around the world in 180 days

Marrakesh is hot. It’s not in the Sahara proper (I don’t think), amidst the oceans of sand dunes that the name Sahara evokes, but it is definitely an oasis in the midst of a desert. During the hottest part of the day (noon to about 4) Anna and I took to holing up in our airconditioned hotel room and playing cards until the heat subsided a bit. The temperatures peaked over 100 every single day we were there and it’s still only July. I get bonus points for going to the desert twice with Anna, heat lover that she is.

Anyway, the point is that we aren’t in Marrakesh anymore, we’re in Essaouira, a town three hours away on the Atlantic coast and Essaouira isn’t hot at all with temps peaking around 80. In fact, in the evening, it gets almost chilly, cooling off into the lower 60’s.

It isn’t just the weather that’s nice in Essaouira, the whole town is very pleasant. It’s a small fishing village that’s slowly turning to tourism. There’s a wide beach to the south and a picturesque Portugese-era wall surrounding the main part of the town. To the north, the Atlantic breaks on a rocky shoreline of rugged beauty. It lacks the rush and bustle of Marrakesh, and after a few days there, it’s nice to relax a bit. The only downside of the town is the wind, which blows off the ocean, rising to what seems like gale force in the afternoon. It makes the beach a little unpleasant, because the wind picks up sand and drives it everywhere. We sat out for about 2 hours today before getting our fill, brushing off and heading back to the hotel to shower up.

6 days and we’ll be home, if things go well. Steve sent me flight updates today, and things are starting to fill up, but it still looks pretty good for us. We’ll see on Friday/Saturday. There’s 3 non-stops to MSP and like 8 more to somewhere in the states, so we’ll make it on something. We’ll try to update everyone on exact times when we get closer, but we won’t really know which flight we’re on until we’re in the air. It’ll probably be something like “we’ll be on this flight, unless you hear different.”

As far as plans go once we get back, we haven’t firmed much up yet. Anna’s cousin Jamie is hosting something at her place in Roseville on the day we fly in. Anyone is welcome–if there are a lot of people interested who don’t know where she lives, post in the comments and I’ll put directions up.

I think we’re going to head down to Rochester on Monday and visit people down there for a couple of days, then head for Cass Lake on Thursday or Friday. This is subject to change, though, because Anna needs to schedule some meetings with St. Thomas and, with luck, I’ll have an interview to schedule. After that first weekend, we haven’t figured anything out. We will be making a trip to Duluth as soon as possible to see the town and all the friends we somehow decided to leave and I want very much to visit Mille Lacs quite soon as well. After we make the rounds, we will probably be spending the bulk of our time in Mpls. After the 15th or thereabouts, we’ll both have our cell phones again, so you can call us and we can call you.
Anyway, that’s how things look at the moment. 6 days is a long time, so things could change. I’ll try to keep things updated here, but we’ve got a lot of travel time in the next 6 days so internet access will be limited.

Edit: Now that I think about it, Jamie might not want directions to her house posted on the internet. Anyone who wants directions, let me know and I’ll email directions to you. (Already got you on the list, Tony).

Tags: Morocco, Travel

This entry was posted on Monday, July 9th, 2007 at 10:31 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.