46 Degrees...But It's A Dry Heat!

For our second day at Khamlia we had arranged a guided camel trek into the dunes of Erg Chebbi. This is the sort of thing that most people seem to come to this region for, or at least those that are not here for ATV or 4x4-ing in the same desert.

There are apparently about 70 hotels, auberges, and other sorts of accommodation in the area. They are largely off the road near the base of the dunes themselves, and many of them come with all mod cons, even swimming pools. Our place is not so well endowed and well south of all of the others in the next village, a tiny community of only 43 families, and as far as we know the last place to stay on this road. The dunes are only a short distance away though and form the backdrop to our northern horizon.

Morocco has a lot of desert, most of which is not sand dunes, but is more similar to the rocky sparsely vegetated variety one sees in Mexico or the southern USA perhaps. Some of the terrain makes me think of lunar landscapes, as it is so void of life and distinctive features it seems quite alien. The ground around here where it is not covered by sand dunes is often very flat and covered in a heavy black grit, and interspersed with small rocks of apparently the same material. There are rocky hills and outcroppings of similar stony appearance.

The dunes have a pinkish hue, though the colour changes with the level or angle of daylight. On the day we went out on our camels, it was just as hot as the day before and since the plan was to sleep in the dunes we did not set out until about 7 pm. The camels were supplied by our Berber guide Omar, a neighbour from next door in the village. He owns 3 camels, but tends for several others for other locals. A good domesticated camel runs about 12,000 or so dirham in case you were wondering, but one still rough around the edges might be had for maybe 7000, if you want to housebreak him yourself.   

Bobby and Betsy showed up and soon the food and Linda went on the smaller lead beast. We know the one she rode was a boy (hence Bobby), but never really checked out the goods on my steed, so she/he/it became Betsy. They were very well mannered, though Linda claims Betsy kept spitting at her, but certainly due to the short tether between the 2 animals she was at least breathing down her neck.

I have sometimes heard camels referred to as “ships of the desert”, and that seems apt. However our experience shows they don't quite come near the comfort of a cruise ship on the Mediterranean. A lot of the time riding one seemed more like being in an 8 foot boat in 10 foot swells! The salt spray was even there, but coming from our own bodies...

Legs are wide apart and forward, while bouncing back and forth hanging on to the bare steel t shaped handles on the horn of the saddle. Especially when the going got steep in the dunes it was a bit like bull riding in a red neck bar (not that I've done that lately) for 2 and ½ hours, and without the Lone Star beer. 

As I mentioned we started out late, after the day started to cool, and as the sun set around 8:30 we actually were wandering the dunes at night looking for the best route in the dark. Omar certainly did know where he was going as he steadily trudged along humming to himself and loosely holding the rope leash attached to Bobby. Probably 70 years old, he never seemed in doubt of the location of our camp for the night, but sometimes had to make detours to find the best route along, around and over the dunes. At least once the camels balked at the knife edge crest of sand we were trying to use, so we would have to adjust the angle of attack. And on more than one occasion they had to go into full braking mode to avoid tumbling down some of the steeper slopes. We just had to hand on and trust the All Wheel Drive beasts and driver.

Eventually, when it was nearly pitch black, we reached our camp. The area has several traditional Berber tents set up in a semi permanent location at the base of one of the larger dunes, a monster I would guess at 100 meters high or more. The camp has one old guy tending the place and he greeted Linda with “Bonjour Fatima!” He acts like the caretaker and camp cook, and he took away the food Omar brought in order to prepare our tajine. Yep, Tajine again, only this time served at 11pm in the dunes with a traditional candleholder made from a plastic water bottle and when that inevitably melted, by my headlamp.   

As we waited for our food and after we ate we lay back and enjoyed the stars and the quiet. There was only one other occupied tourist tent, plus their guide. The 2 guides and the camp cook served us and then retreated to their blankets some distance away. The camels were still tied to each other and the front one was hobbled by a rope around the bent front leg so that he could not straighten his leg and stand up. There was also a mule in attendance and a camp cat or 2, one of which made Linda jump out of her skin.

We slept under the stars, on traditional looking blankets and cushions, opting not to get in under cover under the tent. No blankets on top at first, it was well into the early morning when we needed one. It was about as peaceful as you could imagine.

I woke about 5 and before 5:30 I was starting to climb the dune to get a view from there as the sun was about to rise. It was a lot of work and I decided to go to the crest of a more minor dune part way up rather than make my way all the way to the top. The first rays highlighted the tops of the dunes and started to brighten the

By 7 am we had drunk our first pot of Berber whiskey, broken camp (easy for us, as we brought practically nothing with us and had slept in the clothes from the day before), and were back in the saddle. After a while, when we stopped for a short break, I opted to walk for the majority of the way back. Omar sets a good pace in his sandals made from leather and old car tires, and I kept up in my Chacos, until about ½ hour from home base when I got back on as my radiator started to overheat.

Showers back at the house were certainly appreciated by all, as was a well earned breakfast. Before long we set out on the road leaving Khamlia behind, on our very much camel bruised behinds. It really was a great place, and we would have enjoyed staying longer as the hosts and family were so nice. Next time we could participate in a Berber wedding that we just missed or get to know some of the Gnaoua musicians in the village. We just know that we will do it at some other time of year than summer!   

   

   

South of Fes - Not much to do and too hot to do it!

We have not seen many computers and there has been no wifi for the last few days, and we have not searched it out either, so it is a multi day post. Check back later for pictures...  

June 2nd, 

The day we left Fes was another expensive day, much of which we will see later on the Visa bill which is the first time we could use it at all. We won't likely ever come back and so bought some things for ourselves and gifts for others while here in Fes, mostly leather goods. Except for Marrakesh we won't get near the selection or price range of crafts items we like. We will have a rental car for the next week or so, but we don't want to carry souvenirs around with us for the later part of the trip either, so we decided to send some stuff back by mail, and toss in a couple of extraneous clothing articles. Our hard bargaining (“for you, best price, $450 dirham!”, “Are you crazy? Best price, $150 dirham!”…and finally settling on 250), turned out to cost quite a bit more as the box we packaged up at the Post Office to be sent to Canada cost around 650 to ship, or around $80!

I hope we like the stuff when we get home, and I hope the giftees are happy!

After the Post Office we trucked back uphill to the Pension one last time, paid Zak our 600 dirham (2 nights, with breakfast) and headed out of the Medina to grab a taxi to the Ville Nouvelle and our car rental pickup. We did advance our pickup and rental term for one day, to give us more freedom to move around. The rental is going to set us back over $500 for the 8 days, but we did take out all the insurance we could too. As expected, we had to wait while they did all the particulars but we at least got a car, as another guy arrived from the UK (with an Egyptian sounding name like Anwar) appeared to have been scammed by the online booking agency he had used. They had no record of his reservation, though he had been charged at least a deposit in Euros. We had looked at various rental sites, but I had settled on working through a recognized agency, National, and a Canadian based site. Whew!!

I do say “whew” deliberately though. I had ordered an air conditioned car, but that is not what I got. It has some other mod cons, but the air would have been nice. A Dacia Logan 1.4 sedan, apparently a Peugeot made in Romania. With luck we will get some kind of rebate at Marrakesh when we turn it in, but I'm not counting on it.  A rebate in sweat.

Driving here is not that challenging so far. There are not always quite enough signs in English (or French for that matter), but they are frequent enough that we did not go very far astray today.

The drivers themselves are usually not that fast or aggressive, but it does help to be assertive at least. There are random numbers of cars per lane at times, tailgating is normal and passing is frequent on the highways we have been on so far but we are going to keep to the speed limit as much as possible, as I hear the fines for foreigners can be steep. The hills are also sometimes steep too, and the roads narrow, so that means hanging out behind trucks sometimes but that's alright. We are not in a hurry and when we have asked for directions it has usually been easy to find someone to help willingly.

We are now in Azrou, speaking of hills. The road to here, 100 km or so Southwest of Fes, took us through the beginning of the Middle Atlas mountain range, and up to about 1600 meters elevation. That helped bring the temperature down a bit and also increased the shade options as it is significantly more wooded, and allowed us the opportunity to take some back roads around some lakes and through forests and quiet farmland. Some of those detour routes we were on for about 60km on our map are listed as not Tertiary, not Quaternary, but “other”. They were paved at least but narrow and broken up at times, and with almost no other cars.

After our detour we stopped for lunch in Ifrane, an odd little French Alps type resort. Well maybe not that odd, as they do get snow and the town was built by the French in the 1920’s as a getaway from the hot busy cities below. It is well manicured and on the border of a National Park, the site of a University and near 2 ski slopes.

Tonight in Azrou, we are at the Hotel des Cèdres. Funny that, I just realized that the lunch place back in Ifrane was called Café des Cèdres. Lots of cedar trees around too coincidentally.

The hotel is the cheapest we have stayed at so far and pretty basic but all we need. We could have gone as cheap as 60 dirham across the street at the Hotel Baloney (actual name Hotel Salame), but are not that desperate so are paying 159 dirham here. The room is pretty basic, but has a bathroom with shower and not all of them do. It also has one of the fanciest restaurants we have seen yet, white table clothes and vested waiter included. While it still seems to serve the same food as everywhere else at about the same prices at least they have some delusions of grandeur.

It is noisy here though as we appear to be on a major route through town and the trucks and other vehicles  labour up this hill, plus there are a number of other open air coffee shops below in the plaza, and we even had street cleaning machines early this morning!

We bought some bon-bons for the kids that sometimes will ask, but of course after we did that we did not have any more ask. We also did our good deed for the day, and helped an old man in Berber dress with 2 canes trying to climb the tall curb with no success, while several young locals looked on. He practically flooded us with thanks.

I think this sign means that Goats, Chickens and Cows are required to turn right in 30 meters. You can call the phone # provided if you don't believe me.   

There is a great bouldering opportunity here right at the edge of town below the main mosque, a big jumble of rock that the town is named after (Azrou means Great Rock), and other than that it is a pretty sleepy town, and we will be moving on after breakfast.

June 3rd, 

I also experienced a bit of the Moroccan medical system today, and it went off quite well. I've been prone to ear canal blockage the last few years and started to get another bout of it in my right ear just after arriving in Morocco. As it appeared to be getting worse I looked for a doctor, clinic or hospital and eventually found the later here to see if I could get flushed out, a simple procedure. The staff at the small hospital in Azrou was very accommodating and I was out in an hour after waiting for several other outpatient types, including a little girl who offered me some of her yogurt drink. Not flushed out, as the doctor thought I should use some drops for a few days first than have it washed out, a few towns down the road. I also think he lacked the little squirt gun thing that every facility in Canada probably has for this task. With Linda’s medical connections in Vancouver, we could probably send him a case of them. 

     

I was examined and prescribed at no charge whatsoever. It was an easy task admittedly, but he alluded to some common ground in language and seemed quite happy to help someone from Canada. We chatted a bit about Quebec and the French Connection (not the Gene Hackman movie) with Morocco. After I left the drops cost 29 dirham or about $3 at the pharmacy across the street. Cheap, cheap.

On the road again, we ascended through lush green forests, which eventually thinned out and became a high plateau with mixed trees and grassland, sub alpine meadows with purple lupines and red wild poppies. The elevation maxed out around 2100 meters which, being a sea level guy most of the time, I noticed when I went for a bit of a scramble up a slope to get some views of the terrain. It was a very pleasant drive and a comfortable temperature due to the elevation and the slightly overcast conditions. Traffic? What traffic?

Now in Midelt, about 250km from Fes and about the same from Khamlia where we will be going tomorrow and doing that camel thing, we have a delightful little hotel almost to ourselves (only 4 other guests). The gentle old man who runs it is from Morocco but lived and worked in France for much of his life and with his small pension and savings bought the land and built this place, the Hotel Massira. Lonely Planet describes it as a “great new place” but they must mean by Moroccan standards, as he built it from 1973 to 1979 when he opened for business. It is decorated in Moroccan tacky, but is very homey. Last year when the King came to town the place was the fullest ever with 57 total, though not the royal entourage but police and paparazzi in residence.   

When we arrived he made us Moroccan Whiskey (tea) but as he had no fresh mint left he kept  apologizing for it being too strong of regular tea leaves, as he sat with us a and chatted for an hour. Linda of course loved it, though our proprietor said he would get mint later.

After that, I had my first opportunity to run off a faux guide. As we had driven through town we stopped to ask a traffic cop how to find this hotel and a young guy appeared from nowhere, saying he worked for the hotel and that he could show us the way, so jumped in and directed us here. Though he was not overly pushy otherwise and did make some reasonable conversation, he would not leave the premises despite the hotel owner telling him we did not need his services, and telling us that he had no connection with the hotel. We had offered him a few dirham for showing us there but again he insisted he worked there, but what he really wanted was to take us on some tour of “his shop” to buy more stuff we did not need. I had to get pretty pushy to make him get lost, telling him we knew he was a liar, so it is probably a good thing that our rental car is in a locked garage tonight.   

    

We skipped lunch today, aside from a few dates, which is probably a good thing. Everything has been really tasty, but one can only eat so many lamb brochettes, olives, bread, tajines, and all the rest of it. We will have a bit of a walk to find supper tonight but we expect it to be cheap and we expect a great breakfast here tomorrow. Oh yeah the price for brekkie here is 20 dirham each. The room is 120 dirham with private bath, so is the cheapest and cheeriest yet at about $15 Canadian. We could have a room with a shared squat bathroom for less…nahhh!

In Midelt we allowed ourselves to be sucked into a carpet shop. The owner was probably right about his prices being better than that of Fes or Marrakesh for his selection of Berber rugs. They were beautiful, but we told him right up front we were not buying and did not succumb. At the outset we had promised ourselves “no rugs” as they were heavy and hard to carry home. The prices did not seem unreasonable either, starting as low as 100 dirham, even without dickering. Materials were largely sheep wool, camel hair, and Moroccan silk which is not from worms but from cactus plants.   

One we got free from his clutches, we found our restaurant, in which we were the only clients. We were served by 2 women, one of whom I think said she was Jewish (my French, and sometimes theirs, fails us at times). The food was again delicious and one of the best meals so far. Tajine of the Day was with beef, and we had a delicious salad platter, which was actually made up of at least 6 different varieties of cool vegetable dishes. Beets, eggplant, tomatoes, cucumber were just some of the cold offerings, with a small dish of orange and shredded carrot, and another of sweetened cucumber as a sort of chutney on the side. 

Tajine refers to not only the distinctive clay cooking vessel with the odd shaped lid, but in fact to the style of food and preparation. Traditionally the food would be cooked in the vessel over a wood or charcoal fire, but now much of the time a pressure cooker or gas stove is used. Serving it in a Tajine pot is sometimes the main common denominator, other than the flavouring determined by the most common used spices (as far as we can determine) of cumin, saffron, perhaps cinnamon, and some others we have not quite figured out. The dish can be quite complex, with lemons olives and large varieties of vegetables and can have meat or not, or can be all meat with eggs on top. The Restaurant de Fes in Midelt served a delicious one, and we heard the pressure cooker steaming away in the kitchen. They did not even bother with the affectation of the special pot, but just served a huge array of separate stacks of vegetables (10 or 12 types we think) around the meat, on a plate. Yummy…    

  

June 4th, 

Linda drove the next morning from Midelt to Errachidda. It was up and down a fair bit until there, through narrow winding passes and gorges, with the Ziz river below us much of the time. The greenery along was in stark contast to the largely reddish earth and rocky cliffs above. We passed but did not stop at a number of sleepy towns, including that of Rich. It did not appear to be any richer than anywhere else.  

      

Once at Errachiddia, a richer looking garrison and mining town, we filled up, switched drivers and headed due south towards Merzouga. From before Midelt until here we have had views of the High Atlas in the distance, including patches of snow. No snow down there though, as we have been pushing 40 degrees all day, and in Erfoud, the last major town before Merzouga we saw a thermometer outside a bank that read 46! My watch maxed out at 42, obviously cooled by my body core temperature. Uh-huh.

The guys at a café we stopped at to get a drink said it should be about 50 to 55 by July and August, which we considered to some consolation at least.

Some distance before Merzouga we crested a rise and off in the distance we caught our first glimpses of the orangey sand dunes of Erg Chebbi. Even from a distance we could tell they were tall, and it was quite some time before we really approached them. The road does not pass them by very closely, and is perhaps 3 km distance away. Of course sand dunes don't stay still and there is some drifting sand, and signs warning of it, right up to the road in places. There is a lattice of numerous rustic fences, looking a bit like animal pens, which appear to have been built to help minimize the drifting of the sand over the road, but it still has the appearance of oddly coloured snow banks for some sections of the road. 

We drove into Merzouga, got harassed by a faux guide, and drove out. When someone tells you that there is no such place as the one you have booked you know that he has not your best interest at heart. It looks like a shithole little town anyway.

7 km further south we turned off at the appropriate spot in the tiny village of Khamlia. 43 families live here, and there is one place to stay, and it has just 2 bedrooms. Dar El Khamlia is essentially a home stay type of place in the form of a low rammed earth or cob construction (mud and straw) home. The place is about as relaxing as they come which is good as we have no energy to do much in this heat. It comes with 3 adorable kids, in the form of the nieces and nephew of the 2 brothers that own and run the place. Mum hangs around too, dressed in Berber black but she stays out of the picture mostly, leaving the work to the boys.

The kids actually live in the brother's house a few meters away, and one of them, 3 year old Fatima is already in a love at first sight relationship with Linda. The 7 year old girl, Ikram, is terribly cute too and her older brother Eunice (age 10) constantly tries to impress me with his bike tricks, on the brakeless beater he rides everywhere. We took a while to figure out the older kids names but they don’t speak French (or English) very well and the names seemed at first unpronounceable to us and therefore unspellable.

Despite the heat there are ways to keep cool (ish). Drinking lots of water of course is one of them, and I think I have consumed about 2 litres already today and there is lots of day left, and Linda who claims to never want water has been doing the same. We use a wet towel once in a while to wipe faces and necks, search out breezes and shade, and have spent time in front of a fan. This type of building construction does a great job of insulating but also of holding heat, so our bedroom dropped only to the low 30s last night even with the fan on.

We also decided to stay here only 2 nights, instead of the 3 we originally intended. It's just too darn hot.  

June 5th,

This morning we traveled back to Merzouga and turned off on a piste to go find a nearby lake to check out the water fowl. In the vernacular of Morocco “piste” stands for any route that is not paved, so it could be a great dirt road that regular cars have no trouble with, or it could be single track and so rugged a hard core mountain biker or rugged old local mountain man would think twice about. This particular one was more like the former though washboarded and only about 2 or 3 km long and across virtually flat hard packed dirt. 

The lake is probably much smaller than it once was, as evidenced by the spongy reeds embedded in the shorelines. Morocco suffers from Global Warming as much as anywhere else and desertification is ongoing here. The lake does still stretch a kilometer or more long and maybe half as wide I would guess, though on maps it appears much larger, maybe a seasonal thing. Unfortunately most of the birds on the lake where well off shore or on the far side, but appeared to be snow geese or something similar. There were other duck like birds bobbing about, and way off on the other side I think I saw pink flashes as some large birds strafed the geese before landing. I can't be completely certain they were flamingoes but I believe they were, as they are known to appear here. 

             

After bird watching and camel watching (there were about 20 nearby) we got back on the road and drove to the end of it. The village of Tadouz literally is the end of the road, without anything after it but Algeria.  After pointing in all the directions we could travel to collect minerals, dinosaur teeth or other fossils,  another guide offered to take us sur piste about 250 km all the way to Zagora. We agreed we would go with him next time we are visiting the end of the road in Morocco.

Yesterday and today we have skipped lunch altogether, other than a date or a few peanuts. With the size of the breakfasts everyone gives us and the suppers late at night we don't or can't eat much anyway. Water out of the tap here is hot, and gets hotter, so for drinking is kind of like tea without the leaves. As I mentioned earlier during the preparation for this trip, we are trying to reduce the waste we create by trying not to always buy bottled water. It's unavoidable in the heat though we are trying to minimize it. 

I think, but am not sure, the water here is chlorinated but it is not as obviously so as Casa, so I have been using the Steripen the last several days to treat a few litres at a time and refill the bottles we have, just in case. We also have a nearly full 4 litre MSR dromedary pack in the trunk of the car, but if the water from the taps and in our bottles inside the house is hot, the water in the car must be steam.

In a short time we are going on our camel trek, late in the afternoon. I'm not sure how far or how long we will be on the beasts, but I expect it is to a prearranged tent site and the dunes being so close I expect an hour or 2 at most if we don't fall off from heat prostration.

A night in the desert here should be quiet and give us some great views, and may be a touristy thing to do but what the heck. We are tourists.   

        

The View From Fes and Camel On A Bun

Once again, sharing a Grand (ol’) Taxi was convenient and cheap as Aussies Colin and Belinda were ready to go back to Meknes at the same time as us. From there we walked to the nearer of the two train stations, the one we had slept near the other night. Train fare to Fes was 20 dirham each, for the hour long journey. Train travel here is really a bargain, and is electric powered with fairly modern cars and stations, but unfortunately the system does not go everywhere.

The Fes station in particular is very modern and immaculately clean. But once outside don’t take a taxi from there, as there appears to be some sort of EMP or Black Hole affecting the taxi meters. None of them work, so the fare to the entrance at Ain Azleten in the medina is quoted as 40 dirham for each of us, so 80 total. However if you walk a block or so and grab a cab there, outside the Event Horizon, the meters miraculously are fully functional so the drive only cost 12 dirham.

Our stay in Fes might be just a bit too long at 4 days as have seen and done most things we would like to already after a day and a half. In fact I might just check with our car rental company tomorrow to see if we can perhaps get our car a day early so leave here Wednesday not Thursday. It's not like Fes is boring, but the pushy sales pitches are a bit tiring. I almost bought an Avril Lavigne poster yesterday.

We are also not feeling the need to visit museums when or if we find them. The whole place is a living museum.  

Everything is for sale here, and all of it at “best price” by “my brother”. The guides will take you anywhere…anywhere they get a commission that is. And the medina is so vast and convoluted that one is often tempted to go along with the guide, as you don't think you will find the stuff you want, whatever that is, or find your way home. The narrow streets are laid out like a maze, as little as maybe a meter wide, and are often dark and winding plus all of them look like a street you have seen elsewhere, but where?

One of the greatest things about the medina though is that the stone and the street narrowness and the fact that some sections are at least partially covered and shaded combine to produce a cooling effect. You often feel refreshing breezes that one would not think possible from the temperature in the open sun. We have ventured out of the medina, and usually scurried back in or at least got out of the sun as soon as possible when we did.

Late this afternoon, thinking (foolishly) that it must have cooled down a bit we took the exit closest to Pension Sekaya where we are staying and walked up the road to a vantage point point near the Meriendes tombs so we could look out over the city. The temperature on my Suunto watch registered 39 when I looked as we were coming back down the hill, at about 6pm.

Day 3 in Fes-----------------

Shopping all done, car rental and departure updated to tomorrow but where to tomorrow we don't quite know yet. Perhaps South to the Middle Atlas and Azrou plus the lake region around Irfane (sounds cooler), or maybe to Taza and the caves near there (sounds cool too!). Taza looks like an out and back route, so not so enticing, but whatever it won't be high mileage.

We don't plan to buy too much if we can help it, but it's hard to help it here in Fes, and we certainly won't find a better range of souvenir goods at competitive prices, or we hope not. No T-shirts, but we have some textiles we purchased from the weavers themselves and a few leather articles. The highlight so far is a wooden carving bought around the corner from where we sit and directly from the carver and his apprentices. They finished carving it after we closed the deal, but it had three days of work in it in all. Actually in a sense they did not finish it, as it was destined to be a panel in a door, but we asked them to sell us one as-is and without even oiling it or applying a varnish. We plan to pack it and send it home where I can oil it myself, and do not want it to be still wet when packed as we plan to send a box soon.

Earlier yesterday we took a look around the largest and most famous leather tannery. Reportedly the best time is in the morning before the place gets too rank. One of the processes used to cure the leather is by soaking it in guano, so you might agree that it could be a bit odoriferous. The men working here apparently get well paid, and good for them. I wouldn't do it; it looks like nasty work.

The best way to see the tannery or at least the big one we saw is from the shops that overlook it. The touts will take you there whether you want it or not, and the shopkeeper will sell to you whether you want to buy or not, but while there they will explain some of the processes so if you can resist buying or at least shop wisely it is not bad. It's laid out like Ikea though, deliberately designed to take you through all the sections you don't really need stuff from, to help tempt you to buy. 

Our first day we visited Café Clock, a very cool converted townhouse that has simple dishes, some a bit westernized or at least modernized, but also promotes local culture and customs in a youthful manner that appeals to the hip Fassis (people from Fes) and ex-pats as well. We enjoyed a concert of Jilala traditional music with flute & drums (a band called Issawa). I wish I had thought to pull out my phone and try to record it, and maybe the girl who spontaneously started singing between the band’s songs. The place did get rocking with every employee getting into dancing and clapping too.

Tonight we plan to head back to Café Clock for a camel burger. Yummy!

As for other food, we are trying not to order too much every meal, for one it is too hot much of the time to eat a lot and for another they always bring olives, bread, and or beans as appetizers. Tajine we will have lots more of, so we try not to order it all the time too. The fish here has been great, and I had my first cous cous just yesterday. We think that discretion is the better part of gastronomy when it comes to fresh fruits, as evidenced by the proximity of this roosters posterior to the fresh apricots.           

Moulay Idriss and Volubulis

Moulay Idriss 34°3′15″N 5°31′38″W

Moulay Idriss is sometimes called the holiest town in Morocco. The mosque and mausoleum of Moulay (loosely translated as Saint) Idriss I, a great grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, is here and though off limits to non musselman types like us provides a reference point in the town for us. Turn right at the mausoleum gate from the main square and up through the narrow cobbled passageway, tight at the first corner, left at the fountain, curve around and up the hill, until we find … oh look, a sign! The sign directs us down a narrower winding set of uneven stairs to Dar Zerhoune. 

An extensively repaired and restored 400 year old home on at least 4 levels, this place is beautiful. The lowest levels only get natural light through the central courtyard, open to the sky above, one window over the front where I sit now in the living room on the second floor and a couple of small peepholes in the 2 bedrooms on this floor.

Higher up is the kitchen and dining area with large widows and balcony facing the sunsets in the west and above that the entire top of the house is a terrace where we can sit when it is not too hot. When it is sunny you could fry eggs on the tiled floor.

The donkeys outside are braying to wake people up for breakfast, as the roosters have not had much luck. Other than that there is very little sound that penetrates to our room. In fact after 10 or 11 the first night I could hear NOTHING. This was helped by the fact that we were the only guests that night. Last night with two Aussies in the next room it was very nearly as quiet as after being in Fes for a few days I think they really needed the rest themselves.

Situated in the hills about 450 meters up more or less, this place may get very hot in the coming months, but for now is quite pleasant. Hot by day, at maybe 30 c or so, it is very comfortably cool at night. The design of the houses helps a lot in that regard too. The houses perch, wrap around, and morph themselves into each other and embrace the hills shape in their practically organic designs. Whitewashed, with splashes of colour here and there especially on the twisting streets where the entrances lie, I am sure there are no 2 alike in the entire town.

The town is on 2 hills and from certain angles has the overall shape somewhat reminiscent of the head and hump of a camel. Of course I had to be told that but saw the resemblance once it was pointed out.

The road from Meknes took us through rolling hills covered in wheat, olive groves and other crops. The town is on the edge of more rugged almost mountainous terrain and in fact there has been volcanic activity not far from here though not recently. The town was first built around the year 780 and does still continue to grow, and in remarkably similar style.

It’s a pretty quiet place overall of just a few thousand people, though has a bustling market day on Saturday which happened to be our second day here and the population obviously swells as buyers and sellers come in from the outlying villages and all the streets become lined with their wares. Next to someone selling dates is a blanket covered in remote controls, near a carpet salesman are tables with spices and beside the strawberries are leather sandals.

People streamed into town like sheep (we saw about 20 sheep get out of one van, and about 20 people get out of the next) as we walked out of town to take a hike to find an ancient Roman hammam or bath in the hills to the East. It took a while to find it though we did come across other ruins, some sort of bridge or perhaps aqueduct, and when we did eventually get to the site we found an older man taking his sweet time of bathing in the warm, slightly suphury smelling water. Not to scare him with my white skin or embarrass him potentially by Linda’s presence in the water (we had swim suit like things ready for a dip), we just dabbled our feet for a bit and headed back to town.

We did no shopping other than for our meals, most eaten in one of the semi permanent stalls near the main square. That is aside from our breakfasts at Dar Zerhoune and the supper that was prepared for us there. The guesthouse is managed competently by Fayssal, with help from his younger brother Eunice, and greatly by his mother. She prepared a 4 course Moroccan meal including a chicken tajine, a salad, and an delicious eggplant dish with bread and fruit for dessert, followed of course by Moroccan whiskey. It is not really whiskey of course, its mint tea, but we have hear it called that a couple of times already. It's made with green tea, fresh mint leaves, boiling water, and is usually sweetened with sugar.

We have found that the main draw for most people to this town though is the nearby ancient Roman city of Volubulis. Many people zip out on day tours from Meknes or even Fes to see the ruins and rush back. Good for us and too bad for them, as the town is a little gem. Our companions from Canada in the Grand Taxi did just that, but at least they walked to the ruins rather than taxi over, but we don't know what they did later.

We also walked to Volubulis which is about 4.5km away on the most direct route, but we did the much longer older road that wrapped around the hill that overlooks Moulay Idriss, which provided great views and was overall more pleasant. In fact we did not even set out on the initial climb up to the old road until almost 7pm, our intent being to be at the old city as the sun set.

As in the town, along the way we were waved at or greeted with Bonjour, ca va?, and quite frequently. In fact at one point after we had been gazing up the slope at a flock of sheep moving along though the scrub trees and grass, a voice came from on high, Bonjour Monsieur, bonne vacances! It was the shepherd, at least a 100 feet up the hill from us. He then willingly posed for a photo.

Not long after this encounter we met a friend of Jesus. No it was not a Jehovah's Witness, though I suppose he might have been, but he did not have an edition of Watchtower in his hand. Instead he had some stiff weeds he planned to make into a broom.

The Jesus part was actually in reference to the part he played in The Last Temptation of Christ, as an extra, a friend of Jesus. You may recall I mentioned that a lot of western films having been made in Morocco, and this was one of them, largely shot at Volubulis and the vicinity, and his village was one of them. He was a pleasant and dapper 70ish year old man who upped the cadence of his stroll while we slowed ours for a time so we could chat. Eventually however we had to bid him adieu and put it in gear again, as the sun was getting low.

Once at the Roman city we paid a 10 dirham entry fee each, and proceeded to wander about some of the huge expanse of columns and plinths and half walls and soon reached some of the more impressive sections of arches and the Basilica and then started to find the many mosaics. At first our only companions on the entire site were some nesting cranes, prominently located at the top of one of the columns. This changed a few minutes before the sun set around 8:30 as a local man approached us and identified himself as a night watchman on the site. He took a picture or 2 of us and proceeded to give us a private tour.

As the light was going fast, we essentially scampered over the multi acre city, mosaics to baths, wine cellars to vomitoriums, aqueducts to sewers, olive presses to granaries, stone sundials to stone penises.

There was really only one stone penis actually, about a foot and a half long relief sculpted in 3 dimensional glory on the surface of a low bench. He took great pleasure in showing us this by making sure he reached it first so he could sit on it to hide it, and then making us sit on either end of the bench facing each other, at which point he jumped off, exposing the…umm…solid, I mean rock hard…well, er…stone?...member between us.

   

It was soon too dark to see much more so we voluntarily gave him a good fee of 50 dirham, and he gave us a little camel he had woven from a few pieces of straw as we wandered the site. We thanked him for his excellent tour, and managed to get back to town quickly in the lone Grand Taxi sitting at the gate, the driver sitting there chatting with the other night custodian.      

 ...a bit more on this page soon, and after that Fes  

Taxis to Meknes and beyond

After taking the abbreviated tour of the Hassan II Mosque, we arranged with a Petit Taxi driver to take us back to the Hotel Galia, wait for a bit while we grabbed our bags, and then take us to the Casa Voyageurs train station to get going to Meknes. We joked a bit with him about the fare, as he thought that I thought the price agreed on was in Euros, not Dirham. I said, no I knew 70 Dirham was the price, and that 70 Euros should get us to Marrakesh about 300 km away. Somewhat prescient as it turned out.

Petit Taxis and Grand Taxis make up an important part of the transportation options here. A Petit Taxi is a subcompact car which operates, more or less, like the classic North American variety. They have meters, though the fare might be a set price agreed upon at the beginning of the trip. If the meter does not get turned on, and you don't know how to negotiate, be prepared to get fleeced. There seem to be a lot of meters qui ne marche pas. 

Grand Taxis are usually shared taxis, in older largish Mercedes 2200's, 240D, or similar models, with mileage that is in hundreds of thousands . They don't wander around looking for fares but wait at designated sites in the cities or towns, the number of sites determined by city size, but never are there more than a few stands. They have preset prices per seat, to the fixed locations in the near towns, but typically will wait until all 6 seats are full before departing. That's right, 6, which means driver plus 2 in front, and 4 in the back.

You can pay for empty seats if you don't want to wait the minutes or hours it might take to fill the car, no discount, just 6 times the rate for 1. If you can share with a few friends, it's a good way to go. Better 3 or 4 sweaty people you know than 6 sweaty people you don't know.

At the train station we bought our tickets at 90 MAD each (about $11), for the 4 hour trip to Meknes via Rabat and a whole bunch of other stops.

Oh right, about that Euro fare I mentioned. We had agreed to 70 Dirham, about $9, and when we got close to the station Linda asked me if I had change as she just had a 100 Dirham note in her pocket. I thought I did but she did not hear me say so, so handed him the 100 and he thanked her and took off. I would have waited for him to change it or would have dug around for the exact price but no biggie...

We had to wait at the station almost an hour before the next train and while hanging around for 15 minutes or so, we suddenly saw our taxi driver show up. He had the 100 note in his hand, and at first I did not understand, after all a 30 Dirham tip was just over three dollars for us. Than we realized he was holding, and handing back to us, a 100 EURO BANKNOTE! He had not noticed at first either, but was several minutes away when he saw Linda's error, and he came to give us back the more than hundred dollar "tip" we had accidentally given him! It was not like he could not have exchanged the large amount of cash, as Euros are used very commonly there, and he probably could have used it too. I called him an honest man and thanked him profusely. Linda and I promised ourselves to look more closely at our bills from now on.

After on the train for an hour or more, I tried to explain in French the expression "milk run" to one of our compartment companions, but I was on shaky ground when trying to get across the concept of door to door delivery of milk, something that I have not seen myself since I was a very young kid. The light bulb went on when I used the analogy comme le facteur (like the mailman). I guess they don't use Super Boxes here either.

There are 2 classes on the trains, and most travel 2nd class. The only difference is that the compartments have capacity for 6 in 1st or 8 in 2nd. That's the theory. In practice 2nd class might have 10 or more jammed in. We saw that in action as I opened a compartment door and asked if there was room for 2 more, and as the 4 occupants adjusted there stuff to make room for us, 6 or 7 traditionally dressed old men and ladies squeezed past me into the booth.

We eventually found space and never had more than 3 to 5 companions for the trip, some of whom were quite friendly (esp the milk run guy, some sort of business man going from El Jadida to Tangiers). There was also a father & daughter from the very southwestern most corner of Morocco, an area in the region of the Western Sahara that is disputed over by Morocco and Mauritania. They don't go to war over it but at least in words they do. This pair think of themselves as Moroccan certainly.

Eventually we arrived at the first train station of two in Meknes, and took the first hotel we found and probably the first hotel we could have found as it was about 1 & 1/2 blocks from the station. It was a very nice place, lovely art deco mostly with some M C Escher tiles thrown in and lots of local touches but we could have made a better choice. No problem with the room or staff at all, and the price was more than we would have liked but still ok at 342 MAD including breakfast, but no sleep was to be had for me again.

It was hard to blame it on jetlag now, but the noisy bar below our window I could single out as a likely suspect. That plus the fight that broke out, which was I think just a word battle, and the howling cat, and the street being swept, and the out of tune motorcycles, and the trains. Remember I said the location was convenient?

Oh yeah and the call to prayer that began at 4:30 AM. But it was mostly the coffee shop or bar below us...

So about those taxi fares again. Overhearing a couple of Canadians (how can you tell Canadians at a distance? MEC gear of course) at a nearby table at breakfast in the Hotel Majestic talking about Volubulis, near where we were going, I suggested we share a Grand Taxi 4 ways. The hotel guy had tried to book a taxi for us and make us pay 120 Dirham for the ride, but we knew the actual rate was 60 for the entire car or 10 per person. Sharing it with the bother/sister act from Vancouver/Toronto cost us 15 each, and got us there on our own schedule.

Actually though I should reel back to the night before when we strolled around the old medina and the souq (market) of Meknes at least for a few pics.

In the Souq you can buy just about anything, from garlic

to Tajines and other pottery

to any colour you want in olives (the yellow ones with bitter lemon are amazing)

 to hotdogs

or maybe some pretty scary beasties

 
and even the Slap Chop guy had to start somewhere

You can meet lovely ladies from Rabat (with no husband!)

or you can just hang around

and if none of that suits your fancy, there is always Door Number 5.

Actually I love the doors. You will see more of them.

Coming up soon, two quiet but expensive days in Moulay Idriss, and walking to Volubulis. 

The First Real Post From Morocco

 7am, wide awake in Casablanca. 

Well, perhaps not wide awake, but  I cannot sleep and am not going to try any more while Linda still catches a few ZZ’s. She says she can't sleep a lot of the time but it ain't so.  2 “days” out of Vancouver, but really only a long day yesterday with about 14 hours of air travel from Vancouver through Seattle, then Amsterdam and from there to Casablanca. Add stopovers of 1.5 hours at SeaTac, and 7 at Schipol Airport in Amsterdam, plus the getting through customs, train & taxi from the airport here; it starts to add up.

I don't sleep well in planes trains or automobiles and am a light sleeper at the best of times. So today will be spent  after 2 hours snoozing since home, or rather I will be spent. So it goes.

The flights from YVR to Amsterdam were smooth and on time. With the long stop in Amsterdam, and the quality of the transit system, we knew a quick trip into the city would be not a problem. The trains stop right under the airport and 15 Euros bought us both round trip tickets on the 30 minute train, actually 35 in and 25 out as the intercity one we took out made fewer stops. 

The first sight that greeted us outside was an amazing array of bike parking in the vicinity of the train station. Obviously the concept of Park & Ride here takes on a 2 wheeled connotation. There are ranks of bikes on the waterfront, on the sidewalks, on barges, ramps and balconies. Impossible to say how many there were, but thousands easily.

Of course I knew that part of the culture being so normal here, that bikes are used by everyone to go everywhere practically.  It was just pretty impressive to see so many.

You do not just see them parked though as they are moving everywhere around you, so you have to watch your elbows and your path too. The cyclists do obey the rules of the road though, so at least are predictable. The bike lanes are of course everywhere too.  I was a bit surprised to see that motorized scooters are allowed to share the bike lanes. Probably only the smaller than 50cc ones I expect, but to me (owning a Vespa myself) it appears unfair to the pedal bikes to have the gas powered things with them. Not so much for the fumes or anything, but just that scooters can travel faster and perhaps even more importantly, accelerate faster, than single speed Dutch bikes which represent the majority of the bikes I see on the paths.

We walked around the city for a while, stopped into a bike shop where I dropped a copy of Vancouver’s bike culture magazine Momentum on a table, having read it on the plane. They will probably laugh at our feeble attempts to catch up with them, and at our fixation with fabulously expensive fixies. Practically everything here is single speed and utilitarian.

Another aspect of the Netherlands we had to soak up was some food! And where better to start than with pancakes! I had a delicious bacon and apple variety while Linda enjoyed here waffles, washed down with coffee from the espresso machine of course.

While wandering around we saw several of the cities “other” type of coffee shop, but those will have to wait until we get back here at the end of June. We did not want to get so relaxed we would miss our next flight.

The Royal Air Maroc flight we took next was a moderate distance 3.5 hour hop across Europe plus a corner of the Mediterranean and the northern part of Morocco. We could see Spain below us example, and the hills of the northwest corner of Africa.   Again a smooth flight with a lot more leg room on a half empty 200 seat 737. The biggest headache here was the loud obnoxious Dutch guy who was ahead of us at check-in and beside us on the flight. Hopefully we won’t see him again as he spends his month in Morocco. It started off with him trying to check in a bike that would have cost him $150 Euros to travel with, which turned out to be too much for him, so he gave the bike away. Then when he discovered we were Canadian, he thanked us for liberating his country, and then proceeded to loudly curse the Germans and not just the WWII Germans, but the modern day ones too. 

As the city comes to life outside I suppose I should turn to current circumstances. We are at the Hotel Galia, in the center of Casa. This place we took a chance on based on them being favourably reported on in the Lonely Planet guide. It's very clean, basic, friendly and cheap. As we got here kind of late, about 8pm, they had no rooms with bathroom, but there is a shared one down the hall. It's typically funky in a way we are used to in our Asian travels. Uneven stairs, questionable decor, strange bathroom layout (you can't get in the shower without serious contortions as the doors to the stalls open inward and are as wide as the stall so you there is no way to get  behind the door to close it….stuff like that).

 Not our hotel, but not far

It is also on a street that bears some resemblance to a scene from a movie about trouble in the Middle East, where at least 2 large buildings are just shells that look like they have been bombed out. I know they have not been bombed … I think. Actually there are a lot of older colonial buildings in need of serious repair and they would probably be beautiful if done right.

The location is right in the old city centre and a block from the central market. Rate of 220 Dirham (MAD) and a great breakfast for an extra 25 each, so about $30 spent here by us. Well worth it, I would say.

Next morning we planned to do at least one touristy thing and then get out of town so did not stay up or out late. In fact I don't know that it felt all that comfortable out at night anyway as the district is a bit sketchy though not downright menacing. The cities here do bring out a different breed at night and in general it might be best laying low in a lot of neighbourhoods, though of course not everywhere.

We did need food though so went out for a fish dish a couple of blocks away. It was a plate stacked with several lightly battered whole fish about 8” long, squid rings and prawns. Served with large bread rolls and tomato and chili sauces, it was simple and quite good. The biggest problem here was the aggressively scavenging cats but the street urchin types stayed away probably fearing the wraith of the restaurant employees.

The one touristy thing was more than one in fact. We walked from the hotel though the city, eventually reaching the old medina of narrow lanes and stalls of food sellers interspersed with everything-else-sellers. Turning down offers of guides was made a lot easier after we caught sight of the 200 plus meter high mosque, the main attraction on the water front in Casa. The Hassam II mosque is a monster mosque.  

We latched onto the tail end of an English speaking tour that had already been inside the mosque (you see one mosque, you've seem 'em all said Linda), so only caught a bit of it, specifically the hamman or baths downstairs . We avoided paying for the tour that way, but also wanted to get out of Casa soon so took a taxi back to the the hotel and from there to the trains as we di not want to be too late in Meknes, our next destination, partly because we had nothing booked ahead.  

  

Anyway this huge place, the third largest mosque in the world, was a recent construction over 8 (or was it 12?) years at a cost of a cool half billion. Not Dirham, Dollars! The King obviously wanted to impress, of course not without detractors who would have preferred more money on social programs and useful infrastructure for this developing but still poor country. Apparently the unemployment rate is something like 40%. At some point it might be better to talk about the employment rate. 

 Here's another shot to illustrate a bit of scale, and another to give some sense of the colour and detail.

Coming soon: expensive Petit Taxi in Casablanca and cheap Grand Taxi in Meknes, plus The View From Moulay Idriss.