Ceuta

Our drive to Ceuta was quite eventful. We left the Riad around 10am and programmed our tom-tom for Ceuta. All went well, beautiful scenery, signs that there'd been lots of rain, little rain for us though, until we got near Tangier (up the top of Africa). The tomtom was set for fastest route, so said to turn off the motorway and go across to Ceuta instead of going to Tangier Med and across. The road had been washed out from heavy rain, (they were repairing it when we went through) and then the weather started closing in. We ended up driving along a narrow road, full of big holes on the side of a mountain, not being able to see more than 20 feet in front of us. To make it worse, the fuel light flashed up and said we only had 35kms worth of diesel. After a scarey half hour (thinking we may have to sleep in the car overnight and find diesel in the morning), we finally reached signs for Ceuta and crossed the border, straight to the service station.

Friday, we had a look around Ceuta, driving right the way around the coastline with beautiful views of the Straights of Gibraltar.

On the other side of Ceuta, we saw the Fortalezo de Hacho (a fort built by the Byzantines in the 1st century, still maintained and used for defense by the Spanish military), and views of the lighthouse.

We then ventured down into the middle of Ceuta for a walk, finding a small plaza and the Casa de los Dragones (house of 4 dragons), grabbed some lunch and joined the ferry queue for Algeciras.

After an hour ferry ride and a ninety minute drive we arrived at our apartment in Seville.

Marrakesh

After a great breakfast Monday morning (crumpets, omelettes, bread, jam (strawberry and apricot) and pastries) we were raring to go. We wandered down to Djemaa el-Fna, the square, where there was all sorts of activities happening; men dressed in red with castanets, snake charmers, horse and carts and lots of people selling things everywhere.

Of course next we had to go into the souks, where merchants try to sell you everything from shoes and scarves to leather goods, wood and metal crafts. An amazing site and although we spent an hour or two looking, we didn't buy anything.

I thought we should do the obligitory sight seeing  next, so armed with our map, we headed off past the Koutoubian Mosque.

We crossed the road, dodging the scooters, motorbikes, cars and carts (an adventure in itself). We were going to see the Saadian Tombs, but took a wrong turn ending up at a metalworking souk and the spice souk.

Thinking we'd save the Tombs for another day, we went into the Bahia Palace, where my travel companions sat in the garden whilst I wandered through, (then went back through again once Cam decided he would actually look) and then headed back to the Riad for a while (which turned into all day, as we didn't go out again but booked another day here so we had more time). Dinner was a beautiful chicken targine with salad.

Tuesday morning, we walked down to the square with two English couples who were staying at the riad, and then went to the artesian souk, where Matt had a practical lesson in rug making and we looked at the prices of items so we knew how much to offer in the souk (bartering is not my strong point).

Then it was off to the souk again for lunch and some bartering. Although I did well on a couple of items, I'm sure they all saw me coming, but we had a good time and ended up with a small bag, chess set and marble game.

Tuesday night we went out for tea at a Riad just around the corner. Cam and I had fantastic fillet steaks with pepper sauce and Matt had his regular spaghetti bolognaise.

Wednesday saw us back down at the souk, searching for leather bags. Matt got into the swing of things and bartered for some wooden items. The guy there made us both a figure for a necklace. It was fascinating to watch him use a small hand-operated lathe and a chisel to create the pieces. (I didn't the camera to take photos of it)

After a full day of bartering, we headed back to the Riad with lots of parcels and lighter pockets. We did venture down again to see the square come to life at night with heaps of food stalls, mobile restaurants, monkeys on leads, snake charmers, henna tattoos and lanterns. Very pretty but so busy. We stayed for about half an hour and then went back to the quiet of the Riad and had our final dinner in Marrakesh. (Lemon chicken targine with salad and fruit salad for dessert).

Friday morning we said goodbye to the staff of the Riad and left for an all day drive to Ceuta.

Ouarzazate to Marrakesh

Matthew was feeling much better on Sunday morning, so we started our journey towards Marrakesh with plans to stop at interesting sights along the way.

Our first sight however didn't require a stop, it was the vehicle that we followed out of Ouarzazate. Loaded at the top were bicycles, haybales, goats and sheep.

We saw a few of these  and one guy who decided his animals needed a feed, so he picked them up and lowered them down to his mate on the verge, who let them go.
Very amusing.

We soon reached the signpost, where we turned to visit the famous kasbar where some of the scenes from Gladiator (including the arena scenes), Jewel of the Nile and Lawrence of Arabia were filmed: Ait Benhaddou.

We had to stop along the way though, as there were camels (Matt wouldn't have a ride, but he did sit on one for me) and it was also a great place to view the kasbar.

We found a spot to park the car and a guy offered to be our guide (Cameron bartered him down to 100 dirhams, just as well because he had very little English but a bit of French), so we followed him through the buildings and into Ait Benhaddou.

We entered a cavern in the kasbar where a man showed us photos and props from Gladiator (he worked on the set) and then led us through the rooms (there was even a place up the top for his sheep).

We wandered all the way to the top admiring the view. (and allowing Matt frequent stops as his energy levels were still not high)

Then it was back to   through some small towns and onto the Tizi n'Tichka pass to Marrakesh, which is a 3 hour drive along a narrow, windy road, very close to the edge of the mountains with few guard rails. I was in the front so could see them all
(think I prefer the back).

But it was awesome scenery tho.

Eventually though we made it to Marrakesh and then it was up to me to navigate our way into the medina and then to our riad. We got through the gate and very slowly went through the street as there were people and stalls.  Suddenly a boy on a bike swerved around a person and fell onto the road, his bike skidded to a stop just in front of our car. Cameron hit the brakes and we watched as the boy got off up off the road (with a large graze on his head) and the man on the scooter next to us rattled something off to the boy and some other people in Arabic. He motioned us to go once the bike had been taken away so we moved forward and next thing, there was all this shouting and people chasing the car. We stopped the car again and once more the man on the scooter explained what happened and got us out of there. He led us out of the street, found us a carpark and directed us to the hotel. (200 dirhams). Never was so glad to see a hotel.

Fez to Ouarzazate

We left Fez Thursday morning with a gift of a box of biscuits [very yummy] from our riad, and headed for Khenifra with  Cameron told us stories of when he went through here in 1980 seeing monkeys in trees and the cork harvesting.

Coming out of Fez, we passed the usual traffic, motorbikes, trikes and even the occasional donkey.

It was awfully black when we left town and by the time we got to Ifrane, it was raining. They must have had plenty of rain that way because there was water everywhere.

 And by the time we got to Azrou [where the cedar forests and monkeys were supposed to be] it was all misty and we couldn't see very far at all.

 Matt also started feeling a bit sick, so we went straight to our hotel where he had a rest. [Scenery from our window was nice though]

Friday morning, the rain had eased, but Matt's stomach had not. We drove through the Atlas mountains to Imilchil

 and then onto Tinghir via Todra Gorge. 

The scenery was beautiful but we stopped only for me to take photos [occasionally, most photos were taken out the back window, as we were driving along] and for Matt to talk to the rocks. We drove into Tinghir, put Matt to bed and visited the pharmacy [straight across the road] for some medicine and rehydrating salts. 

Saturday, after letting Matt rest until nearly lunch, we headed off to the Dades Gorge, 

and then along the Dades Valley [Valley of 1000 Kasbirs] to Ouarzazate. 

Once again we headed straight to the hotel room for Matt to have a rest. Hopefully he's better tomorrow.