Morocco – Stopover for a few Weeks

Q: "Hello. How are you? What country are you from? How long have you been in Morocco? What's the name of your hotel?".

Hear these baited questions and the very good chances are that you are talking to one (of the many) infamous Moroccan touts whose purpose in life is to transfer all that hard earned cash from your wallet, to their pocket. They do this by earning commission from bringing you to businesses that provide you with a service or goods, like a hotel. Of course by arriving to the business with one of these guys the price goes up by the amount they have to pay them. Not ideal at all. The simplest way to get rid of them is to be nice but...

A: "Good, thank you. Australia. 2 weeks (even if you have just arrived). None of your business".

At this point they may try to make you feel guilty ("Why do you say this? I was just being friendly") but more likely they will come to the conclusion that the person they are talking to understands the situation and leave you so very quickly, without a word, as if you had never existed, looking for their next meal to feed on. They are harmless if you know they are around but it gets to you after awhile and the problem is it can affect how you respond to genuinely friendly people. The balance is delicate. The good thing is they are rarely found outside of the main tourist destinations where you can trust the people you meet are as they say they are.

I started this blog rather negatively so let's get all the bad things out of the way quickly because Morocco is definitely a fantastic place to visit. Salesmen. The saying goes "there's no room for friends in business" (I don't agree with this but it fits into my story so I am going to run with it). You can either call the merchants in the souks one of two things, highly skilled manipulators that try to extract the best price for their goods so that both parties depart in agreeance ... or crooks. "Come in my shop, I give you the best price" (or the one that I liked the most "I will give you the most democratic price"), is usually over double the new best price when walking out, and, if you walk out without the goods the chances are you will hear ever lower best prices being shouted the further you walk away. Never underestimate experience and these guys have bucket loads, they are good! The shops where these guys trade are located in the souks that are usually found within the city's medina. A medina consists of a carless maze of alleyways spreading within kilometers of a walled city. These alleyways are usually flanked by high walls of surrounding buildings as they snake their way within the city. Getting lost is obligatory and also really fun as around each corner a new surprise can await. This is my 3rd visit to Morocco and I am undecided whether being lost within a medina is better now or before. With the advent of GPS any open space allows you to re-orientate as to where you are, in the past being lost would either mean a far longer walk until you fortunately come across some landmark you recognize or, paying some kid way too much to take you back to your hotel. The old way being far more of an adventure but not always finishing with the perfect ending.

The 2 most famous medinas in Morocco are the ones in Fes and Marrakech. Upon landing in Morocco I jumped straight on a train from Casablanca for the 4½ hour journey to Fes. Founded around 800AD, today Fes has the world's largest medina and subsequently the largest car free urbanized area in the world. I hadn't been here for over 25 years when I then could have sold my girlfriend for a princely sum of camels. No girlfriend this time but the intrigue, smells and sights all still existed. Within medinas areas are set aside for tanneries, clothes, fruit and vegetable stalls, metalworks, leather good manufacturing as well as many other skills refined over the centuries. Smells permeate the air whether that be the acrid smells at the tanneries, the fresh odor of herbs or the flesh from the meat market (camel for anyone?) Walking around another blind corner means the chance to stumble upon a small plaza with a cafe for drinking a well earned cup of mint tea, or possibly a quick sidestep to dodge an oncoming donkey laden with goods, perhaps an intricately decorated mosque built 100's of years ago. You can really have a great adventure and it is bucket loads of fun.

From Fes I took an overnight bus to Marrakech and it's world famous square, Djeema el-Fna. Within this large square you'll find snake charmers playing their flutes to upstanding cobras, musicians, storytellers, acrobats and absolutely so very many tourists that at times you'll wonder if you really are where you are supposed to be. At nights food restaurants spring up and spruikers strut their stuff attempting to woo you into their premises. A lot of fun can be had as you walk around deciding which place to choose, There's also stalls selling fresh fruit juice, snails, truckloads of nuts or people giving henna tattoos or conducting skill games. This place is a hive of activity from morning to very late at night. Behind the square, Marrakech's own souk spreads out. Verbal jousting with the salesmen is common. Fun for someone with an already heavy backpack that doesn't really intend on buying much. Unfortunately fruitless time wasting for the person attempting the sale. Admittedly I did end up buying a few small things, I still use a leather money belt that was made here in 2002 and got them to make a copy. Overall, fortunately, my backpack didn't put on too much weight.

From Marrakech I wanted to travel towards the Algerian border and the easiest and fastest option was to take a 3 day tour to the Sahara desert. I had previously taken this same tour but there were good things to see and do so I had no qualms about the repeat performance. From Ait Benhaddou (an ancient city with buildings made of clay that has been used in movies such as Gladiator), Dades Gorge which, when viewed from above, looks to be a river of olive green as a thick band of palm trees snake their way into the distance flanked on both sides by the contrasting brown hills or mountains, Tatra Gorge surrounded by it's steep cliffs with just the road and a small river squeezed into the valley below, and to finally, the Sahara desert, with it's vast expanse of sand. The most interesting thing that happened in the desert was my attempt to sleep under the stars which ended in a sand storm and a local berber tribesman falling on top of me as I attempted to sleep on the ground. The most painful was the camel ride, or rather the minutes after getting off those extra wide beasts. The most exhilarating was after the most taxing, that being the long climb up the huge sand dune (40 mins) followed by the quick run down (3 mins) taking huge steps that gave the feeling of walking on the moon. On the last day of the tour they dropped me off in a town to catch some buses north, away from the throngs of tourists I had gotten used to.

So during the rest of my trip in Morocco I only saw 2 other foreigners. An Italian man, Romano, who's motorbike had come to grief while mapping routes off-road for an upcoming international rally (interesting chap with great stories) and Elisa (I hope I got her name right) who acted as my interpreter in Figuig, my last true destination in Morocco, but her true job was running a business where she sold Moroccan jewelry in her homeland, France. Figuig is an oasis town right on the border of Algeria. There is a section on a higher plateau  where most of the commercial businesses reside and a lower part where most of the palm trees reside (and of course houses). I stayed in the lower level in a 300 year old traditional ksar (fortified house). Food was included in the price so one night Elisa and me had dinner at Amina's (my host's) sister's house. The food was altered for their guests adding chicken to the sheep's head platter. Far more agreeable although the meat from the sheep's head had unfortunately been removed from the head itself (photo opportunity lost). The food is placed on a large platter with everyone eating directly off this platter, saves on lots of dishes I guess. I haven't talked about food yet and want to mention the tajines so that I remember to cook some up when my travels end. Tajine Kefta (with tomatoes) Dave, don't forget it! Overall the food in Morocco was great as was Figuig and it's surrounds. An overnight train from Oujda finished the trip. Great place Morocco which I highly recommend (just watch out for the touts and those over inflated prices!)