The Plan B Adventure

Welcome again to North Africa and the warm Mediterranean climate of its most western country….Morocco. We arrived in Casablanca after what can only be described as the longest travel day (because it was actually two!!) of our trip. As we looked at what lay ahead of us in travelling from Cape Town to Casablanca we both cringed, looked over at each other and said “Did we plan it this way!?” Here’s a brief look at what we were about to undertake: two hour flight from Cape Town to Jo’burg; five hour lay-over in Jo’burg; eight hour flight from Jo’burg to Dubai; two hour lay-over in Dubai; eight hour flight from Dubai to Casablanca; one hour train ride to Casablanca from airport; 15 minute cab ride to hotel; three flights of stairs to our beds; finally, 19 hours of sleep after 30 hours of travelling. Wow….sleeping has never felt so good!

Refreshed and thinking clearly again we opted for one day in Casablanca before exploring the rest of Morocco. Well….to our surprise as we sauntered around Casablanca we didn’t run into Bogie, Ingrid Bergman (sorry Vince!), or Ricks’ Cafe (there are a hundred places with the same name). Maybe not to suprisingly, Casablanca is much like a North African mini-Paris. Everyone speaks beautiful French, woman are dressed in modern outfits with cute shoes, men don sweaters thrown casually around their necks, and cafes/patisseries are EVERYWHERE!! As there aren’t many sights to see we decided to wander the streets a bit on a jam-packed Sunday afternoon then settle into a nice cafe to view a few of the World Cup games. Now this is something we haven’t touched on yet. Watching the World Cup abroad is a completely different experience and you quickly realize that ‘futbol’ is THE most widely watched (Sorry…Chris and Anna, it’s not NASCAR) sport worldwide. The cafes are packed, usually with men smoking cigarette after cigarette as if its their last pack ever. If you happen to be the rare woman (read Becca) in the cafe this can obviously affect your experience. Even more interesting is that the Moroccan fans actually cheer for Spain and France. Wait a minute weren’t these areas mortal enemies for hundreds of years?? Guess supporting a winning team transcends battle lines, especially when your team doesn’t reach the big show. By the way in case anyone is keeping score we are cheering for the Portugese as we will be there for the final!

After consuming our fair share of cappuccino and tajine we headed to the train station for a quick trip to Marrakesh. The trains in Morocco are surprisingly nice and riding 2nd Class is nice as you get to sit 8-deep with the locals in a barely air conditioned coach. Actually its not that bad and allowed Becca time to bone up on some of her high school French. Stepping off the train in Marrakesh you are immediately aware that it is not Casablanca. In Casablanca people are too busy and unconcerned with trying to quadruple every price just because you look like a tourist. Not in Marrakesh! Being the hub of tourist activity in Morocco every local has an angle, more accurately called a scam. For instance the taxi drivers at the train station have meters but won’t even hear about using them as they know that most people will pay quadruple just to get to their friendly Sofitel confines. Unfortunately we do not have that luxury so we must stand curbside with our bags and haggle with fifteen different drivers before we can find someone that will only overcharge us by 50%. However, after we check into our hotel we get a brief glance at the magic that is Marrakesh. We sit down with some ice cream and coffee in Djemaa El Fna (the big open square) and watch snake charmers, henna artists, acrobats, and other random circus acts as they entertain the hordes of local and Western tourists. Quite a scene and some of the best ‘people-watching’ you can do worldwide.

As for the other big attraction of Marrakesh, the souqs, warranted a quick visit but we had opted for shopping in the days to come. Souq actually means market or bazaar but in Marrakesh it means alleyway after alleyway of shopkeepers hawking their goods and attempting to entice you with tea, free sweets, or our favorite “Just Looking Mister, please you don’t have to buy just come in and looking!” If you are planning to enter the souqs for shopping you better have your game face on as these guys (all guys) know every trick in the book. It is actually quite fun to wander around and eavesdrop on unsuspecting tourists as they are chewed up and spit out by these masters of their trade. After experiencing markets (souqs) worldwide we have a few bits of advice: learn to say “No” straight way with a smile; never ask “How much?” unless you really want to buy; never, ever, ever take the first price. We have yet to be at a market where the price you should pay and the first price quoted haven’t been universes apart! As for the sights (actual sightseeing) in Marrakesh, they are quite unimpressive. The real way to experience it in all its glory is to share some food at the food stalls, watch acrobats while enjoying fresh-squeezed juices, and view all the action from any rooftop terrace.

We had so much fun and flexibility with our rental car in South Africa we decided to rent another and experience a completely different part of Morocco. Instead of heading up the coast as many do we chose to head inland and see the kasbahs, gorges, and valleys that are hidden within the Atlas Mountains and its surrounding desert. Our first stop was Ait Benhaddou which contains the gorgeous kasbah, palmeraies (palm groves), and landscapes that are featured in movies from Lawrence of Arabia to Kingdom of Heaven to Gladitor. What amazed us was after a few hundred kilometers of driving through nothing but desert-like terrain you come upon this astonishingly lush oasis in the middle of nowhere. As we will come to find out over the next 500-700 kms this is something that happens quite frequently and lends to the natural beauty of this area. Over the next few days we drove through 800m high gorges, valleys of pink flowers laced with winding rivers, and towering kasbahs encircled by local inhabitant’s dwelling. Entracingly beautiful landscapes are abound throughout this area of the world and it was consistently perplexing as we saw something beautiful then looked at each other and said “Is this really Morocco?”

Of course, the most exciting part of the rental car excursion was not provided by the landscapes or scenery but by Ms. Becca herself. Getting annoyed by her blowing hair as the car didn´t have AC she requested a pull-off so she could get into the trunk (boot for our English readers) and get something to use to pull back her hair. As soon as the trunk shut and Jeff heard “Ooooooh! No” he knew…….the only key they had to start the car and unlock the trunk was now inside the trunk. Picture for a minute being in the middle of nowhere surrounded with nothing but gorges and desert-like mountains and two hours outside any city….Couple that thought with 100 degree heat and a quarter bottle of water…..needless to say the culprit (Becca) had a bit of a panic attack. Knowing that calm heads would prevail Jeff began to work diligently on getting into the trunk but after multiple attempts and a French car manual things were not looking good. After some nice locals stopped to help, Jeff thought “Wait a minute…no radio means no speakers!” As he hurriedly pulled back the carpet over the back seat he saw the infamous key straight through the empty speaker hole. Voila!! And we were off again with a very thankful spouse in the passengers seat. Whew!!!

After Key Debacle 2006 we were on the road to Fez, our final stop in Morocco. The next few days were filled with wandering through the endless and infamous alleyways of Fez´s Old City, fending off (again) endless and infamous requests from Fez´shady tour guides and salespeople, enjoying delicious rabbit and prune couscous, and relaxing on our rooftop terrace. Fez is a very interesting city and epitomizes Morocco in every sense but we were so worn out that we enjoyed taking our time, sleeping in, and planning our next adventure into the south of Spain. Andalusia here we come!

Tags: Fez, Morocco, Travel

This entry was posted on Friday, July 7th, 2006 at 5:13 am and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.