Berber Country

Today was a travel day, leaving Fes at 8.00am we travelled deep within Berber country and arrived on the edge of the Sahara Desert to the call of evening prayers at sunset.

It was a day of contrasts. We left the hustle and bustle of life in the medina, travelled through the cedar forests of the Mid Atlas Mountains, through a Swiss style village in the mountains and fed Barbary Apes on the roadside. We emerged from the mountains into an arid zone with minimal vegetation except for occasional apple orchards and then down into the date palm filled Rift Valley, then entering the desert. The mountains made us reach for jumpers for the first time of the trip and then we needed the air conditioning on full blast as we drove through a desert sandstorm.

This was the heart of Berber country and we saw many of the nomadic tribe shepherding through the mountains and arid zone and the occasional camp with traditional Berber tents. Ahkmed changed his language tuition to Berber with even less success than Arabic.

Tomorrow we explore the Sahara and will stay overnight in a Berber tent.  

In Fes

Adrian in fes in Fes

Today was spent exploring the Medinas of Fes. First it was a visit to the new medina to see the palace gates and the former Jewish Quarter. New is a relative term as the new medina was built in the thirteen century, long after the old medina which was founded in 859AD.

Much of the day was spent exploring the old medina on foot: wending our way through the maze of 10,000 streets, visiting one of the earliest universities, the famous tannery, mosques, vendors selling leather goods, ceramics, woven goods and other stuff. Being Friday, it was a quiet day with many of the markets and shops closed for the holy day. The streets here were quite narrow with one way signs on the narrowest of these to prevent donkeys (the main mode of transport for goods) becoming stuck.

This evening we ran the usual gauntlet of restaurants trying to attract tourists. We were taken in by the catch cry of one of these who whispered “good wine, best Berber wine”. It had been a dry trip for us as it is not easy to get a drink in Morocco. We were sat down in the open air restaurant facing one the busiest thoroughfares near the famous Blue Bab (gate). We selected our food and asked for wine. Much muttering went on in Arabic and French leaving us unsure whether the wine offer had just been a ruse. Finally we were delivered special bottles of Coke (containing red wine). We think some of the locals were a wake up to what was going on as we got the evil eye from some of the passers-by. Tomorrow it’s off to the Sahara. 

Wide Brown Land

Ahkmed and Rashid

We were joined on today’s journey by Rashid, the brother by his mother of Ahkmed. Rashid took on the driving and whilst he applied the same techniques the GPS failed to work as well and we observed the map being consulted on several occasions. Freed of his driving duties, Ahkmed attempted to tutor us in Arabic. We proved to be poor students frequently failing his pop quizzes.

Our journeys took us through cedar forests and then into more open country which resembled the wide brown Australian landscape including eucalypts on roadside verges. There were however a few exceptions: the architecture of buildings; the cattle were tethered on ropes; edible crops were hedged by cactus plantings; there were decidedly more people with shepherds tending sheep and goats and venders selling all manner of produce; the sight of horses and donkeys was common serving as beasts of burden; and an acrid haze permeated the atmosphere.

As we neared the imperial city of Meknes olive groves filled the landscape. We were taken on a guided tour of the 12^th century medina a city known for its mostly green and ochre hues. We observed traditional craftsmen making clothing, metalwork and wooden objects. We also visited a traditional Muslim school. After lunch it was on to explore the Roman ruins of Volubilis and then onwards to Fes where we will be staying for two nights. Tonight Adrian finally got his couscous.

Take me to the Kasbah

Today we left the hustle and bustle of Casablanca behind and headed to Rabat, the capital of Morocco. Ahkmed, our driver was able to get us there with ease and it was only when he needed to find our riad that he had to call on his special GPS skills.

Rabat has given us our first taste of what we were expecting to find in Morocco. Our riad is located in the old medina (city) and is only accessible by foot or motorbike along narrow pathways. It is a magnificent old building entranced by an ornate door and the entire building surrounds an internal courtyard with Moroccan ornamentation throughout. Our French speaking hostess welcomed us with traditional mint tea.

After tea it was off to the Oudayas Kasbah, a twelve century old fortressed city which contains a tangle of pathways with buildings mostly painted in white and various blue hues, an ancient palace (now someone’s house), a mosque, views over the harbour and Atlantic Ocean from its highest point, women making traditional carpets and gardens.  We also visited the Mausoleum of Mohammed V and Hassan II.

Following our excursion we capped today’s taste of Morocco with traditional fare at a local restaurant. This time however it was Adrian that was hard done by. In Joy’s zeal to ensure that she was provided with a gluten free meal, poor Adrian had to put up with the same six dish entrée without the cous cous that should have accompanied the tagine  main course.

Here’s Lookin at you … from Casablanca

We have managed to make it safely to Casablanca despite a couple of communication issues. Firstly the airline didn’t get the information that Joy needed gluten free meals. Whilst the flight attendants did their best to provide her with sustenance she had to look longingly at the range of fine fare that Adrian was provided with on the two flights.

The more disconcerting issue was that there was no driver waiting for us when we arrived. We tried phoning the tour company but both numbers went straight to message bank, or so we thought. After waiting for an hour or so we tried again, still no luck. Had we been scammed: we were thinking? 

The information counter was able to provide a phone number for our accommodation, and phew, we were booked in. We got the information desk to check the number for the tour company and found out we needed to put 0 on the front. The message we had been getting was “the number you are calling is not connected” or some such thing in Arabic. As it turned out the driver thought he had to pick us up at 7.30pm not 7.30am and he was still in Marrakech. So we got a taxi to the hotel and the driver arrived this afternoon and took us for a tour of the Hassan II mosque (the third largest mosque).

Our first impressions of Morocco are that the people are friendly and the driving is chaotic. But drivers are courteous unlike Canberra, traffic lights are observed unlike Cairo and drivers stop for people on pedestrian crossings unlike Rome. There is also no need for GPS or street directories. The system used by both our taxi and tour drivers is simply to ask the driver stopped along side you or a pedestrian how to get where you want to go. In the case of pedestrians if they don’t know they will conscript others to help. Despite a few U-Turns the system seems to work.

In addition to the mosque we also found some markets (with Rick’s Café!) and the nearby streets are starting to fill up with vendors selling all sorts of wares, so we are off to go exploring. At least we know the system to get back to our hotel, if we get lost.     

One More Sleep and We're Off

The trip is planned, the bags are packed, one more sleep and we are off to Morocco.

We leave Canberra around 11:30am, travel for about 30hours and are scheduled to arrive in Casablanca at 7:40am on Tuesday.