Episode 26 - Marrakech
Beautiful Atlas mountains, desert turtles, and a super yacht sailor
And so, my grand holiday tour of Morocco continues! After checking out the wonders of Casablanca along the coast, I take the train inland to the Medina city and the imperial city of Marrakech. Narrow alleyways, bazaars, and street food await!
Sunday 12/10/2023
After making it onto the train in Casablanca, it was time to find my seat in the train car. The train was structured like the train carriages in Harry Potter, where there was one narrow hallway on one side of the train, and train boxes that had 8 seats each occupying most of the width. We had assigned seats, but someone was sitting in mine, but I wasn’t too pressed about it, so I found an empty row and proceeded to take a nap.
I slightly needed to use the restroom, so I went to check out the restroom on the train car. In a stroke of planning genius, the train car that had ~70 people had only one restroom, so I decided to wait until we got to Marrakech to use the restroom.
In America or Europe, having only one bathroom per 60 people would be considered terrible planning. In Morocco, it is called second class!
I fell asleep in the train car and woke up at Gare de Marrakech. It looked just like a Parisian train station, except using a red sandstone of Morocco rather than the tan limestone of Paris. Crazy!
I walked all the way to the hostel (about a 30 minute walk) since I wanted to save money on the taxi. I eventually made it to the Medina, the historic city center that is effectively a walled fortress full of narrow alleyways and streets. Along the way, I bought a kilogram of oranges from a random street vendor for 15 dirham, and the guy weighed out the kilogram by using a literal scale and a kilogram weight.
What a legend!
The alleyways to get to the hostel in the Medina were quite sketchy, especially at night, and I found myself very happy that I was a tall, white guy in that environment and not a girl. That would be scary indeed. I checked into the hostel after midnight, climbed up the rickety bunk bed to my crib for the next 2 nights, and went to sleep around 1 am.
What a day!
Monday 12/11
I woke up around 9:30 in the morning in anticipation of the yummy breakfast at the hostel that I was told ended at 10. The breakfast was delicious, the cup of Joe was fantastic, and it was straight deliciousness.
I had two days planned in Marrakech, so I was looking online at what to do in the city. One of the online ideas was to go on a day trip up to the Atlas Mountains, which were visible from Marrakech.
The thought of seeing and being among mountains, which I had not been among since the Alps on the Interrailing trip with Joe and Emma, was exhilarating. I asked the hostel dude if he had any recommendations on how to get there, and he told me that there was a hostel trip planned for 8 am in the morning the next day, with the return around 5 or 6 pm.
Since my bus was leaving for Agadir at 5:30 pm the next day, this was not an option, so I asked how I could get there now.
“Walk to this mosque, go around the right hand side, pay 35 dirham, and get in the grand taxi with all the other locals.”
Ok, I can do that!
I walk over to the mosque, and there is so much activity happening everywhere. Locals walking and driving everywhere, everything under the sun being sold, it was crazy. I find the grand taxi I am supposed to take up to this town called Sti Fedma, and pay 50 (not the promised 35, but I’m not worried) dirham to hop on the glorified minivan with about 20 other people.
I am the only non-Moroccan on this bus. All the tourists took the nice, fancy, air-conditioned shuttles up to the mountains in the morning, and here I was, riding up with the locals. There were looking at me at first wondering why the hell why I was there, and then they just stopped caring and accepted it. Lol
I absolutely loved it. These kinds of experiences, where you get sheer exposure to the real culture, is what I truly, truly, enjoy.
There was a bus transfer at the foothills of the Atlas Mountains, and then we were riding up into the mountains proper. I saw a lot of camels (first time!), a goat herder with a bunch of goats on the side of the road, and random people hopping onto the roof of the van when the interior got too full. Around early afternoon, we made it to Sti Fedma, the mountain town I came to visit.
The Atlas Mountains were absolutely surreal.
First of all, they are massive. I’m talking summits over 3000 meters / 13000 feet. The mountains are jagged, broken, sharp. Truly beautiful but absolutely rugged. The fact that people survive and live there year-round?
Wow.
And a random fun fact, but I learned that they are the namesake of the Atlantic Ocean!
Sti Fedma is located high up in the mountain valley, and there was a touristy area with cushions along the riverbed and lots of overpriced shops and whatnot.
I skipped past all that and hiked up the road to see where the locals lived and spent their time. I bought some cheap Moroccan bread at a random shop I found for a dirham a loaf, then continued up the valley. I saw some massive switchbacks up the mountain in front of me, and my goal was to hike up to the top of them, enjoy the views overlooking the valley, then head back into town.
I make it to the bottom of the switchbacks where there was a small village and began going up the switchbacks and was quickly stopped by some shouting locals. They told me that going up there is forbidden because apparently, the top of the mountain is where the Berber tribes live.
The Berber tribes! They’re the indigenous North Africans that lived in Morocco prior to Arabic conquests centuries ago, and primarily live in the mountainous regions of the Atlas Mountains across North Africa now. Their languages are in a completely different family of languages than Arabic, and their script is insanely cool and strange. Below is a sign I saw in Sti Fedma, written in Arabic, Berber, and French, respectively:
Long story short, I met one of the Berber chiefs at the bottom of the switchbacks, and one of the locals told me that if you want to go up and see the Berber tribes, you have to make a whole expedition out of it, bringing food and plenty of water for the locals. They will be very very angry otherwise if you show up without the proper supplies for them.
One does not simply pull up to the Berber village in the upper reaches of the Atlas Mountains, it seems! That was not written in the online postings at all, but I suspect that’s because no one did what I did and just booked it up the valley road to its end.
The guy I was speaking with was Ahmed, a Moroccan Arabic man who spoke English, French, Spanish, Arabic, and numerous Berber languages. Ahmed proceeded to show me around the river valley (the mountains are brutal and jagged, but the bottom of the valley with the river there is an oasis!) and to my surprise, showed me some potato farms that they had growing there. We had a little photoshoot in the valley as well, and he invited me to come back one day to see the Berber villages in their entirety. Put that on my bucket list.
I thanked Ahmed for his tour, then hiked back down the valley to the main Sti Fedma tourist town, hopped back on the bus going into the center of Marrakech, and fell asleep. I was still a little astounded that people were able to survive in such harsh conditions in such harsh mountains, and it was truly such an amazing experience to see how people really lived there and see such gorgeous mountains that were unlike any I had ever seen before.
Once I was back in Marrakech, I headed to the central square that is the largest marketplace in Africa and at night, a place where different traditional music groups play. I met a random Arabic man that was describing to me which countries all these music groups were from and what the different traditions meant. It was honestly so cool, and the music was unlike anything I had ever heard before.
After checking out the music groups for a bit, I headed off to dinner at a restaurant that the Canadian pilots in Casablanca had recommended for me, and it was quite delicious. My table was on the rooftop, and I was able to see all across the top of Marrakech in the meantime. The food was delicious, though I did find myself missing Emma and Joe. Traveling by myself is nice and trying out some solo travel is cool, but I miss the wonderful Interrailing company. :)
After dinner, I headed back to the hostel, where I called Mama, then Emma and Joe, easing my missing of them. It was honestly so great to talk to them both again!
After the calls, I did some reading in the hostel lobby area and met this cool Canadian bloke, Brandon.
Turns out, Brandon works as a sailor for super yachts and travels the world for months at a time on these yachts, and chills in random countries between jobs. In this case, he was chilling in Morocco!
We had a tremendously interesting conversation, and we discussed about how cool different languages are. He told me about how Indonesian is quite a simple language to learn because it was developed by European sailors during colonialism and was the lingua franca of sailors, so it is quite simple with very few tenses.
Crazy stuff!
Tuesday 12/12
I woke up around 9:30 again and headed downstairs for the yummy breakfast again. I met this random German couple and we chatted for a bit, then Brandon from the night before came downstairs too.
Brandon and I decided to explore the city together, and met up around 11 in the lobby of the hostel after getting ready separately. I had a few things bookmarked on my Google Maps that I wanted to check out, Brandon was flexible with what to do, so I led us to some gardens I read about that are apparently super pretty.
On the walk there, Brandon was telling me about his sailing travels and some Romanian business deal that almost happened on one of the boats he worked on. His life seems so interesting, though he did admit that it can get quite lonesome at times and he doesn’t see friends and family for months at a time when at sea.
We made it to the gardens, filled with cacti from across the world and buildings the most beautiful shade of blue I have ever seen. The blues were just so vivid and I literally could not stop telling Brandon how cool I thought the color blue was. I legitimately think that that is my new favorite color, that shade of blue. We had a little photoshoot, then headed back toward to median to check out the bazaars and shops.
Along the way, we got some freshly squeezed pomegranate juice, ate lunch at some random street restaurant that was delicious, and Brandon told me that the best way to not get sick from local food is to eat the local probiotics to get used to the bacteria. We then walked around the Medina and just looked at all the shops, of which there were a ton. Some of the highlights:
So many bright colors being sold. The pigments come from ground up flower petals and are used to make paint. The beautiful deep blue I was seeing everywhere came from indigo, a rock that was mined in the mountains and then ground into a powder. I bought myself a small piece for 10 dirham.
So many ceramics and woodworking shops.
Someone was selling turtles and chameleons.
Woodcarver that tried to sell us honey sticks and carved a cool necklace for Brandon.
Honestly, it was just so cool to see how the medina worked and all the bazaars operated. Insane. We were just absorbing all the sights and sounds!
We walked back to the main square and saw the main entrance into the Medina, a beautiful archway that had been around for hundreds of years. I saw a picture of French soldiers in front of the entrance, and wanted to see it myself.
I then bought some dates (a yummy sweet fruit), and Brandon and I headed back to the hostel to chill. We chilled some, hung out some more, and I found 6 different desert turtles on the roof of the hostel that belonged to the owner of the place. Vibed with them, packed up my bag, and headed off to the bus station. The bus to Agadir awaits!
And so the second city of Morocco has come to an end!
Interesting side note, but everyone thinks that I am French because I learned that the vast majority of white people who visit Morocco are from France. I was just telling everyone I was from Russia since Russia-Morocco relations are much better than with the US.
Chatting with Brandon was great because he was a native English speaker too, so we could harness all the powers of the language, all of its nuances and complexities, in our conversations, making them so much more special.
Some more pictures:
