Oh Morocco. What a beautiful country. When people ask me
what my favorite country I went to was, I usually answer with Morocco. I loved every
country I went to, but there’s something about the culture of Morocco that is
so authentic and I had the best experience there! In one of my first blog
posts, I talked about how they took Morocco off the itinerary for a bit but
later decided to put it back on after finding out about the Ebola situation in
Senegal & Ghana. I literally cried because I was so happy. I didn’t know
why, but I just knew I would love Morocco and have always wanted to go there.
And it did not disappoint.
RANDOM OBSERVATIONS
-Everyone trying to sell you stuff at markets were men,
compared to Vietnam where it was only women
-There are so many stray cats here, but not dogs
-Hookah, or shisha, is literally everywhere
-Mint tea is literally everywhere and is the Moroccan
specialty. Tea with hookah is a great combo, as I realized at my riad
-It’s hard to explain, but Morocco to me felt like a
combination of India and Vietnam
-French is very widely spoken and so is Spanish since it’s
so close to both countries
-I’m probably allergic to something in the air in Morocco. I
had the sniffles the majority of the time
L
DAY 1
In most countries, I chilled for the first day in the port
city and set out for another destination the following day. But we didn’t spare
any time in Morocco. We docked in Casablanca and Yesenia, Jack, Lorely and I
immediately set out with our backpacking backpacks and caught the shuttle that
took us to the port terminal gate. We got off and found a building with a
Starbucks, wifi and an ATM, and we figured out where the train station was
located where we could catch the train to Marrakech. We went back outside with
the intent to catch a taxi, but we got bombarded by multiple taxi drivers who
were trying to get us to go with them. It was extremely overwhelming and a few
of them started pushing each other and getting into a fight, so we quickly
walked away from them with the help of a security guard. We decided against
taxis after that and realized the train station was within walkable distance,
so we started walking.
Casablanca was not at all how I had imagined Morocco. It
just looked like a normal city, but there weren’t too many people out and
about. We made it to the train station after a solid walk and bought our
tickets. We had some time to pass until our train arrived, so we found a café across
the street and ordered the first cup of many mint tea’s we had during our time
in Morocco. And it was heavenly. After finishing, we waited a bit more then
caught our train. So many SAS’ers were on the same train as us! I think it was
about a 3 hour train ride to Marrakech and when we arrived, I finally felt like
I was actually in Morocco; gorgeous brown buildings, beautiful elaborate tiles,
and tall palm trees. We found a taxi and got dropped off in front of an alley.
It was really busy and reminded me of India because of how many people were on
the road carrying a lot of their stuff. We got out of the taxi and started
walking to where we thought our riad (pretty much the Moroccan version of a hostel)
was. A guy suddenly asked us what we were looking for and we told him the name
of the riad. He led us there and it was only about a minute away, then he asked
us for money. After lots of arguing, we just went in the hostel because he was
being ridiculous. After that happened, I made sure not to let anyone “help” me
because I knew they’d ask for money.
So we made it into the riad and it turns out it was the
wrong one. It was the “sister riad” to the one we had booked to stay at. A nice
guy who worked for both riads said he would walk us over to the other one, and
so we walked for about 10 minutes through many alleys and markets with many
twists and turns. We finally made it to “Hostel Waka Waka” which was a part of “Marrakech
Rouge Hostels” (we still called it a riad) and got welcomed by two awesome guys
who sat us down in the common area and served us mint tea, brought out shisha,
and blasted “I’m in Love with the Coco” over and over again. One of the guys
spoke English well, but the other one spoke more Spanish than he did English.
So we somehow managed to communicate in Spanish, which was neither of our
native languages. I found that so funny and cool!
We put our stuff in our rooms and looked around the riad. It
was a small place but so vibrant with beautiful tiles along the walls and rugs
with crazy elaborate patterns. We were starving by then so we embraced the huge
Jemaa el-Fnaa market after meeting a nice Slovenian guy who was also staying in
our riad who tagged along with us. The narrow alleyways slowly became more and
more populated as we approached the big square where all the action and food
was. We found a place and went up some stairs to get to the rooftop. A very
popular dish in Morocco is “tagine” which is named after the earthenware pot in
which it is cooked. There are many different types of tagine offered and the
vast majority of them I found out are gluten free. So I tried a potato and
chicken tagine and it was delicious. I was really sad I couldn’t eat any
couscous since that was one of my favorite things to eat before I found out I
had Celiac, but at least I had tagine to fill me up! By the time we were done
eating, the majority of people had closed up and there wasn’t much going on in
the square. We managed to find our way back to our riad in the dark and went to
bed since we had an early start the next day.
DAY 2
The rest of our group had arrived sometime in the middle of
the night. Dylan put together a group and organized a camel trek for us! We got
picked up early in the morning and all of us fit into a huge van. I think there
were about 13 of us plus some other random guy who tagged along to be dropped
off at his village or something. The drive took HOURS with a few stops along
the way. I don’t remember the exact time but I’d say we left at about 9am and
didn’t actually get to the Sahara desert until sunset-ish. Boy was I not
prepared for the car ride. The majority of the ride involved going through the
Atlas Mountains along the craziest roads I’ve ever seen, comparable to the Road
to Hana in Hawaii. There were twists and turns everywhere and constant climbing
and descending for hours. It was crazy. Surprisingly I did not get car sick and
neither did any of the girls. But every single guy did. The random guy had us
pull over so he could puke and all the other guys were having problems and had
to move to the very front of the car to feel better. I don’t know how it only affected
the guys, but I am so glad I didn’t get sick!
Along the way to the Sahara, we stopped at an old city
called “Ksar Ait Ben Haddou” which has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since
1987. This is a fortified city, or ksar, and most people living in the area now
live in more modern homes around the area, although 4 families still live in
the city. Several films have been shot in this city including Prince of Persia,
Gladiator, The Mummy, Kingdom of Heaven, and last but definitely not least,
GAME OF THRONES! (For those who watch GOT, it is the city of Yunkai where
Daenerys goes to.) We got to wander around the city and take stunning pictures.
It was exactly how I imagined Morocco to look. After we crossed over a river
and back again (after a little boy helped me without asking and then begged for
money after), we went to a restaurant. I had my beloved tagine, this time with
eggs and meatballs which was my favorite!
We eventually crossed all the way through the mountains and
drove even more and finally made it to the last place we would stop at before
the desert. We got some snacks and water then drove for a little while longer.
We finally made it to the desert and saw camels already waiting for us. We
chose the 2 day 1 night excursion so we didn’t go as far into the desert as the
3 day 2 night one. I kind of wish I did that one because the desert that that one
goes to I heard is beautiful with golden brown sand and dunes everywhere like
you’d expect the desert to look like. We were at a part of the desert that didn’t
have such deep sand and had many shrubs everywhere. It was still amazing but it
wasn’t really how I’d imagined it would be.
We got our stuff out of the car and we each got escorted to
a camel. I never realized how terrifying camels are. They are the closest thing
to monsters that this world has. They were roaring and making crazy grunting
noises and some were being really stubborn too. I walked to my camel and hopped
onto him. It was terrifying when he stood up! To stand up, the camel leans
really far forward and you feel like you’re going to fall off it, then he
finally is up. I was holding on for dear life! We finally started walking and
it hurt SO BAD. I’d always heard about how much riding a camel hurts and really
didn’t think it would hurt THAT bad! My camel’s hump might have been a little
bigger than normal camels? We walked for about 20 minutes into the desert and I
was so happy when we stopped and I could get down. I already felt the soreness
coming on!
The camels had taken us to this nomad camp in the desert.
There were many big tents set up that each fit about 10 people comfortably. The
tents looked like they were straight out of Game of Thrones; it was so cool!
Our group had 2 different tents so we split up and claimed our tents and
mattress. Once we got settled, a guy came in and served us dinner. It was dark
by the time we finished dinner and the majority of us decided to climb up a
small hill and lay down and look up at the stars. I laid there for what felt
like hours and it is one of my most cherished memories. Staring up at the night
sky in the middle of the Sahara Desert was just so beautiful. I’ve never seen
the sky look like that and I felt like such a small person in this huge
universe we live in. After laying down for a while, I heard drums close by. I
got up and walked to the fire that people were sitting around, and there were a
few nomads hanging out. One was playing the drums and 2 got up and started to
dance. Their dancing was so entertaining! It involved lots of wiggling and butt
shaking so I was just cracking up. After their little performance, the drum got
passed around to everyone and we all got to play for a bit and make our own
beat. Of course I did it too and I was having so much fun that I didn’t even
want to pass it. After sitting in the circle for a bit, I went back up to look
at the stars once more to soak in that moment, then I went to bed since I was
absolutely exhausted from that long day.
DAY 3
I surprisingly got a really good night’s sleep. We got woken
up quite early and left soon after. I felt pretty sore from the camel from the
day before and I had to get back on it because we were riding them back to the
truck. It was awful. Honestly one of the most uncomfortable 20 minutes in my
entire life! After taking some camel pics, I eagerly got off and got in the
car.
We set off and got some snacks at the same little shop as
before. We then started heading back. I loved looking out the window on these
car rides. Morocco is such a beautiful country that’s filled with desert oases,
winding mountains, and beautiful buildings. The next stop was a place with pretty
rugs, knives, and just about everything, but I was done with buying stuff. We
drove for a while and then the driver asked us all if we wanted to stop at this
movie studio called CLA Studios that was a part of our tour. The majority of
people didn’t really care but me and this other girl wanted to stop. I was NOT
going to pass up an opportunity to see a film studio in another country! So we
got out and went on about an hour long tour with a funny tour guide. There was
a Dutch couple on the tour with us and they were so rude. When the tour guide
would spend a little longer than they liked talking to us they would look so
impatient and spoke up asking if we could hurry up. Why even go on the tour if
you wanted to race through it? We went through and saw things from many movie
sets like The Mummy, Gladiator, Game of Thrones (we saw Astaphor!), and other
movies I hadn’t really heard of. We also
walked through an “exploded marketplace” that was being used for a movie being
filmed there the next day. It was really cool and looked so legit. Towards the
end of the tour we saw a huge insect on the ground. It was like a gigantic
grasshopper, I think it was a locust or something, but damn are there weird
critters other places in the world.
We got back to the car after the tour and everyone was so
ready to head back to Marrakech. After driving for a while longer, we finally
made it back to the riad. Some of us were hungry so we went out to the main
market square again to eat. There’s a street food section in the main market,
so we decided to sit around and soak in the crazy environment. What do you
think I ate? More tagine! This time there was kiwi in it and it was delicious.
After a great meal, we got up and looked around. There was a guy holding a
monkey and we knew he’d try to get money from us in any way possible so we
stared at the monkey but didn’t go towards it. Well the guy saw us eying the
monkey and came over and placed it on Laura even though we were backing away
and told him not to. It was already on her so we just decided to take some pics
and he wouldn’t leave us until we paid him. I hate getting into those
situations…
After walking around for a bit, we decided we would look
around the market more the next day and actually buy stuff. We walked back to
our riad and everyone was out in the common room talking. We joined and smoked
some hookah and eventually ended up on the roof talking to cool people along
with one of the hostel workers. Now, we weren’t planning on staying the night
at that riad after our camel trek. I was going to take a train to Fez, but we
all were sick of traveling so much so we stayed. The riad was fully booked but
they had couches upstairs outside under a tent/fort we were allowed to sleep
under. It was so comfortable! I definitely did my fair share of sleeping under
the stars in Morocco!
DAY 4
Shopping day! There are such cool things in the Moroccan
market. I bought many t-shirts, candles that said “Marrakech” with the hamsa
peace sign on it, hamsa earrings, puzzle boxes that take a long pattern to open
it, and more. I loved the whole vibe of the market and we were there for hours
walking around and looking at just about everything. Later, we decided to go to
a traditional Moroccan bathhouse called a Hammam. Yesenia and Lorely decided to
get their nails painted and eyebrows threaded I think, and Laura and I decided
to get a body scrub and massage. Boy was that an interesting experience…the
women had us sit in I’d say about a 12x6 foot room where we each were on one
side of it on a bench-like surface we laid down on. They told us to take all of
our clothes off and gave us this underwear-like stuff to wear. Laura and I kind
of just looked at each other and shrugged then started undressing. The women
came back in and told us to lay down. Let’s just say, I had no idea I’d have to
be naked for this, especially with another person getting the same treatment in
the room! But I was relaxed. They started pouring buckets of HOT water on us
and the material we were laying on made the hot water burn even more. It was
pretty uncomfortable. It was legit a full-on shower like how it was in the
olden days. She even shampooed my hair and scrubbed my face and everything! After
this, we got towels to dry off and got escorted to the massage room.
The massage was so nice after that hot bath or whatever you
want to call that. After the massage, I felt pretty relaxed and my skin was
glowing! These body scrubs work! But I honestly don’t know if I would do it
again if I had the chance. We went back to the riad after this and grabbed our
stuff. We took a few pictures with the workers and of the beautiful riad
itself, then set out to catch the train back to Casablanca. After catching a
trolley back to the terminal and walking a bit in the dark, we finally made it
back to the ship. Oh how nice it feels to come back to the ship, my temporary
home, after a long adventure in a new country.
DAY 5
On our last day in Morocco, I went off to the Morocco Mall
with Yesenia. She had to get computer stuff, I was looking for a dress for the
Alumni Ball coming up, and we just looked around the huge mall. There was a
huge aquarium/tank from the ground to the ceiling filled with crazy fish. I’ve
never seen anything like it, especially in a mall. After a few hours, we headed
back to the ship to make it back for on-ship time. It was such a bittersweet
feeling knowing that it was the last port! The voyage was practically over,
besides finals. The next site of land (besides refueling in the Canary Islands)
would be Southampton, England where we would dock and never return to the ship.
I tried to push that thought aside and try to soak in the last moments I had on
the ship which was just 6 days.
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