Tizi n' test pass and a great hotel stay

I got up early (well, 7.30!) and went downstairs to enquire about the likelihood of any hot water, and was firmly … told, not a chance. So I returned upstairs to my room and sort of dangled over the shower head washing my hair and various important parts of my anatomy with cold water. I am not a fan of cold showers.

In the end I just sort of sloshed the water all over me … very painful in a sort of OMG … cold water way but of course bracing. It was not however an experience I am interested in repeating any time soon!

I went downstairs and over the road for a nice breakfast of croissant and coffee and hit the road pretty much soon thereafter.

The first part was all roadworks again and so my poor, long suffering Clio and I bounced through river beds which was where we were diverted as they build small bridges over the top! It was a tedious ¾ hour but soon I saw the fork which pointed one way to Ourzazate (where luckily all the lorries went) and the other to Tizi n’test and Marrakech.

The road wound up through the rather scrubby plain but soon we were climbing up through what was absolutely wonderful, long vistas and views, even if there was a little mist here and there, one could see for miles.  The clio fairly rattled along as I hurled it through hairpin bend after hairpin bends, and threw it into the rubble on the right side of the road as I was occasionally forced out of the way by either lorries or taxis who really were not goig to stop or move out of the way for anyone!

I stopped at a little sort of shack where they were offering cooked meals. I sat down at a table with a stunning view over the countryside and ordered another Spanish Omelette (which they called a Moroccan omelette for some reason ….) 

I have to say that what came was the best omelette of any sort I have had anywhere! I mean that. It was delicious with fresh tomatoes and onions. I sat eating this and drinking mint tea, looking out over the mountain and felt really this was a pretty good place to be.

A family came with their donkey which was duly loaded up with cement bags – I think the café sort of doubled as a staging post for the local villages - and the 6 year old boy was duly sent off with one of his donkeys loaded up and Dad followed on a few minutes later. Independence is obviously taught at an early age!

The rest of the journey went off smoothly. At the top of the pass there was another restaurant that had a side line selling Tagines, which they stocked in a old, wheelless van which had been perched on the edge of the roadside, in part overhanging the drop below. Who would buy a Tagine at 6000 seems also beyonf me, but hey!

The other side of the mountains was a little greener and there was a river down along which were perched lots of small little Berber enclaves and villages. At one point the river was dammed off and so a rather sophisticated looking tourist activity had sprung up all of which looked rather nice.

I was getting into the Oungadia (?) Valley now which is in itself a tourist destination, especially in the spring when the fieds arounds are a riot of wild flowers, and with lots of small B and B’s and one or too larger hotels springing up.

Feeling in need of a pitstop, I came across a place with about 5 huge red flags outside … in need of a pit stop, I drove in. To start with I thought it was Richard Branson’s place (he has some sort of ritzy place round here for the well heeled who are prepared to pay £400 a night) but as I walked into the main reception area and look out at the gardens beyond I realised I was somewhere really rather special, if a little down at heel.

I walked into the gardens and just couldn’t believe my eyes! It was like arriving in paradise … and in the middle there was a wonderful swimming pool with comfy sunbeds all around.

I had the idea of staying here but decided before even asking it was going to be far too expensive … but then there didn’t seem to be too many people around so you never know.

I collared the receptionist and asked him how much it would cost to stay. We started off at 1200 doodahs at which point I sort of feigned huge disappointment … and so we continued in the usual Moroccan way!

In the end we ended up at 800 (about £57) …. At which point the very nice man indeed told me that he had forgotten to mention the fact that dinner was included for the price and that I would be upgraded to a suite if I liked. It was hard ro refuse as I really didn’t feel like complaining! I went to fetch my bags and was shown, basically to my own little cottage in the grounds.

After a hot bath (yay!!) there was a knock on the door and a man walked in saying he was going to light my fire.  For a minute I thought we were back in Taroudant and was about to tell him I was a good sort of girl … but then he came in with his assistant who staggered in under a huge pile of logs.

The fire was duly lit and the glass of wine which came with the wood was deposited on the table. It was filthy, but the first drink I had had all week.

Later on came dinner which I consumed infront of the fire, all on my own it has to be said which was a little sad, but I was able to catch up with editing some of the photos I had taken and to also catch up a little with this blog.

Essouira to Taroudant

On the way back from Egypt a few weeks ago I saw an article in the Easyjet magazine singing the praised of a place called Taroudant which is in the southern part of Morocco near the Atlas mountains, and so I started to do a little research on the place. Most of the sites I went to also sang it’s praises as a sort of “Mini Marrakech” and as the place where all the smart people go when they aren’t shopping in Waitrose …. Indeed judging by what I read, I was expecting there to be a branch of Waitrose in the central square.

I did notice 1 lone comment on Tripadvisor from a man who broadly said he couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about and that the town itself had very little, if indeed anything, to offer.

I always tend to take notice these sort of lone comments, especially if they are expressed in a reasonably literate manner, and I have to say it did register with me, but I chose to ignore it and left at 10 in the morning to drive to Taroudant.

En route …. YAY!!! I finally found the cheese factory and was graciously met by the charming lady who ran the place, who immediately thrust a plateful of cheese into my hand. I have to say it was delicious, especially the goats cheese, but the place was absolutely deserted as it is not the tourist season and so there wasn’t really much going on.  I am also not quite sure I got the right place as the tripadvisor articale said there was a sort of restaurant attached which this place certainly didn’t have. However the name was the same so maybe this was just the country outpost of the main event somewhere else!

The nice lady told me the story of starting the place up with some of the local women and that it has become quite successful over the years. They sell their cheeses to the local markets, some of the local restaurants and take some occasionally to places as far away as Marrakech where they have a following too.

I moved on after about 10 minutes, and was slightly amused by the lady chasing after me and telling me, rather breathlessly, that her brother had a piece of land to sell in Essouira and did I want to buy it! I am afraid I declined.

A slight disaster struck soon after as driving quite peacefully down the road I was flagged down by a couple of police officers who told I had been caught speeding and that I would be fined Dirham 500!!

I was a little surprised by this as I was just tooling along looking at the countryside, but they were adamant that I was doing 82 in a 60Kph limit, and was hauled out of the car , told to produce my passport and driving licence and broadly sent to stand in the corner whilst they dealt with someone else who they had stopped for overloading his lorry! This could take time!

My turn soon came however and I produced 400 Dirhams which is all that I had on me and we set about the dance of …. how to retrieve most of it!!

My experience of living in the middle east many years ago had got me well trained in the art of bribing police officers and one thing I learned, and remembered luckily, is that it is bad form to bribe police office by actually doing it verbally if it can be avoided. Sort of makes the whole process once removed and no one need feel guilty or embarrassed etc!

So as the man started filling out the form I shook my head and indicated that I didn’t really need a receipt for his troubles, and slowly ‘took back’ 300 of the 400  Dirhams I had placed in the policemans hand.

He didn’t seem to object, smiled at me and indicated me to wait til the other terrible crook and criminal had driven off, before handing me back my driving licence and passport, thanking me profusely and saying what a good chap I was!

I simply walked back to the car (with a warning there was another radar group abiout 30 kms down the road) and drove off. Bad moment averted!

The drive through the mountains towards Agadir was wonderful and the motorway almost deserted and very well maintained. I enjoyed the drive, stopped for a coffee en route at a very well maintained service station high in the hills,  and in the end it took about 1 ½ hours to the Taroudant turn off.

The road degraded somewhat and once again I bounced my way along, taking in the sight of the Atlas Mountains on one side. I was also delighted to see a group of goats by an Argan tree, two of whom had climbed right up into it, as they are wont to do. I took a photo of them and carried on, rather amused to have seen what I had frankly never quite believed!

I arrive in Taroudant at about 3pm and my first impressions were not good. I asked for directions to the main square and was told I was in it! It seems rather small, rather messy and not terribly picturesque. I was immediately reminded of what the lone voice of dissent had said on Tripadvisor!

I was then pounced on and chased from pillar to post by a tout who was intent on showing me around the town, when all I really wanted to do was to sit down and have an orange juice to relax from the journey.

He gave up, but was soon replaced by another man who seemed a litte more pleasant and subtle in his approach and so I asked him for suggestions on where to stay. He took me on a wild goose chase around the rather small central area of town suggesting this Riad and that, most of which seemed rather out of the way and wildly over priced.

I took matters into my own hands in the end and walked into the Taroudant Hotel right back in the middle of the main square. It looked rather wonderful in a sort of 1950’s way, with a central row of palm trees in a courtyard (A real Palm Court) but the rooms were very basic. I was shown to a room tucked away somewhere at the back of the hotel and immediately asked whether they didn’t have anything overlooking the main square which by now was pretty full and buzzing.

Yes, but it was noisy, they replied and there was no hot water (turned out there was no hot water anywhere in the hotel) but I took it nevertheless as it was the size of a tennis court and had a wonderful evocative feel to it, painted in pink with white tiles and having 3 sets of windown, all looking out onto the main area outside. .

I felt I could be planning a trip up the Limpopo or through the Sahara (more likely as the Limpopo is not even on the same continent is it?) which is just down the road near Ouarzazate, a town I had wanted to visit but which has been badly affected by flooding (which seems strange given where it is!)

Next I was given a tour of the Souk. Well, honestly, people write about it as a sort of “Mini Marrakech” which it certainly isn’t. Marrakech’s souk is alive with activity and people who, as in Luxor, pester the life out of you, which I happen to enjoy … it puts one in touch with the real people, and rarely do you find anyone who really gives you a hard time …. This place wasn’t. No one seemed terribly interested when I looked at a pair of slippers … and so I put them down and carried on!  I was also told it was ‘much cheaper’ than Marrakech but when I saw a similar hat to the ones I had bought in Essouira for Dirhams10 I asked how much it was here and was promptly told 60!

Anyway I wandered round the souk at express speed and returned to the square for another Orange juice and a think. This place really wasn’t doing it for me!

I had heard of a road which went over the Atlas Mountains back to Marrakech which was meant to be rather beautiful and very windy. It climbed up to 2200 meters and has wonderful views over the surrounding mountains. I asked a few people about it, and they all told me that whilst it might have some snow on the far side, it was definitely open now and that it was well worth doing. I was intrigued … and really wante to get out of Taroudant as soon as possible!

I decided I would leave Taroudant the next morning and that I would return to Marrakech via the tizi n’Test pass, just for the experience. I read up about it on the web a little and was decidedly looking forward to it.

I had a last look around Taroudant which only served to confirm my impression that it really was something of a dump. It seems there is a very active gay community here  consisting of expatriate artists and decorators who seems to go around decorating each others Riads incessantly, what with I don’t know. Anyway, as I wasn’t likely to be included in anything remotely interesting on that front I returned to my hotel room, put as many blankets as I could find on the bed, as it was absolutely freezing, and slept like a log!

In and around Essouira

Breakfast was heavenly on the terrace as it was a crystal clear day and the sky was a powder blue. It was quite lovely! I was the only person up there enjoying the sunshine as all the others in the place were still asleep … including the lady with the complexes!

I had a fight with the seagulls again who came and tried (and largely succeeded) in stealing the baguette off the tray that breakfast came perched on but got enough down me to enjoy, together with some good strong coffee and a chat with a couple of rather monosyllabic Italians on the next roof!

I spent about an hour trying to find the carpark where I had left the car and then headed off with the intention of finding a cheese making factory I had heard about, run by a ladies co-operative (I should have asked my young friend to come …. She would have been delighted!) but which unfortunately is literally located in the middle of nowhere!

I followed the instructions to the letter, but as not only couldn’t find the place, but could actually even identify the road on the map with a road in real life drove down various side streets most of which led nowhere ….. apart from one!

At the end of this particular street was a small village set on a hillside. The first thing I noticed were innumerable donkeys parked, munching contentedly on their nosebag of whatever donkeys eat. Hay or something probably!

Up on the hill was an Berber market which, whilst unfortunately coming to an end was still interesting to walk around for a while. Everything seemsed to be on offer, from fruit and vegetables scattered on plastic sheets on the ground, to buckets, mops and brooms in vast profusion. One of the most striking things was a throng of men who were all huddled together in a small tent. On asking what they were doing a man gave me a knowing looked and said “Casino” … no more questions asked!

I only discovered once I got back that this is infact a very famous market where lots of tourists come in the high season as it is so picturesque. I have to say I agree though whether I would be tempted to buy anything there I doubt!

I had though had enough of the relative dirt of the place and so once again set off to search of the elusive cheese factory. I bumped off down a dirt track which led out of the town into the countryside along which most of the local Berbers were travelling on their donkeys … the seemed amused by a European driving a car along such a rough track but waved cheerily as I motored past.  But after a while I gave up completely on this fruitless search and decided to head off elsewere, trying to find the coast road which I had been told was rather picturesque.

The countryside around Essouira is lovely. Green and very pastoral. Lots of agriculture seems to happen, with lots of olive frives and Argon oil trees (I still haven’t discovered what argon oil actually is!)  here and on the whole it is all very well kept.

Whilst cars abound, I was however surprised by the number of donkeys being used as a main means of transport with father or mother riding up and the rest of the family walking quite happily beside, chatting away. Seems all very sociable and it was a lovely sight and made me realise, as I do every time I come to a place like this that what we have in Europe is wonderful but, at least to my increasingly isolationist point of view, rather too much. I wish, and the wish is genuine the older I get, I could get out of where I am now in England and move somewhere just a little more gentle. Italy always seems a happy medium. Maybe it is the acceptance that I can no longer keep up with the demands, both passive and active made on your time and energy living in such close proximity with the over achieveing and aspirational society England has become.

In the end I found the coast  road but given the recent floods here it was almost impassible with, adding to the utter desolation of the road, roadworks for miles on end. It became something of a chore concentrating so hard trying to coax my little car through all the mud and holes caused by the works!

My poor Renault Clio coped admirably with the thing which I think even a 4 x 4 would have trouble getting through! I have owned a number of Clio’s over the year and think they are wonderful cars, with particularly throw-aboutable chassis. The poor thing bucked and weaved its way along through the mud and dust for mile after mile, stopping here and there as dumper trucks, diggers and tractors crawled all over the road. The poor car disappeared under a total covering of mud and dust!

I had hit the coast road in not in quite the place I had intended (rather closer to Essouira than I thought) and whilst it wasn’t California’s Highway 1,  It was pretty nice and so I headed back to town after a long day for a Iced Lemon tea on the balcony.

Dinner this evening was at another restaurant in the same general area of last nights, and whilst it was another tagine (this time lamb) it was excellent. Tender lamb and well spiced. I asked for a simple tomato salad to go with it.

Over the alley from the restaurant was a stall selling a wild array of wooly hats, each one, unbelievably, priced at the princely sum of 90p!

As the restaurant was equipped with wifi (lots are here, to their credit) I posted a photo of said hats on my beloved Facebook and invited various people to chose one as a Christmas present. I gave a 40 minute deadline and in that time got ‘orders’ for 8!  The seller thought all his Christmases had come at once! I am sure they will last all of 5 minutes!

Tuesday - around Essouira

Around Essouira

Slept like a log and woke up at 8 which for me is quite amazing as I am normally awake at 4 and stay that way til I get up. The night was without doubt cold but the sun had been up before me and so that place was warming up! There was a shower in the bathroom whose hot water tap made the difference broadly between freezing cold and scalding hot and so there were a fair few choice swear words emanating from my direction whilst I got clean!

Breakfast was on the high balcony and consisted of baguette, apricot jam and fresh orange juice. The French and those who consort with the French, such as the Moroccans, haven’t the remotest clue how to make coffee and so what arrived was a bizarre concoction of diluted Nescafe and some warm milk. I am afraid I took over the kettle and coffee on the rooftop kitchen and produced something near drinkable, much to the amusement of the breakfast wallah and returned to my table….. just in time to watch a seagull flying off with part of my baguette!!

He seemed to me about to make a return visit and so scrambled for my camera and amazingly just managed to shoot him in the act as it were. When I looked at the photo it was a one in a million shot as I had managed to photo the little blighter with my baguette in his mouth and with a look of utter triumph on his ugly little face! 1:0 to the birds … but I shall exact my revenge!

I trotted out of the hotel into the sunshine and headed towards the fishing port I had been told was a must. The sight that greeted me was something I really had not expected. This was a ‘real’ fishing port .. not some sort of ersatz port for tourists.  And the whole of the fleet was in!

Overhead the entire place wheeled thousands of seagulls all out to feed on the same delicacy and thus making a noise that belied belief. One would dive for one piece he has spotted and was immediately dive bombed by a few hundred others after the same tasty morsel. It was an incredible and wonderful sight, and slightly reminded me of Hitchcock’s film The Birds (different bird though) -  the main dog, or seagull fights seemed to take place place over the land and in particular over the street lamps and so I was able to snap a few. Seagulls, like spray, always seem to photograph well!

On one side was a boat building yard … building huge wooden fishing boats. It was fascinating to see that sort of industry, long since abandoned in Europe, was still in existence and thriving here.

I was invited to take a look around and so walked up and down the 10 boats that were being build, mainly from mahogany …. With the hulls of wood and steel, each being fashioned and hammered by not a single machine that I could see … but all by hand. It was wonderful.

If I understood the man telling me about the place correctly, one of these boats costs in the region of £60,000.00 which when compared to the horrible plastic monstrosities you see on the Isle of Wight and beyond rather puts the world of boat building into some sort of perspective! The 10 lines up had already een sold, ad there were also a few smaller oats being built for the inshore fishing.

The harbour confirmed every mans imagination of what a fishing port is … there were men bent over their nets mending them by hand, there were groups of other men straining to pull some of the vast industrial nets out of the bowels of the ship onto a lorry so that no doubt they could be sent off for repair before the fleet leaves again in 2 days time for up to a fortnight at sea. I do intend to try and get up at 4am to go and witness the sight of these massive bots all leaving harbour at the same time!

There was a small section to one side where they were selling the days catch with an huge array of freshly caught fish you could imagine. Prawns of course, lots of familiar fish and an awfullot that wasn’t familiar, such as, I think catfish … all sorts of fish I recognise but would attempt to put a name to … and if you want you can buy a fish and take it over to another part of town where they will cook it for you for nothing. I do propose to try that one out if I have the time.

I also had a mooch around the fort which stands guard over the harbour. It was quite high and afforded great views over both the port and back to the old part of the town. Good value for a pounds and I spent a happy 10 minutes photographing various visitors with their own cameras!

I soon returned to the hotel as it was time to check out, but not before some fun haggling almost to the honourable death with a young man absolutely intent on selling me a pair of Ray Ban sunglasses.

It was a great few minutes of friendly banter :

I started off well ….

“What the hell do I want another pair of sunglasses for … I’ve got a pair ON!! Look at all those people over there who haven’t even got a pair …. Go and terrorise them!!  ….

which started off at €45 (“they are real, you know”) and made its way crazily down through €20 Euros (at which point they suddenly became

“OK, they’re fakes!!” .. “NO!! Really … I AM shocked!) until we reached the bottom line of €10

(“You ARE joking”) …and beyond to €5

(“that’s still way too much”!)

and then on down to €3! At which point my friend started to alook a little frazzled and admitted he had bought them for 3.50!

I walked away back to the hotel not having done the deal and en route settled at a café for a cappuccino and orange juice … and and lo and behold my sunglasses friend wandered by, greeted me like a long lost friend … and soon battle was rejoined!

My excellent Cappucino had weakened my resolve and he had swapped the REALLY cheap looking ones for a pair that had metal bits on the arms … and so I am afraid I buckled and agreed to buy the smart pair for €5!! I was secretely rather pleased with them!

But I hadn’t finished ….. oh no!! Not by a long way …. I whipped my own sunglasses off and started to haggle with my astonished sunglasses wallah, telling him I would sell him MINE for €100  … but if he was really nice I would let him have them “for a good price” ….. maybe €50!  I thin he thought I was being serious ….  It was all highly amusing ….

It was time to move to the Dar Skala Riad I had book and so I wandered off down the lanes in search of my new lodgings … which turned out to be accessed down a sort of tunnel and via a secret passage, and up through a trap door.

I was greeted by Jorge, a good looking, peasant man from the Argentine who has lived here for over 12 years, having moved here from living on the Cote D’Azur!  Hard life!

We had a long chat on the general topic of escaping the winter weather in Europe (he thoroughly agrees with the idea) before heading out again in search of the old Medina, or market, some distance away but where the locals go rather than the tourists. It was an older, more dilapidated part of town where the majority of stalls sold practical stuff rather than stuff you might otherwise see in Bond Street or an up market charity shop in Surrey.

I spent the rest of the afternoon walking around the Medina (the centre of the town) through the narrow streets. With all the shops and booths now fully open (they do stay open until about 11pm unless there are not many people about as was the case last night) and this evening it was a very different place to the evening of my arrival.

Thronged with locals it was a hive of activity …. With 2 distinct areas. One for the tourists (more upmarket and thus more expensive) with few food shops and the other for the locals, somewhat further away and much more allied to peoples everyday needs.

There were fruit stalls which looked most appetising with a wonderful array of vegetables and fruit all neatly laid out and then there were rather worrying looking butcher’s stands which always make me feel slightly queasy in the Arab worls and they all look decidedly unhealthy. But not many seem to die of food poisoning and so it can’t be that bad!

I returned home for a rest and a drink on the terrae at the top of the house which has a wonderful (even better as we are closer) view over the Atlantic Ocean too and there met a young lady from Marseilles who was travelling alone. We had a chat about women’s rights of all things, which seemed her sort of obsession, on and on she went saying how awful it was that women had no rights at all … blah, blah. I am afraid I rather lost the will to live after a while and started talking to the seagulls about far more interesting topics wuch as where to go for dinner!

The sun was providing a wonderful show as it descended below the horizon with the sky turning a wild shade of orange and pink. It was extraordinarily beautiful.  A man on an adjoining rooftop started singing with a guitar and so I was able to snap a couple of rather good shots of him too! The photo opportunities on this trip are quite amazing, with the blue doors and white walls of most of the houses very striking.

At about 8pm I headed off again into the market on the recommendation of Jorge, who told me a place called “Mayme” in the old Souk, was a great place to go. It turned out to be right at the other end of the market and I had to head down some pretty narrow and dark alleyways to get there but found it in the end.

There were precicely 5 tables in the place and it all looked rather cosy. I was allocated the table by the door and so had a rather good view out into the street for some great people watching whih when you are eating on your own is a good thing to be able to do!

I have to say the food left me disappointed. The soup was out of a tin, of that I am quite sure, or at least had so much flour in it as to render it almost inedible. The ubiquitous Tagine was ok, made with fish, but didn’t have a great deal of ‘stuff’ with it and was rather tasteless too. Still … the fresh orange juice was great! I don’t understand why they insist on making a tagine which is so bland … I suppose they are worried by the fact that Europeans are not used to hot food and so pedal back a bit on what they put in it!

On the way home I stopped off at a jazz bar, where a group of locals seemed intent on beating 6 bells out of a series of instruments, particularly a snare drum, and all in all making a hell of a racket.

There was a strange smell in the place and it didn’t take me long to realise that most of the visitors there were smoking something other than Marlboro. I realised I was inhaling the smoke in a sort of passive way, or whatever the expression is …. And so decided the best way to deal with it was to order another mint tea, relax and enjoy the whole experience, which in the end I did … alot!