Author: Kara Rountree

Happy Thanksgiving!  We are grateful for the ability to wander the world and for all of you who wish to come along. We promised you the good, bad, and ugly. There will be a little of everything in this Thanksgiving post today. 

We arrived late in the afternoon a few nights ago to spend 3 nights in Casablanca. We were thrilled to walk into our room which felt luxurious compared to some recent stays since leaving Marrakesh. The first item on our agenda after checking in was to find a FedEx to ship home some gifts we’d purchased.  The office wasn’t too far, so we chose to walk since we’d been sitting in a van for 3 days. Google Maps routed us through an ugly, dirty, and very smelly part of the city.  This didn’t help our first impression of Casablanca at all. So far, this wasn’t the romantic seaside city people had talked it up to be. In Rountree fashion though, we decided to hold judgement until the end of the stay. 

Casablanca is like any large city. It’s population is 3.84 million, similar to Los Angeles. Of course, like LA, there are safe and unsafe areas, filth, homeless, graffiti, and crime.

Hassan II Mosque

We took a familiarization tour the morning of our first full day. The tour provided us entrance to the Hassan II Mosque.  This is the only Mosque in Morocco which non-Muslims are permitted to enter. It was breathtaking. Everything was hand crafted from the carved plaster, marble inlaid mosaic floors, wood ceilings, and the chandeliers. There is no air conditioning, so the roof retracts in the hot summer months to promote air flow through the open arches above all the doorways. Construction took six years to complete with three crews working around the clock seven days a week year round to complete the mammoth project. The majority of the materials used in its construction came from Morocco.  

When Muslims enter the Mosque for prayer, men and women enter through separate doors and must first wash their hands, face, and feet three times in the ablution room, or in the fountain outside the Mosque. Men and women also pray in separate locations. The men on the main floor and the women in the balconies above. 

This is the largest mosque in Morocco and the third largest (height and capacity) in the world. A maximum of 105,000 worshipers can gather together for prayer: 25,000 inside the mosque hall and another 80,000 on the mosque’s outside ground.

Rick’s Café

Opened March 1, 2004, the café was designed to recreate the casino/bar made famous by the 1942 film Casablanca.  The location and film name was created after the producer and director of the movie dined in a riad which is now home to Rick’s Café. The interior did not match the movie set, but the meal and service was delightful. We’d rank this as the second best meal we’ve had on this journey so far. That honor is still held by La Trastienda in León, Spain.

Hotel Issues

We don’t want you to think everything is always so wonderful when we are traveling. Sometimes issues arise causing frustration. On this leg of the journey our hotel in Casablanca was the thorn in our side. The saga began right at the start on by our first full day as we were locked out of our room after breakfast. Our card wouldn’t work and multiple resets by the front desk didn’t resolve the problem. We got the manager involved who had maintenance break in to the room while we were out on our tour, but without necessities we’d planned to take with us (like TP and sunglasses). When we returned the key worked. No biggie, these things happen. 

But then on day two, when we returned from breakfast we were again locked out of our room in the same manner. Once can be dismissed, but twice? I was a bit annoyed since Rex and I planned to get some work done that morning and now we couldn’t. After escalating to the manager again, they had to break into the room once again and offered to move us to a “suite” which wasn’t as nice as the room we already had.  However, we appreciated the move and hoped it resolved our lock out problem. We are grateful for their attempts to work things out but overall customer service is not this hotel’s strong suit. 

Morocco vs Croatia World Cup Match

We watched the Morocco/Croatia opening round match with lots of locals and some fellow travelers in our hotel. The action was exciting, but the match ended in a 0-0 tie, much to the excitement of the local crowd. Apparently Morocco was the underdog and the tie was a good result for them. 

Finding gratitude

All in all, our experience in Casablanca was just okay. The hotel rooms themselves were nice, but hotel service was lacking for the rates they charge. Hopefully this will improve in the future. We likely will not return to Casablanca, and if we do, we wouldn’t stay at this hotel. However, Morocco as a whole (especially Marrakech) we will revisit for sure. 

We are grateful to have our health, family & friends, ability to travel the world, food in our bellies, a roof over our heads every night, and so much more. 

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Fes

We left Marrakech and decided on a multi-day road trip to visit a few more cities before leaving Morocco. We hired a private driver (Mustafa) to take us from Marrakech to Fes, then to Chefchaouen, and finally to Rabat, and Casablanca over 3 days. 

Our first stop was Fes. Our host in Marrakech arranged a private guide to show us around the old city (Medina) for the afternoon. We learned that Fes has the oldest and most complicated Medina in the world, the Fes El Bali. Without a guide we would easily have gotten lost for days and Google maps doesn’t work at all in the walled city. Hilly and narrow, the medina is vastly different from Marrakesh. It was like stepping back in time. There were no motorcycles whizzing by us, only donkeys and pedestrians which made roaming the medina much more peaceful.  Fes is also home to the oldest theological university ever established in Morocco, dating back to the 14th century and founded by a wealthy woman from Tunisia. 

We had an interesting tour of the largest leather tannery in Morocco. It was tucked away in the middle of the Medina where they process cow, camel, sheep and goat leathers. The smell was horrific.  We were offered free sprigs of mint on our way in the building to help offset it. Thank goodness, it was bad. Apparently the smell comes from ammonia in pigeon poop which is used in large quantities to soften and remove the fur from the leather. Who knew?!  The poop is expensive too, so they joke and call Chanel #6. It was interesting to see the steps involved in preparing the hides and to see the beautiful bags, jackets and other items that get created once it’s done. 

Chefchaouen

We left Fes and made the 4 hour drive to Chefchaouen (pronounced chef-sh-owe-en) which is known for its blue walls throughout the city.  It is also known as Morocco’s “blue pearl.”  The Medina is beautiful and was much easier for us to navigate. It is a photographers dream.  We were taking pictures around every corner. 

Apparently, camels aren’t just for riding. In Morocco they are also for eating!  We had a camel burger tonight for dinner.  Camel is not served in steak form. You’ll see it served mostly as burgers or meatballs in Kefta dishes. It was slightly drier than beef, but tasted mostly the same.   If you ever see it on a menu, give it a try!

We’re back on the road again tomorrow. We have two more cities to visit before we say farewell to Morocco. 

Today we were lucky enough to be invited on a personalized cooking class with a shopping trip to the souk where the locals buy their meat and produce included in the experience. We learned to prepare two separate meals which became our lunch one day and dinner the next.

Moroccan cooking looks complex, but it’s very simple once you get the hang of it. The warm spices make for some serious comfort food that will have us craving it again in no time once we leave this beautiful country. 

After working in the kitchen most of the day, it was time to go to the spa. I hadn’t yet indulged myself with a massage after the Camino, so I finally changed that by visiting my first hammam. 

Entering the hammam, the decor, layout and architecture were simply beautiful. There was a pool in the center with loungers on either side. The actual hammam was in the back. There was a large marble room with a marble block riser in the center. The room was hot, very hot, as was the stone floor and riser, but I acclimated to it quickly. The tellak (technician) rinsed me with hot water then rubbed Moroccan black soap all over my body. I was then told to relax for about 10 minutes to let the soap work it’s magic. I was rinsed again, then sanded down. You read that right, quite literally sanded down. I thought they used a medium grit sandpaper glove. I want to say I’m joking, but I’m not. The glove they used is called kessa mit and can be found online. After the initial shock, it actually felt quite nice and the results were amazing. So much dead skin was sloughed off of me!  Kinda gross, but also kinda cool. My skin has never felt softer. When the hammam was complete, I was escorted to a lounger where I was served Moroccan mint tea and had a pre-massage foot massage. Oh, slow down now, I could get used to this. This was followed shortly with an incredible 60 minute full body massage. The entire treatment took about 135 minutes and cost only $75. I walked out of there soft and relaxed. I want to go again!

Today is our last day in Marrakesh. We leave to explore more of Morocco tomorrow. It’s been a great experience, but it is time to see more of the country. Thank you Marrakesh, we will be back.

More to come. 

Today was another long day of driving, this time to Essaouira, a coastal city on the Atlantic Ocean in western Morocco. 

Along the way we stopped to learn about argan oil which apparently holds the cure to most of life’s maladies. It was quite expensive and very tourist-trappy, so we didn’t buy anything. 

A bit further along the way we stopped to take photos of goats in trees. We’re pretty sure they had help getting up there, but it was still a fun sight to see. Apparently this all started when goats would climb the trees to get at the argan nuts, which they love to eat. Then someone thought one goat in a tree is cool, but 10-15 would be even better. It was quite a sight. 

Eventually we made it to our destination and walked into a crowded fish market with fishermen selling the day’s catch right off the dock. We were persuaded to pick out our fish and let the locals clean and grill it up for us. It was a great experience. We had a wonderful lunch of red snapper, sardines, a small tomato and onion salad, bread and drinks all for less than $9.00 USD. How cool is that?

We recorded a segment on our fish market experience. Check it out…

Over the last few days we have seen many different sides of Morocco with even more yet to discover. Our beautiful Riad in the heart of the Medina has been a sanctuary from the busy streets. Our host is taking great care of us making sure we don’t get lost and  coordinating tours with guides to keep us busy which is why we haven’t had a chance to share in awhile. 

Thank goodness on day one we booked a familiarization walking  tour of Marrakesh’s old city. The tour navigated us through several bustling squares and into back alleys where artisans were busy at work.  It also helped us get our bearings. Sort of…

The Medina. Oh boy, where do we start… The narrow maze-like cobblestone streets, some no wider than a sidewalk, are lined on both sides with shops and restaurants with motorcycles, pedestrians, delivery vehicles, tuk tuks, bicycles, push carts, mules, vending carts, and more all navigating through at the same time. It operates at a high level of organized chaos with only an orchestra of honks to communicate intent as people dart past each other to get where they are going. 

We visited the Ourika Valley, a couple hours outside Marrakesh in the Atlas Mountains.  A Berber couple opened their home to us and shared tea. They are both artisans. He makes musical instruments and she makes hand woven carpets. We stopped for lunch at a beautiful place along the river where we sat on cushions at a low table right next to the rushing water. From there we headed into the desert to ride camels at sunset. It was a magical day. We were exhausted when we got back to our riad, but it was worth it.

After an early alarm and delicious breakfast, we were off again the next day. This time in search of the Ksar of Ait-Ben-Haddou deep in the Atlas Mountains. This is also called a kasbah, and now we know what The Clash was referring to in their famous song. It was a long drive, eight hours total and normally done over two days, but we have limited time and want to see as much of this country as we can. The site has been the set of many films and TV series like Game of Thrones, Indiana Jones 3, Gladiator, The Jewel of the Nile, and Lawrence of Arabia, just to name a few.

Morocco has been incredible so far and we have only seen the tip of the sand dune.

More to come!