Camel ride

The camels were waiting for us when we arrived in Merzouga, a village where all the camel rides into the desert start. It was my first time in the desert and while I might have previously ridden a camel in a zoo I was well prepared for what I was told about the real desert camels: they are supposed to be grumpy. So it was a pleasant surprise that my camel actually seemed nice, it only snorted at me once.


Since it was my first ever ride into the desert, I was fascinated by the rich red tones of the sand. It was near sundown so the shadows were long and the colors were even more intense. We rode the camels for about one hour, going behind a hill where all we could see all around us was the desert. Looking at a map I know that it was a very small desert, in fact, had we continued for another hour around the next hill, we would have come out of the desert on the other side. But it was still magical to see nothing but sand all around us.


In the evening we were entertained by the Berber camel keepers who sang and played drums. It was beginning to get cold so they lighted a fire. And we were able to watch the stars. And get sand in our shoes when we walked anywhere. We spent the night in tents covered with several layers of blankets that they provided. Fortunately I knew in advance that the nights were going to be cold so I brought my warmest sleeping bag which I covered with a blanket and pulled everything over my head so my ears wouldn’t freeze. I’m not exaggerating, it really was freezing, we ran across a frozen puddle in the morning.


After the unpleasantly cold night we mounted our camels again very early in the morning and rode out of the desert into the sunrise. While I could say that the evening ride was extraordinary, the morning ride was just so very cold that I could hardly wait to get back to civilization, take my hands off the metal handles with which I hung onto my camel and have some hot tea.

Ouarzazate

A visit to Morocco has to include a trip to the desert and a camel ride. So we booked a three day tour from Marrakech with a local travel agency. There was a big mix-up on the morning of our departure with the travel agency because there were many tourists and many minibuses and lots of commotion, moving people and their luggage from one minibus to another and general chaos. When everything was finally sorted we started our tour almost two hours late. A good thing we were on vacation, we weren’t in a hurry to get anywhere so we didn’t let it bother us.

Our trip towards the desert included sightseeing along the way. From Marrakech we first had to drive across a pass through the Atlas mountains, where we stopped to admire natural wonders such as a narrow river gorge and huge geologic rock formations. On the other side of the pass is Ouarzazate, the center of the Moroccan movie industry. Many high profile movies, such as Gladiator, Prince of Persia, Asterix and Obelix meet Cleopatra and many more were filmed there, either in local studios or in the Taourirt Kasbah, a restored village. The village has been used to portray locations such as various deserts, ancient Rome and even Tibet.


Our tour guide alias minibus driver was what someone called “isn’t he just the worst tour guide ever?”. So he didn’t speak English, but many of us members of the group knew enough high school French to make basic conversation. Add Marko, who speaks French fluently, therefore the language barrier shouldn’t have been a problem. But it turned out that he told us to take 45 minutes to explore the Taourirt Kasbah and then 45 minutes for lunch. And we did exactly that, explored the village and then had lunch in one of the many restaurants in the area. When we returned to the minibus on time, he was extremely upset, because apparently he wanted us to return to the minibus after the first 45 minutes of sightseeing so that he could take us all to lunch (to somewhere where he would have made a nice commission, no doubt). He was still pouting when he stopped in front of the Atlas Film Corporation Studios and informed us that due to our late morning start there was no time to visit the studios. I understood this as punishment for our disobedience at lunch because I really wanted to visit the studios, to see if they are anything like Universal Studios.


Our driver also made a shopping side trip disguised as a visit to a village where they make traditional Berber carpets. Marko and I didn’t buy anything, not only because we really don’t need a carpet but also because the Berber carpets are neither beautiful nor well made.


On the second day, our driver made sure we wouldn’t stray for lunch again and thus rob him of his commission. He drove us high into the mountains to the only restaurant in sight with admittedly a beautiful view of an oasis below. It turned out to be the most expensive restaurant on our entire Moroccan trip. We needed to eat as we weren’t sure when he would feed us next so we reluctantly ordered the fixed lunch menu. To be fair, it cost approximately as much as a fixed lunch menu would cost back home, but compared to prices elsewhere in Morocco, it was extreme.

Finally, after two days on the road, we approached the desert where the camels were waiting for us.

Marrakech

I was excited to finally get to Marrakech and its ancient medina. What I didn’t expect was that the place was packed with tourists and consequently there was the constant hassle of having to fend off all the touts who wanted to sell us stuff or just wanted us to pay for whatever. A few times it seemed to me as if I shouldn’t even have my eyes open when I walk around because if I as much as looked at anything someone would appear from nowhere and demand that I pay.


We experienced this the very first morning at the Djemaa el Fna, the central marketplace in the Marrakech medina. I was thrilled to watch old men play music to real cobras. I wanted to take a photo with them and while I fully expected to pay them for the privilege, I didn’t expect to have to pay such an exorbitant price. And on top of it all, when I posed for the photograph, they wanted me to hold a snake around my neck! Unbelievable, they should have paid me if they wanted to put a snake on me! They thought it amusing that here was a tourist who didn’t want to touch a snake.


Moving along the marketplace, all of a sudden someone put a monkey on my shoulders. I immediately asked him to take it away, wondering how much it would have cost me if I dared to take a photo. And I had to keep my hands hidden deeply in my pockets, just to keep them safe from all the women who wanted to grab me and paint tattoos on me. But then, that’s the Marrakech experience, exciting, unexpected and far from boring.


On the other hand, what I love about Morocco is the easy, relaxed pace when one can sit down in a café and drink mint tea and people watch for hours at a time. On such occasions it really is a world apart from the hectic stress back home.

Casablanca

In keeping with the tradition to spend winter holidays somewhere warm, Marko and I decided to head to Morocco. Choosing the destination was done by process of elimination. Since the vacation was quite short, we didn’t want to go too far so we wouldn’t have to spend half the time traveling and dealing with jet lag. It had to be somewhere warm which left northern Africa and the Middle East as possible destinations. We ruled out Middle East immediately, we crossed off Egypt because we had already been there, same for the Canary Islands. That left Morocco and Tunisia as possible destinations. Although we haven’t been to Tunisia yet we ruled that out because I think it may be too touristy. And although we had been to Morocco before, we only touched the northern part where we arrived by ferry from Spain. So the decision was made to go into the heart of Morocco and see the desert as well.


We arrived in Casablanca on December 31st so we spent New Year’s Eve there. When planning the trip I had a mental image that we would look for a place to spend the evening outside, perhaps near a beach. But it wasn’t all that warm after all, the temperatures dropped to below 10 degrees Celsius at night. We found a restaurant with dinner and a show for the evening, it was actually outdoors but they placed gas heaters at each table so it was quite enjoyable.


Casablanca is a modern city with lots of noise and traffic and not much to see or do except to visit the Hasan II Mosque. I was impressed with the beauty of the mosque and even more impressed that this was probably the first time ever that I visited a mosque where women weren’t required to cover their hair.

Our main destination of the trip was Marrakech and so we took a bus to get there. The bus station was new and modern with Wi-Fi coverage. They sold us bus tickets with assigned seats and they checked our backpacks as if we were at an airport. Our bus was modern and air conditioned and the road from Casablanca to Marrakech turned out to be a four lane highway all the way. Morocco has definitely modernized by light years from how I remember it when I last visited there over 27 years ago.