Relax, Morocco – The desert tour Part 1 , Our experience in Morocco
In our experience in Morocco, We were awakened by the rooster that, somehow, had escaped from that photo with the cat. Let’s hope they catch him !!! However, it was not so bad, as we had time to prepare for the most exciting part of our visit to Morocco: the excursion to the desert. We washed, dressed, and went to breakfast. Shit, there was no breakfast! As we were leaving quite early, we had dry packs ready.
The problem was that they consisted of the only crappy cakes we had ever tasted at his house, as well as fruit yogurts. Anyway, we were going to live it. At 8 o’clock, like clockwork, our driver Hassan was already waiting for us. Hassan was a young Berber (about 25 years old), with the build of a Somali track and field athlete. Or put another way, it weighed as much as Maggie’s suitcase.
Book your Morocco desert trip with us.
Which didn’t stop him from grabbing two suitcases and heading to the parking lot. Naturally, with the other two, we follow him. We have already seen this movie. We got to the car, collected our bags, and drove off. Now, I know you’re waiting for me to tell you how we got into what looked like a combination of WAZ and gypsy wagon, but no. Hasancho was going to drive us in a relatively new Mitsubishi Pajero.
A fact that was important since we had a clear 7 hour trip through Morocco. For reasons beyond his control, the dashboard was not covered in “original Moroccan carpet”, something we experienced without much pain. I am not going to tell you the way to the first stop, I will only mention that thanks to Hassan, I learned that the law in Morocco does not require driving on three lanes at the same time. But apparently, he was one of the few who could drive in one lane, and in the right lane. I think Hassan had a Ph.D. in single-lane driving. At least a Ph.D.
Ifrane – «The Switzerland of Morocco»
Our first stop of the day was Ifrane. It is a hill station that the otherwise silent Hassan described as the “Switzerland of Morocco.” When we arrived, it was clear to me that Hassan had never seen anything of Switzerland since the only thing they had in common was the island-shaped roofs of the houses, but, by the same logic, it could have been called the ‘Thunk of Morocco “Or the” Chepelare of Morocco. ” By the way, Hasan hadn’t heard of Tankovo. Anyway, Ifrane turned out to be a pretty hill station, which if compared to any of the ghettos in Fez, it would be called not only Switzerland but directly ‘St. Moritz and Aspen in one »from Morocco. Our main activity here was having breakfast and coffee at Swiss prices. I wanted to have breakfast earlier on the road,
The encounter with the Berber macaques
We continued on the road and about 30 minutes after Ifrane we stopped in a forest, in the middle of the road. We wandered a bit about why we were stopping in the woods. First of all, we were surprised that there weren’t any locals who would mix with Hassan and sell us something. Then I had the incredible idea that they were kidnapping us and that they would sell the women as slaves and dismantle me to obtain organs. However, the fact that Hassan was alone and did not have much of a chance to participate in a bodybuilding tournament doomed his eventual plan to failure.
So we got out of the car and decided to take a walk through the grove (the first cool place in Morocco). However, at one point, we heard someone rustling in the bushes behind us. We turned around and there was no one. I heard a noise behind us again, and again there was no one. At that moment we turned around and there they were. They had surrounded us. Maggie wasn’t next to me, and they were everywhere… Fluffy little monkeys, with big eyes. Then I saw Maggie. He was squatting next to the leader of the group, a big fat male macaque, and feeding him peanuts.
The problem with Maggie, however, is that she is very contact-oriented. Especially with furry animals. When I tell him to be careful, he’s already patting the boss on the head. Something the boss doesn’t like. He turned to her and glared at her. Ugh, everything was uneventful, you might think. Basically yes, but I said above that Maggie was very in touch. For unknown reasons, he decided to pat the boss on the head again. Since I’ve always gotten a six in physics, I know that every action has an equal force and a counterforce in the opposite direction (or something like that). In this case, we can add the inverse of feelings. That is, Maggie -> strongly -> caress -> affectionately -> Sheff; whereupon Sheff -> strongly -> punch -> aggressively -> Maggie follows.
By the way, to this day he still has a blue stain from the blow. Then we found out that Boss doesn’t like having his head stroked, the others were coming for peanuts anyway. When we ran out of peanuts we took out the disgusting cakes that we did not have for breakfast (And the fruit milks that we did not eat because they did not think of giving us spoons) and we decided to feed them to the macaques. I will never forget the disgust of a monkey when he tasted the cake. The others decided not to try them.
When we ran out of peanuts we took out the disgusting cakes that we did not have for breakfast (And the fruit milks that we did not eat because they did not think of giving us spoons) and we decided to feed them to the macaques. I will never forget the disgust of a monkey when he tasted the cake. The others decided not to try them. When we ran out of peanuts we took out the disgusting cakes that we did not have for breakfast (And the fruit milks that we did not eat because they did not think of giving us spoons) and we decided to feed them to the macaques. I will never forget the disgust of a monkey when he tasted the cake. The others decided not to try them.
As we stood still and photographed the monkeys quite a bit, the time was early. Hassan gestured for us to meet up so that he could tell us the plan from now on. We were in a kind of circle, and Maggie was in the center. At that point, the boss (who doesn’t like to be patted on the head) walked past all of us to walk up to Maggie and pull up her pants. Apparently, that wasn’t enough, because he walked over to her again and slapped her on the butt. I did not love the treatment he gave my wife and in my eyes, but I had to accept that there was a certain attraction between the two from their first meeting about 15 minutes ago. Like I said, her love is still visible on her leg.
On the way to the Sahara
We got in and continued in our white Mitsubishi, listening to the great music Hassan had chosen, and among all his songs, there was only one that sang about “Habibi.” We pointed this out and explained that every self-respecting cupcake in Bulgaria has at least three songs with “Habibi” on their phone. This created two serious problems: first, Hassan didn’t understand what a cupcake was, even after we explained it to him with a croissant (they were a French cologne, after all, the croissant is a French word) and second (worse): no believed us. Big mistake! That he didn’t believe us. For the next 10 minutes, the car’s soundtrack was the resounding “Habibiii, are you sleeping well?” of Maggie and Jeannie.
After realizing that our “Habitus” s was better than his “Habibi” s, Hassan told us about the Atlas Mountains, He convinced us with three hundred sunrises that there is a lot of snow in winter and various other phantasmagorias. In the hours that followed, we saw many small villages, great mountains, trucks loaded with hay that hid them. One of the cool things was their cattle trucks. Their bodies were two stories tall, with cows on both.
The second floor had no roof, a kind of terrace. It was like a VIP cow lounge. Any similarity to the famous nightclubs on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast is a coincidence. The second floor had no roof, a kind of terrace. It was like a VIP cow lounge. Any similarity to the famous nightclubs on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast is a coincidence. The second floor had no roof, a kind of terrace. It was like a VIP cow lounge. Any similarity to the famous nightclubs on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast is a coincidence.
Thus, in front of us, view after view alternated. The landscape was constantly changing and we never got tired of it.
The only thing that was constant and getting stronger was that slight tightness in my belly. Already satisfied that Hassan was not going to kidnap us, we began to think about food, since it was close to 1 in the afternoon. Finally, I couldn’t help myself and asked Hassan when and where we were going to eat. “In 20 minutes,” he told me. Do you remember the story of Fez about the Moroccans, the banknotes, and the numbers? 20 minutes turned out to be 2 hours and 10 minutes.
But then at 3:10 in the afternoon (I’m very strict with my schedules when it comes to eating), we stopped at a roadside restaurant, which forcefully brought me back to my years as a tour guide, when we stopped tourists in a roadside joint on the road between Varna and Burgas and they gave us 20 leva per person, and tourists tipped them with 3-day kebabs for 3 leva each (without the chutney !!). I looked left – a wasteland, I looked right – a wasteland. I turned – mountain, but that didn’t change the fact that we had to eat at the roadside trap. We went in, and inside there were white tablecloths and cutlery (well, they weren’t cutlery, but for the story…).
Right at the door, we were greeted by the waiter, who in our unanimous opinion was Condie’s first cousin. Come to think of it, didn’t they condemn it? But maybe he’s not in jail. Well, well, things have come to a head. Anyway, he handed us each a menu, A4 size (for those of you who don’t know, that’s the normal size of your printer sheets) with 2 (in words: two) entire offerings on it: a menu Consisting of salad, skewers, and dessert for 190 dirhams (around 35 leva) or a menu with salad, tajine kefta and dessert for 150 dirhams (around 30 leva).
At that moment, I realized that everything that is done for tourists between Burgas and Varna comes back to me in one fell swoop, and the money I made from them, now I will give it to Condie. However, the hunger was stronger. So we ordered a kefta tagine and waited. Meanwhile, the people at the next table indignantly left the place, leaving their dessert, which consisted of a few tangerines. We thought for a long time (maybe about 7 seconds), finally, we got up and took the tangerines. After a while, the waiter came and brought each of us a plate of coffee with two, three stalks of cucumber and a few pieces of tomato.
Everything was cleverly gathered into a small ball in the center of the coffee plate. White tablecloths, tall water glasses, silverware (I know, I know, for the story), and a picture of a salad neatly wedged into a coffee saucer. Gourmet, gourmet. (Chef Condieu got his score on TripAdvisor). Mentally, we had already devoured the salad (physically it wasn’t much of a problem) when the tray was brought to us.
Except it was common to all. A very large, but common one. We had ordered the kefta tagine – remember mini meatballs in tomato sauce, garlic, spices, and an egg on top. It was the same: mini meatballs, mini meatballs, and mini meatballs. Tomato sauce, egg, and garlic were missing, instead, there were many meatballs with a lot of cumin in water. If you have the opportunity, watch some documentaries about swimming pools in China. So imagine that the little Chinese are little dumplings.
Well, that was our Tagine. Except the meatballs have no lifesavers. Our spirits were a little low here, but we didn’t get too angry with Hassan, after all, he has a family to feed, and it must not be easy to find tomatoes in the desert. However, Condrieu, ooooo Condrieu. We share our opinion on the meatballs directly with him. Apparently, we passed, because he ran after our jeep with a couple of bottles of water, which he gave us as compensation after we stopped and caught up with us. And the water in the desert is a precious commodity.
A little discouraged, we continue towards our last destination of the day: Merzouga. Merzouga is a small town on the edge of the Sahara. The population is mainly Berber. Along the way, we passed several towns and cities that were surprisingly reminiscent of the landscapes of the movie “Not without my daughter” (a very beautiful film, even if it is old). At least those were Maggie and Jeannie’s associations.
However, going back to Merzouga, and more specifically doing a little lyrical digression. The reason is that the organizer of our trip, Brahim, is from Merzouga. Brahim is a young Berber (25-30 years old) and owner of Marrakech Camel Trips. Typical of Berbers, he was terribly loyal and the organization of our trip exceeded all expectations. I’m deliberately advertising like this because, despite all the jokes (they were true in Morocco my dear), I can’t help but mention how impressed we were with everything Brahim and Hassan did for us.
Sahara desert
But let’s get on with the journey. Due to our photo breaks, time is quite advanced. Hassan decided to make a little change to the plan (he asked us first if we wanted to) and instead of heading to Merzouga, we headed straight through the desert. We only made a short stop at a store where we collected scarves to make turbans. A task that Hassan took on.
Already in a daze and with the assurance that there would be no scorpions (a question Maggie raises every 20 minutes on the road), we started chattering about some live shit … Whoaaaaa, suddenly Hassan made a sharp left turn, jumped off the road, and headed straight for the dunes. The biggest mistake of his life. Driving through the dunes got Maggie’s adrenaline pumping so high that she started screaming right into Hassan’s ear (who was behind him), and that happened every time the jeep bounced. Obviously, this was fun because he was playing with the car in the dunes. Hello friends, I want this to be fun and entertaining, but Jeannie was not amused. I think he still can’t hear well with his left ear, or at least he does when he can’t stand it. But the experience was truly incredible.
And so we crossed the dunes until another jeep, with four men inside, caught up with us. We stopped, they said something to Hassan and followed them, naturally still pulling, the most normal way of driving through the dunes. Well, to be honest, I was a bit worried here. In the first place, I had no idea where we were; secondly, we followed a jeep full of men, who undoubtedly ate more than Hassan. But ooh, no big deal – nothing happened, they just showed us the way.
After about 30 minutes of driving through the desert, after the 17th turn, after Mohammed’s tent, we reached our camp. It was amazing: 8 big white tents and small tables and cushions placed in the center for us to sit on. Wow. We left our bags in the lobby of the camp (on the sand, yes) and sat in the lobby bar (again, on the sand, but with pillows).
They served us a great mint tea, of which I drank at least one bottle, and after about 20 minutes of waiting they sat us in our tents, they told us that dinner would be in an hour and that we had time to shower and prepare. Hahahaha, to bathe in the desert, I would have passed out laughing. Until I walked into the store. It consisted of a huge room with an incredible bed, and a small bathroom with a toilet where they had prepared shampoos, body lotions, and various other cosmetics, the purpose of which I did not understand.
I took a quick shower, apparently using soap instead of shampoo and body lotion instead of shower gel (or so Maggie explained), and went out again for tea until it was time for dinner.
After an exact hour of waiting, we were called in for dinner and seated at a long table luxuriously laid out with at least 10 types of plates and forks. The four of us sat down and I decided to grab something from the ready-made snack buffet.
A very important explanation of what happens during this time. Right next to our four seats there is an Asian group (I will not define if they are Chinese or otherwise, since I am slightly confusing their nuances). At the last minute, a girl from her group walks up and starts looking for a seat at the long table and asking her friends if the seat in question is available. “Tsk tsk?”, “Tsk tsk?” (which apparently in their language means “And here?”, “And here?”). Being a Bai Gan standout, I naturally got confused as to what was what and grabbed a large enough plate to fill with appetizers. And with the plate already full, I go back to my chair and at that precise moment the Chinese (possibly Chinese) points to my chair and says proudly “Tsuki?” Hey, my curtain fell off.
But since I was hungry, my chair would squeak. But I decided to be cultured, I looked at her, and since I sensed that she did not know German, Spanish, Italian (or anything I knew), I was quite cultured and I said to her in Bulgarian: «Ah, girlfriend, here you are not going to crash! ». Which took away his appetite and he returned to his store. This caused an inevitable depression in their entire group, and a Chinese girl came to cry. We later found out that she was actually watching a movie on her phone and she cried about the movie, but it doesn’t matter.
After the drama with the appetizers and the Chinese had passed, they began to bring more dishes: soup, roast chicken, roast beef, well, a lot of food, a lot of wonders. We ordered 3 fancies and a juice (drinks were not included in the price) and ate as much as we could, even a little above it. It was time to pay for our drinks and go to bed. Now, this is a very crucial moment and we immediately remember the calculation and Morocco. Our waiter comes over and we tell him that we want to pay. The conversation is like this:
- Me: Can we pay?
- Berber: Yes, the fanta costs 30 dirhams, the juice 40 dirhams.
- Me: I’ll pay in full.
- Berber: Fanta costs 30 dirhams, juice 40 dirhams.
- Here I give you 200 dirhams (3 × 30 and 1 × 40) because we have no others. The conversation continues:
- Berber: Fanta costs 30 dirhams, juice 40 dirhams. How much earn?
- Me (quite surprised): 3 for 30 dirhams is 90 and 40 dirhams for the juice.
- Berber: Fanta costs 30 dirhams, juice 40 dirhams. Do the math, how much does that cost in total!
- This is where I understand that man does not know how to do mathematics.
- I: 130 dirhams
- Berber (looking at me suspiciously): Well, if you say so. And how much do I have to pay you back?
- Me: 70 dirhams.
He gave me 70 dirhams back and didn’t ask me to keep it as a tip. I was very surprised by the Berbers, incredibly kind and honest people.
As we count our accounts, I hear it raining outside. Eeeee, no, it’s raining in the desert. I leave the tent restaurant and it turns out that not only is it raining, but it is pouring down and the sand, somehow, does not absorb the water. Puddles start to form everywhere and it starts to get worrying. Still, we made it to our tent and went to bed, hoping we wouldn’t have a cruise in front of our tent in the morning. It didn’t stop raining all night, but the feeling of sleeping in the rain in a tent in the middle of the Sahara was incredible. I fell asleep thinking about the camel trek through the desert and the many beauties that awaited us the next day.
Helpful tips
And again the serious part.
How to organize your excursion through the desert? You have two options: make an appointment in advance or simply opt for one of the many agencies in Fez or Marrakech. If you decide to organize things in advance, this is the agency we did it with:
Marrakech Camel Trips – Unbelievable, unbelievable, unbelievable. They really chose the best camp in the entire Sahara for us, and a hotel with incredible views for the second night. They fulfilled all the whims of food, rest or even the colors of the turbans. Also, the price was much lower than other agencies we contacted. I emphasize that they do not give us any discount for advertising for them, they are simply really incredible and nothing was impossible for them. Comfortable car, luxury camp and hotel, and an amazing attitude.
The other important tip is: don’t pet the monkeys in Ifrane! Seriously. Instead, you can buy peanuts by the kilo in Fez and feed them, they love them. If not, there are several guys in the woods who offer you apple chunks for some amount. But they like peanuts better.
I was also going to tell you not to eat at the restaurant we were in, but it is a bit difficult because there was nothing else in a 70-80 kilometer radius and if you stop there, you will eat there. Swallow it! What follows after will erase any bad memories.
Relax, Morocco – The visit to the desert, part two
5:50 am. I hear screams in the camp. One of the Berbers is trying to wake us up. Now, this I do not understand. It is true that they said last night that we would get up at 5:50, but I did not expect them to mean it. Otherwise, he would not have accepted. However, what to do. Drama in the desert, ladies and gentlemen, drama. We get dressed in a hurry, brush our teeth, and leave the shops… And she looks at me. But she looks at me lovingly. No, it’s not Maggie, it’s a huge black camel (okay, dark-skinned, let’s not get racist).
He stands up and stares at me as he chews slowly and sweetly. At that moment, Maggie leaves the store, almost collides with the camel, and runs screaming back to the store. The camel, having no store of its own, continues to chew. After a minute, Maggie comes out of the store and asks if she can hug the camel. Our man, the Berber, interrupts her gently, telling us that we have to set the camels on fire to see the sunrise on the Erg Chebi dune, the largest and most impressive in Morocco. I still don’t understand what leads them to name piles of sand with names, but perhaps it is due to the lack of other entertainment in the desert.
The camel excursion to Erg Chebi
They quickly explain to us how to get on the camels. I get on mine, at which point the Berber signals him, and that’s my camel, as he begins to unfold, like Lubo Ganev at a banquet table. But miraculously, a living Transformer unfolds. This is the time to share that you have to hold on very tight when you get up, or you will be shaken like a sack of potatoes. After my Transformer deployed for about 30 seconds, it reached the final position at one point.
I wonder if it was because it was dark, but that camel didn’t seem so tall to me. And I realize that here both the Berber and I missed out on saying something important to the other. Apparently, he forgot to tell me that, once deployed, my Transformer is as big as the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. And even more obviously I have not told you that I have a fear of heights. By fear of heights, I mean that if I get on a chair I start to feel dizzy. Without having drunk!
After we all got into the Transformers, we drove slowly through the dunes. But it also wobbles and hits you on the butt. I can’t take a photo of that shaking, much less a video. The good thing is that since I’m scared to death (Transformer = Burj Khalifa), I can’t stop shaking and therefore my chills counteract the camel’s swaying. Smart, huh?
Little by little, it begins to unroll, which on the one hand makes me see that I am even higher than I thought (is there anything higher than Burj Kalifa?), But on the other, it reveals views that I did not even imagine existed.
The views, sadly, can’t make up for the fact that my camel apparently ate beans last night, plus he’s tuned and doesn’t have a catalytic converter. I am experiencing all the emissions that it emits. I almost broke my teeth when the Transformer decided to fold, but satisfied with the hour to walk through the dunes, now we tuck in the camels and go to breakfast.
Breakfast, of course, is in no way inferior to dinner. As there is still some time left before Hasan picks us up, we decided to take a photoshoot around the dunes.
At one point Hasan picks us up and off we go, naturally with the invariable turn of the jeep around the dunes. After a while, we arrive in Merzouga, where we stop to finally meet Brahim, the organizer of the desert excursion. Note that so far they have not received a penny from us, other than the advance. Hey, this really impressed me on the Berbers. They are very honest and trusting. It is true that we had nowhere to go, but still. What would it be like in Bulgaria?
The Canyons of Then and the Dades Valley in Morocco
But let’s not get distracted. After some sweet talks with Brahim, a visit to the bathroom at his house (I am with three women, it cannot be) and a drink of cold water (in the literal sense), we continue to our next stop: the Todgha Gorges. I want to tell you that on this day and in this place something very funny happened to us. But there was nothing. Hello people, I felt so small in this place. It is a series of canyons in which one stands at the bottom of the canyon and disappears. Forget any problems, any laughter and just absorb the energy of this place. It was simply majestic. Enjoy it too.
The day flew by, so we continued to our hotel, located in the Dades Valley. We arrived relatively early at an amazing little hotel where we would stay for the night, which had a great view of the valley.
Since we weren’t too tired, and it was early and light, Maggie and I decided to take a walk down to the valley. Naturally, we did not look for the road and went directly along a path that started from the hotel and probably led to the valley. We weren’t going to find out because we didn’t get to the valley. The problem was that there was an olive grove on our way. We have always heard that olives are disgusting, but it is another thing to try them on the spot. Also, we picked an olive, it was the bitter brother, a tragedy.
We would have survived, but at that moment a granny appeared out of nowhere. But like a ninja he jumped out of the bushes. And when he started babbling in his language and pointing to the olives, or rather the bones that we had thrown on the ground. I yelled to myself, “Breeeee, they are very picky about cleaning here,” and took the pits. But she kept babbling and pointing at the pits again. I also explained that I knew they were bitter, but that it was too late. However, the ninja does not calm down and begins to scream very loudly.
In the end I got tired of explaining it to him, he obviously didn’t understand Bulgarian, there was no point in saying it in English and we went up the road to the hotel. For two olives, he ate us. Therefore, we ended the exploration visit to the valley. We went back to the hotel and…. a part of the photos, of course. When we settled in, it was time for dinner. At dinner we asked the hotel owner about the gardens, he told us not to go there because there were security guards and they would beat you a lot if they caught you there. Where was the blanket, I asked. Where? We didn’t eat the boi, but I prefer the boi to the cries of that witch.
We had dinner, took some photos and at the hotel and went to sleep.
The next day we had breakfast and hit the road again. Nothing new. The news was that it was our last day of travel. On the way we passed by Barzazat (I checked it three times on google to see if it was well written) where we stopped to see the film studios.
Warzazat and Ait Benhadou – Hollywood from Africa
The Barzazat is the Hollywood of Africa. It is a small city, but quite developed thanks to the film industry. Movies like The Mummy, Gladiator, Asterix and Obelix: Mission Cleopatra have been shot here. Also “Sex and the City.” After the filmmakers were not allowed to shoot in Dubai, they decided to do their Dubai at Barzazat. The blows are like that. The city doesn’t have much to impress except for the many movie studios. There is usually a symbolic entry. Inside you can explore on your own or with a guide who tells you a few things.
Hassan stopped us in a relatively nice studio, but the guide was very informative. In the first place he had no idea about some things, what movies they were from, in the second he omitted quite important information. But we will forgive him the guy didn’t ask for money but said to let him have anything we wanted if we were happy. He is lucky that we have not taken it at face value, because if only we would have left it if we were happy…. He would have understood what “round to zero” means. The good thing is that we took some very funny photos with the props.
Visiting Aït Benhaddou is an essential part of any journey on the track of famous films in Morocco. It is a fortress city where many famous movies have been shot.
Here Hassan had paid a local guide to show us around. Unfortunately our guide was a bloody lazy. After muttering to himself for 5 minutes, Maggie got angry with him and began to narrate, to which he asked in surprise, “Are you Berber?” The tour guide wouldn’t get up, but the place was magical.
Already hungry, we sat down to eat at one of the local restaurants, at Hassan’s suggestion. I don’t know if I had taken note of the first meal, but this place was also very nice. A restaurant with delicious food, a swimming pool, everything as it should be.
After lunch, it was time to move on. I had been riding in the front seat for three days and decided to switch with someone who was stiff in the back. My mother sat in the front, which caused an incredible drama in the hearts of the locals. One of them approached and asked Hasan, “But how is it that she sits in the front and a man is in the back seat?” (Hasan translated it for us later). After explaining that we were foreigners, the locals-only said one thing, “Aaaaaaah”, whose nuance we never understood what it was, and we set off again.
Tizin Tichka Pass
Unfortunately, the end of our trip was approaching, but we still had a step to go… hey, you’ll excuse me there, but I’ve never been able to know how to pronounce it. But we call it Tizin Tichka. Basically, nothing interesting was planned here, apart from the extraordinary views and incredible roads at 2200m.
They hid our hat. A road like a highway. In Africa!!! Anyway, we shit on this bird (Tizen Tichka) and go down.
Along our way, as everywhere in Morocco, some very cool stones are sold that resembles a ball, the exterior is like smoke and the interior is glass. Since we couldn’t get anything anywhere, we decided to ask a roadside vendor. We passed by and naturally, Maggie liked the gypsy stone better. Smoky on the outside, bright cyclamen on the inside (pure pink, but she said it was cyclamen) and we asked Hassan for the price. The seller gave him a price, at which Hasan turned to us and said, “Come in, it’s a lot of money for a stained stone.” This was the beginning of a long and entertaining discussion. Now in Arabic, now in Berber. I don’t understand it either, so I’ll tell you what I heard.
Seller.
Hassan: «Yala Kolor Natural, the jaguar will play …» and here already in English: «I am a Berber and I grew up here, do not explain to me what Kolor Natural is. They are always white inside, you have painted them ».
So the seller decided to prove that they were not painted, tripped over his toe, and rubbed the stone. Big mistake! His entire finger turned pink (cyclamen de), at which we burst out laughing and jumped on the car.
Shortly before arriving in Marrakech we also stopped at an argan cooperative. Now, with my hand on my heart, this was a somewhat touristy return. In theory, the cooperative should be organized by local women who collect the argan oil and sell it. Directly from the producer. In practice there are no argan trees in the Atlas Mountains, that is, nothing is extracted, only a small attraction is made for tourists and then the argan oil is sold at an excessive price. Probably diluted with oil. But it was interesting. Maggie was able to turn the high-tech oil extraction apparatus a little, which consisted of two stones for pressing the nuts.
Instead, they offered me to try different types of honey, including argan. Well yes, but again a big mistake. For some inexplicable reason, they left me alone with three bowls of honey and decided to sell perfumes and other shenanigans to women. I was not interested. So I sit down, dip my bread in the honey and eat. And so on for 20 minutes. Their honey was nice, so I went to see how much it cost. It was damn expensive, about 10 euros for 200 grams. So I ate at least that much so far. But I took a jar to eat at home.
The serious part of the trip: yes, we are tourists, and yes, people look at us as such. It is normal for prices to be a bit high. Do not be angry with them, in most cases, they are people who barely make ends meet. Give once 5 euros more, take a photo with your camel. And above all, respect them and their culture. Smile, thank them. Especially for Berbers, it means even more.
Our visit to Morocco was about to end. We only had a few days left in Marrakech, but they would not be less interesting for that.
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