Morocco 2012: Roadtrip to Marrakech

Ben Youssef Medersa (Koranic school)

The whole team went on a roadtrip to Marrakech on the weekend. We hired a minbus and driver for the weekend, much easier than trying to coordinate taxis and train. The drive took about 4 hours and we arrived to lovely warm weather with clear blue skies. A very different look and feel from Rabat - Rabat tends to be white (houses etc) whereas Marrakech is all terracotta and palm trees.

We headed straight for the Medina, into the famous central square, Place Jemaa el-Fna, which is huge and full of people, noise, smoke, food, stalls, snake charmers, and heaps more. After a rooftop lunch we ventured down into the square to get amongst it all....and my first stop was being talked into sitting with a cobra and his snake charmer, not sure how that happened! I even got a cobra kiss on the forehead, then of course the charmer wanted money. That's the way it works here, nothing is for free.

We then headed into the souk and of course got caught up bargaining with the shopkeepers for a variety of things like pashminas, jewellery, silver teapots, ornaments and so on. Amy was on a real scarf hunt! Half the group headed back to the hotel after awhile and the rest of us did more sightseeing before getting lost trying to get back to the square thru the souk. Of course the young boy who "helped" us demanded money at the end and was quite disgusted with the handful of coins we gave him - demanded "paper" money!

Went to a touristy show that evening called Chez Ali which included a massive 4 course dinner then show that included a belly dancer, horses, muskets, and a camel.

The next day our driver took us to various places like the Menara, Koutoubia Mosque, Saadian Tombs - all of which were great examples of Moroccan architecture. A great weekend, we arrive back in Rabat at 8pm to a welcome bed.