Flight to Marrakech and drive to essouira

At times it seems almost cheaper to go away than to stay at home and what with Easyjet offering a return flight to Marrakech for £50 and the judicious use of AirBnb hotel (get the member’s name from the site and then contact them direct .. it’s always cheaper and you get a good indication of the owners by interacting with them directly) to find a well reviewed Riad with a dining terrace overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, in an interesting looking town called Essouira on Morocco’s southern coast, a budget few days away in the sun can be just that. Flight and 4 nights away for (so far) have cost me £110!

I am not pleading poverty but I do quite enjoy balancing my budget when I travel, especially without Caroline. She, perfectly reasonably, likes the comforts of home when we go away … I am less fussed asking more the opportunity of immersing myself up to a point in the local culture and people than needing a hair dryer in the morning and well turned down bed before I turn in.

I have been to Morocco many times (the first time aged 12 with my parents to the ClubMed al Al Hoceimas in the north where amongst a wonderful array of activités organised by the GO’s at 6.30 we all congregated in a sort of Roman Amphitheatre and listened, lying flat on our backs to wonderful classical music pumped out at full volume for an hour or so every evening …. I suppose these days it would be to stand around glassy eyed with a head ache listening to a rendition of Smack My Bitch Up by the Murderous Bastards!) and have always had an interest for both the people and the culture (Not to mention the shopping and eating opportunities!) of the country.

A few years ago Caroline and I travelled to Marrakech for a few days staying in a wonderful Band B called Riad Madani which was within a few steps of the main Jamaa al Fna Square and owned by a former foreign Minister of France.

It had an enormous, tranquil garden and much to our amazement also a huge heated swimming pool where we took breakfast in the sun every morning. We did all the sights and sounds of both the Marrakech and the surrounding area, enjoying for instance a wonderful lunch by a rushing river in the Atlas mountains a couple of hours or so outside Marrakech.

So this time I have decided to just spend one night in Marrakech on arrival and then travel by coach to Essouira which I read is a wonderful old fishing town a couple of hours away and on the coast, and which in the 1960’s was the in place to go if you were Cat Stevens and Jimmy Hendrix! I am happy to become Peter come 50 years too lately as apparently it still has a ‘relaxed vibe’ … so let’s wait and see what gives …. Man!

I have no idea where I will be staying in Marrakech , but do remember seeing a BandB right in the midde of Jamaa al Fna Square and so intend to go there first and see it it’s still there as I felt at the time it would be rather fun to stay somewhere directly overlooking the madness that the square becomes every night after sundown, even if sleep seems somewhat unlikely! I can always sleep on the coach tomorrow!

MONDAY 8 DECEMBER

Arriva into Marrakech .. a change of plan (of course) and a eh … drive to Essouira

Passage through Gatwick, hugely aided and abetted by A. Valet Parking and B. hand luggage only, was a swift affair, though standing next to the car for 5 minutes whilst the Parking man went over it for scratches with a fine toothcomb was both freezing and annoying., and before long I was in the departure area where, on every occasion I travel I am incredulous at the motely mass of humanity parading up and down in a seemingly endless mass.

Travelling seems to bring out the absolute worst in people these days and stress levels this morning seemed impossibly high. I see a couple of rows break out between families in full view of the other passengers which I have to say I have not seen before!  

I board the plane and I am afraid to say I am forced to move as soon as we take off on account of the man sitting next to me who seems to have omitted to wash for about a week. How anyone can get out of bed in the morning in such a state is beyond me, but soon I am sitting in a row far away and can forget about him. I just feel sorry for the lady sitting with him!

We flop down into Marrakech after 3 hours where a few passengers feel the need to make unbelievably patronising remarks to our lady pilot.  She took them in good if world weary good grace!

I must say what impressed me about her was her similarity to so many former Air France Caravelle pilots of years ago, who, with a great show of gallic élan, were usually already hard on the throttle as we rounded the final corner from the taxiway onto the runway and so would scream down the runway and up into the air in a very dramatic fashion! I was always hugely excited by these sort of showy take-off. I am sure they are not allowed these days!

Passport control is over in a thrice and I head into the terminal where of course before I have taken 3 steps into the country my plans change completely and comprehensively as I see a raft of hire car companies facing me once through the exit.

Making sure I have my licence on me I head over, and after a fun 15 minutes haggling them to the boards on price, darting back and forth between the various booth til I can’t remember who last I haggled with …. I am now the proud driver of a silver Renault Clio, complete with Aircon, for the princely sum of €120 for 6 days! Amazing really.

This at least gives me a high degree of independence and as anyway I wasn’t entirely comfortable with the idea of traveling by coach, or worse still by battered old and somewhat uncomfortable I have been told - “Grande taxi” – where up to 6 people pay a driver to head roughly in the same direction … - this actually seems a reasonable solution all round and means if I get fed up with Essouira I can head off somewhere else!

It is quite some years since I last drove amongst the infidel and so I nudge out into the traffic with a fair degree of trepidation and caution, but it is not long before I am hooting my horn like a good ‘un and hurling pithy insults at the men on scooters as they scream across my bows in every direction all at once! It is actually rather fun.

I decide I need petrol and so I hurl myself with gay abandon across about 4 lanes of traffic/donkeys/carts/motorbikes and people and take on 200 Shekels worth, making sure I ask the attendant the way to Essouira (no, of crouse I haven’t got a map …what do you think I am? Organised!!?)

I finally head out of the scramble of Marrakech on a crowded but straight as a dye road and soon it is lunchtime.  I head into a service station which has chairs and tables set up outside. I walk in as if I own the place and ask a loafing waiter for a sandwich. The waiter looks at me as if I am quite the worst thing that has happened to him all day, shakes his head and carries on.

In my best French I ask what he might thus suggest, at which point he points to a counter along which is lined up about 20 tagines all with different fillings! They look and smell delicious and cost €2.00 each!

I opt for a “meat’ one (No idea … didn’t have the courage to ask, but I suspect goat!) and a Coca Cola … a safe staple of the entire world as far as drink is concerned. I sit in the beautifully warm sunshine (it is about 65 degrees with a deep blue sky and a light breeze … sorry England!) and enjoy my very boney Tagine, surrounded by wild cats and by men who all look like Jedis, wearing as they are their Moroccoan djellubahs ! I have definitely arrived in Morocco and am thrilled to be here … now with 5 days at my disposal to do whatever and go wherever I like.  Next stop Essouira give or take a cup or six of mint tea as we bounce along!

The road to Essouira is good if slightly monotonous. It passes through some desert like scenery before changing to a green agricultural landscape with Olive trees and Argon groves. What strikes me is the light which is quite beautiful, bathing the fields in a luminous and somewhat hazy sunshine. I pass through villages which are a mixture of trying to attract passing  tourists (vast “farms” of Tagines on both sides of the road for sale … why anyone would lug a Tagine home to England when pound shops sell them is beyond me … I suppose it has to do with being genuine) and locals. Clean it isn’t.

I arrive in Essouira at about 4.30 and from initial impressions am slightly disappointed as it seems little more than a modern urban sprawl, but more by luck than judgement I end up in a vast parking area where I am pounced on by a car minder who tells me I can’t drive into the Medina, or centre, and that if I care to grease his palm with 40Dh he will see to it that my car is not disassembled and sold for scrap overnight!

This seems enormously good value for money as he than grabs my bags and we start a wild chase through the tiny alleyways and lanes lined with a fabulous array of shops and stalls, until we reach where I have booked for one night (my Riad Dar Skala for tomorrow is booked up tonight and by all accounts I appear to be quite lucky to have got in there at all!). I am by now absolutely exhausted having had hardy any sleep but I am dragged up to the top of the Riad where I am to be shown the terrace with sea view.

One of my favourite expressions (or to be precise, acronym) of the 21^st century is the teenage expression OMG – adding as many !!!’s commensurate with what it is you are OMG’s at, and of course short for Oh My God!! … or in my case, as I am just a little older, Oh My Goodness!! But I don’t stand on ceremony!  It conveys a sort of enthusiasm for life which on the whole I still feel, adding in implied ‘giddiness’ and exaggeration to the equation so people know really how you feel!  In my day, the expression was ‘Crikey’ but OMG!!!! is so much more meaningful.

The view that greeted me was truly an OMG!!!!!! moment. A 180 degree view out to sea over the rooftops of the old town,  sweeping back in to take in an endless vista of whitewashed rooftops, minarets, assorted towers, seagulls and of course, looking downward, a few rubbish tips as well.. It was beautiful and as we are facing due West will be something even morespectacular when the sun begins to set.

After calming down from the view I was ready for a nap. It had already been a very long day.

2 hours later I woke up absolutely frozen. The sun had set, the wind had got up and it had got bloody cold. I begged a heater (no chance) and instead was given 3 extra blankets for the bed. A reasonable compromise.

I headed out into the Souk. Having just returned from the other end of Africa (Egypt) it was inevitable I would end up comparing the 2. I found the Souk here rather tame by comparison to Luxor and to my astonishment I realised there was one thing missing  …. The HASSLE!

I have never been put off in the least by the banter in the Luxor souk as it rarely if ever spills over into something threatening or unpleasant.  It is always good natured and is a game each party knows (or should know) how to play. Newcomers and those of a nervous disposition (mostly Brits I am sorry to say) find it intimidating but it gives you immediate interaction with the locals as sometimes even the owner of an adjoining stall will come over and join in.

Here no one really talked to me or even tried to sell me anything (not there was very much of interest to buy … this is nor Marrakech!) and I wandered through the market stalls pretty much unmolested. Pity really …. It also seems the souk closes around 8pm – which suggests to me it caters more for the tourists than the locals - as by 7 everyone seemed to be packing up and heading off home. Strange.

I did see a couple of unusually excellent Art Galleries (there is a long legacy of Essouira being an artists enclave going back to the 1960’s) where the standard of what was on sale was way above average. Moroccan and French artists selling their painting which unlike the ridiculous art scene in Cowes of which we were a brief part, was not all about timid paintings of boats and more boats, but bright and bold, dramatic paintings of local scenes from countryside to sea, with a few of Jimmy Hendrix, Cat Stevens (he was here too apparently) and eh .. Fidel Castro too! There was one artist in [articular, whose name I am afraid I cannot remember, whose colourful depictions of faces and people were really very impressive.

Soon it was dinner time. The choice for dinner is wide but everything seems frightfully expensive for what it is. After my excellent lunchtime Tagine I am not terribly hungry but I eventually settle for a cosy looking restaurant where I am afraid I am disappointed in the result. It is also full of tourists – mostly French middle management types who all look like rather dusty version of Laurence of Arabia, wrapped up dramatically in myriad cream coloured scarves, jewellery and heavy boots to make them look like they have just wandered it from the deepest Sahara ! Bless ‘em! As I write this I cant even remember what I had to eat, so it really cannot have been very good!

So ends the first long day. I must admit to finding this place a bit tame and slow moving for my liking, a bit of a pastiche of what a Moroccan town should be, but maybe I need to get to a warm bed and start again tomorrow morning … a visit to the famous fish market seems the way forward … that is after a good breakfast served on the roof terraces with views of the Atlantic breakers. Well, even the thought of it beats my usual plate of warming porridge in Cobham .. or at least I hope it does.