turn out to be much longer (we finally arrived at Ras al-Ma at about 11), but our drive was certainly filled with adventures.
… Robbie got pulled over for “speeding”. The road shouldn’t have been a 60 kph zone, ultimately he was going like 43 miles per hour, and the guy gave him a penalty for doing 25 over, when he was only doing 15 over. The fine is double (which of course he had to pay in cash, one half to the Moroccan government, the other to Officer Ahmed’s already-plump belly.)
We then stopped for a “snack break” where we probably bought more junkfood than this establishment sells in any given year. We also managed to get lost, but eventually arrived at our Gite (guest house).
The next morning we found out that our Guest House host had a son who lived in Bouies Creek, NC. So, of course they think this is a perfect time to give him a call (keep in mind it would be 4am EST!) Because of the personal connection, he agreed to let us stay at the Gite another night. So we took a day trip to the sources of the biggest river in the country.
On the way we stopped to take some pictures by an old oak tree:
Narrowly averted catastrophe:
We got to the sources, but we couldn’t see anything. That’s because the banks had been lined with little huts selling tea, drinks, and snacks. So we sat down and had a coke, while dipping our feet in the cold water. Pretty refreshing on such a hot day!
We wanted to take a hike to find the oldest cedar tree in Morocco. We didn’t have time, but I sure hope this wasn’t it:
The next morning we headed back to Rabat. In what might have been my favorite driving maneuver of the trip, we parked the cars for the last time and waited for the rental guys to come pick them up. The cars successfully returned with all four panels on each side intact (c.f. our South Africa experience) we had a beer to celebrate. Then we took a walk through Rabat before Chris and Anna had to leave for the airport.
The wall of the old city:
Can you tell which one is John?
Afterwards, we went to a Chinese/Vietnamese restaurant. Chris and Anna were eager to eat some Asian food, something they can’t get in Mauritania too easily. You know what, I’m not even going to tell you what happens next. You’ll have to wait for the next post. I need to make sure you read this story. It has to be the greatest moment of our Morocco trip…
When we got up to our hotel, the Kasbah du Toubkal (the filming site for parts of Kundun) we were just astounded by the natural beauty of the place. The days we were there were filled with hiking, eating delicious food, and meeting all kinds of interesting guests, including the hotel’s co-owner.
I’m glad we didn’t have to drive the Atos on this road:
A Berber village:
Chris, John, and Robbie on the trail:
After our hikes we would have lunch, rest up, and then meet on top of Jill and John’s rooftop balcony for a happy hour before dinner.
While Jill and John enjoyed their room in the tower, the five of us got a much better deal, we slept outside under the stars.
On every hike we’ve gone on for the past twenty-two years, John has always been telling us about the snack shop that’s going to be there at the top of the mountain for us. Of course, after years of hiking in the Appalachians, he’s never come through on that promise.
Well, it might have been the biggest shock of our lives when we got to the top of the pass on one of our hikes and found this:
Can John ever deliver on this promise again? Well, he did the next day as well, when three little kids were selling cokes at the top of the pass. But 2 in a row is probably as lucky as he’s going to get.
The decision to go to Marrakesh was already one of the toughest points of contention in our itinerary. It’s one of those places that you just feel like you have to see. The attraction point is the old city and the huge square in the middle. John had wanted to see Marrakesh since the early nineteen-sixties. Jill knew it was going to be unbearably hot. Robbie wasn’t looking forward to the stress of the city and wanted to keep relaxing at the beach. Chris and Anna were ready to get away from the beach. I figured Marrakesh would be neat for a little while, but certainly wasn’t enthralled about driving through it. The guidebooks said “Don’t drive in Marrakesh.” The couple we met at our apartment in Essouaria (from Asheville, NC, small world) told us to avoid it alltogether. And the apartment representative assured us that driving there would be “easier than in Tokyo”. We figured we’d give it a shot, spend 2 nights there and then head on to the mountains.
We were supposed to meet our landlord at the McDonald’s on which was right off Ave. Mohammed the fifth as you enter town. (Note to those who travel to Morocco: Every town, city, village, or hamlet you enter, you will be entering on Ave. Mohammed V.) Well, we were, in our typical fashion, quite late, and our guy seemed eager to go. He told us to follow him. He jumped on his vespa scooter and jetted off like Mario Andretti. Driving in Marrakesh isn’t fun. Following this guy at least turned it into a game…
We got to the apartment, and there seemed to be something in the air:
We set off for the city center, our group of seven an easy target for faux guides. But we managed to make it down to the center without incident.
One of the greatest things about Morocco might have been the fresh orange juice. Everywhere we went, delicious orange juice better than any I’ve ever had, even fresh squeezed, in the US. And a whole lot cheaper than a jug of Tropicana. We got some of the fresh stuff at the market in Marrakesh:
The remarkable part about the square is the way it comes alive at night, with rows and rows of stalls selling grilled Moroccan dishes.
The first night we opted for the Moroccan-Thai fusion restaurant. It turned out that it was only “fusion” cuisine in so far as that there was Moroccan and Thai stuff on the menu. But that suited us just fine, since we’d had our fair share of Tagines up to that point.
The next day we ended up back at the square. Here’s a view during the day:
We walked around a bit, saw some spice markets. This is why you come to Marrakesh.
Just remember that the same exact spices can be bought in the grocery store for many times less… I guess that’s not very much fun though.
We then continued on the the Bahia Palace.
John in the courtyard:
We then headed on to the Madrasa, an old Islamic school. Interestingly, Morocco has closed virtually all of its Mosques and religious sites to foreigners. This is in contrast to Egypt, for example, which has many Mosques from different time periods which are simultaneously open to tourists and in regular daily use for prayers. This school is one of the few in the country that are open to tourists.
Robbie out front:
John and Laura walking in the courtyard:
Robbie, used to sitting in the corners at school?
At that point, Jill, John, Robbie and Laura had felt like they’d had enough of the hustle and bustle, so they headed back to the apartment. Chris, Anna, and I wanted to see a bit more of the city, and wanted to try a Vegan restaurant their friend had recommended (I was desperate to try a pumpkin couscous, a local delicacy).
We found the non-tourist part of Marrakesh, which was refreshing. Active markets and bustling streets, but with people going about their own business and not hollering at us to buy some dumb junk.
We eventually did find Chris’s restaurant. But sadly it closed at 5pm.
The amount of lean in that wall made me pretty uncomfortable though…
So the three of us returned to the square to get food from the stands. It was a pretty neat experience. We took three loops around, each vendor shouting at us reasons why his was the best, even though they all looked identical. One was particularly obnoxious, some were offensive. We first sat down for some soup at a place that only Moroccans were eating at. We figured that was a good sign. Had a great lentil soup, and a chickpea soup. Then we walked around again until we found a vendor who’s salespitch appealed to us. This guy appreciated that we spoke/were learning Arabic and wasn’t pushy. So we sat down and had some brochettes.
Then we walked to meet the rest of our group who were having dinner on the other side of town. We had ice cream at Haagen Dasz, then headed back to the apartment.
This is my attempt to take a picture of the moon in front of a tree. Not much I could do without a tripod or place to set the camera. I thought it was a particularly Middle Eastern picture that would look pretty cool. It really just looked more like this.
