Marrakech: An Amazing Moroccan Getaway!

February 20th-23rd

As the days leading up to this trip went by I began to feel anxious and excited all at the same time. I woke up early on Thursday morning before my alarm because I had so much nervous energy building up inside. That’s when it hit me. Wow. I’m going to Africa today. Emma, Lily, and I had been talking for over a year about going on this trip, but something in me always doubted that we would actually make it there. On every flight that I take whether it’s from Tucson to San Jose or Prague to Barcelona, I can’t help but pass out for the duration of the flight. This time my nervous energy was not allowing any of that. I was anxious about going somewhere that was so culturally different than anything I had ever experienced before. Halfway through the flight, the attendants handed out papers that each person had to fill out. They read the “Kingdom of Morocco Public Health Passenger Form- Coronavirus.” With the current state of this pandemic, this definitely alarmed me a bit. The second that I stepped through the doors at the gate I immediately began to spot the cultural differences around me. I noticed the airport’s multiple prayer rooms and that the janitorial staff consisted of women wearing hijabs. That is when my anticipatory anxiety all went away as I was filled with excitement to explore Marrakech. For some reason, we were able to go through domestic customs instead of international which I assume had to do with the fact that Spain is so close to Morocco, but I really have no idea why. This saved us a ton of time and I was not mad about it because the international line was 10 times the size. I noticed that the customs in this airport was extremely strict. The agent looking at my passport questioned if the picture was me and then proceeded to say “No glasses is better for you. Welcome to Morocco.” This insulted me a tad bit but I laughed it off and carried on.

My friends and I also booked this trip through Bus2Alps and I wouldn’t have done it any other way. This time was much different from our trip to Interlaken because there we were off on our own the entire time other than the activities that we booked through them. This time, the staff had a full itinerary booked for us and because of this, I felt so safe the entire time. We were greeted by a driver at the airport that night to pick us up and drive us to the hostel. Little did we know when we had booked the trip that on Thursday Bus2Alps had nearly a full day of activities planned that day. Our flight didn’t land until 9pm so we were bummed that we missed out. After a short drive, the van pulled up to a corner to drop us off. I got out of the car, looked around and was confused as I didn’t see our hostel. Then we were greeted by another Bus2Alps staff who was there to guide us through the little streets that the van couldn’t drive down. While we were walking through the streets of old town Marrakech at night it was so surreal. All of the homes in the streets were connected and they looked like one large clay wall with several doors spread out. The Bus2Alps staff member told us that this was because in their culture they say “You should not harm your neighbor by showing your wealth.” This was definitely shown as we walked by some of the homes that had open doors. One looked dark and very impoverished, while the one next door was vibrant, bright, filled with colorful tiles and fancy furniture. When we reached our hostel we were relieved to see how beautiful it was. My friends and I were definitely nervous to see what our Moroccan hostel would be like but it was gorgeous! Our only complaint was that our room was much too small to have as many beds in it as it did. Throughout the weekend we had to take turns changing and getting ready because there was only enough room for one of us to do it at a time. This forced us to spend most of our time while we were at the hostel sitting on the lawn chairs by the pool or on the pretty colorful sofas in the patio. The weather was gorgeous at night. Nothing to complain about!

The next morning we got up bright and early to explore on our first day! Walking through the same small streets looked so different in the daylight. There were donkeys pulling trash, people riding motorcycles, and men setting up their stores in the Souks. They warned us about dressing conservatively on this trip, but not everyone did. They also told us that we needed to practice asking permission before taking pictures, but not everyone did. One man driving by on his motorcycle yelled, “Americans. No pictures.” At times it angered me how blatantly oblivious some of the college kids were in not respecting the cultural differences, but I tried to ignore it. From there we got on busses and went into the valley to a Berber village. The Berbers are the first indigenous tribe of Northern Africa, but the majority from Morocco. When we got off the bus, men ran up to us and tried to sell just silver and woven jewelry. Of course, they sensed that I was the weakest of my friend group and they pried on me. But I put on my sunglasses and just kept saying no thank you. When we were at the house we were led to a gorgeous patio in the home that has an amazing view of the valley. Then we got to watch one of the Berber women that lives there make us Moroccan mint tea with fresh spearmint. I typically don’t prefer sweet tea but I could not stop drinking it! The most interesting part of watching this was seeing her add the sugar. They keep their sugar in a giant cone and while making the tea the woman kept hacking off pieces to add in. Then, more of the women that work there brought us out flatbread with honey, butter, and oil. So so good! Then we were free to explore the huge house. In the backyard, they had chickens, sheep, and a donkey. Two little children of the home were running around laughing, screaming, and waking all of us with sticks.

From there we got back on the bus for a short ride to where we would be riding camels. Along the way we saw multiple people with small groups of camels just off the side of the road. Our guide told us that we were going to the person that has the largest group they could find, which was 8 camels. Being that there were more than 40 of us, we had to go in groups. While we waited we spent time with two baby camels that cried every time their moms left on a ride and a donkey. Our turn lasted about 10 minutes which was a perfect amount of time. The seat on the camel was not comfortable and mine was slightly slanted so that made it worse. Something that confused me was that the Bus2Alps crew encouraged us all to wear a pashmina on our head for a “camel pic.” Many people brought their own but they also had a few to share. This kind of rubbed me the wrong way, especially when people decided to wear them in a way that only showed their eyes. Keep in mind that it was 80 degrees outside and we were in the mountains, not the desert. The scarf wasn’t protecting their faces from sand but making them sweat. They kept asking my friends and me over and over if we wanted to use the dirty loaner scarves and we declined. They looked so filthy that they probably had lice or something. I personally just felt that they were walking into the steep waters of cultural appropriation here and I wasn’t comfortable with posing for a picture for that reason. After the ride was over and we said goodbye to our camel friends, we got back on the bus to get on with the rest of our day.

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The next thing that was on the agenda for the day was a hike and lunch. We drove through the Ourika valley and a village there. On the way there the staff played Waka Waka by Shakira and Africa by Toto to get us excited. When we got off the bus we saw so many amazing shops and that got us excited to explore the souks later. Also, there was restaurant after restaurant on the river. We began our hike up to a pretty waterfall and it was more like rock climbing. Our guide helps us through it but the wet rocks and the steep climb was definitely not what I was expecting. Along the way, there were hundreds of shops and a handful of restaurants. I was confused by the elderly people who were up there that had completed the climb that was so extreme for me. On the way down we walked along the ridge and it had a beautiful view of the valley. Emmas said it wasn’t anything new for her as it kind of looked like Arizona. Along the way down the guide was trying to talk to us and we didn’t quite understand what he was saying. After a little back and forth he decided to show us what he was saying. “Hello!” he yelled and his voice echoed back. This reminded me of that scene in the Grinch when he is talking to himself in his cave and I couldn’t stop laughing. My friends thought I was such a weirdo. Also, on the way down the guide pointed out a very unsuspecting plant. He told us that it was juniper and they used it to make gin. 

When the hike was over we went immediately to the restaurant for lunch. When leading us to our table they walked us through the restaurant, out the back patio, down some stairs, and we saw our table was in the middle of the river! We took off our shoes and socks and got into the river to reach our seats. The water was freezing cold because it was melted snow from the top of the mountains. We all rested our cold toes on a bar at the center of the table and enjoyed an amazing meal. We had vegetable purée soup, chicken with lemon and olives, orange slices with Moroccan spices on top, and mint tea of course! Everything was ridiculously good. When lunch was over we got back on the bus yet again to head back to the city center. The bus dropped us off at the big square which is called Jemaa el-Fnaa. This is the center of the main marketplace in the old city. This is where they have a ton of vendors, shops, restaurants, and street performers. I think that this is where the snake charmers are but thankfully we avoided that at all costs and I didn’t have to witness that at all the whole weekend. One terrible thing we did see was a monkey on a chain. At this point, I kept my head down because I did not want to see anything else like that. While we were walking back to our hostel it was our first time in the souks during the day. This was our first experience with the extreme catcalling. The men called us American girls Lady Gaga, Shakira, and Spice girls in order to get us to come to their shop, which never worked of course. That night we had dinner in the middle of the square, which I was not expecting. It was at one of the restaurants that had men outside yelling at people to come and eat there because there were a dozen of the same exact place within a block. We had chicken kabobs, olives, grilled vegetables, and mint tea. So far, I was extremely happy with the food that I was having through Bus2Alps, and that defiantly reigned true throughout the rest of the trip. After dinner our guide took us to one of the vendors who sold amazing cookies. We got to fill up a box with as many cookies as it could possibly fit for $5. That’s when we called it a night and headed back to our beautiful hostel to end an unreal first day in Africa! 

The next day we had the choice between going to the spa or ATVing, and we picked the spa of course! We walked through the square to get there and the place was really pretty and serene. But boy, we had no idea what we were in for. We did a Hammam bath and massage. There was a steam room, mud, buckets of water, exfoliating, and lots of oil involved. I would not describe this experience relaxing at all, but a cultural experience to say the least. If you’re interested look up Hammam bath and you’ll have quite the laugh. After we finished up there we cleaned up a bit at the hostel. They recommended not to wash the oil off of your body or hair until the next day. During the massage, the woman had aggressively rubbed an obscene amount of oil in my hair but it just looked like I it gelled back so I decided to listen to their advice. We went back to the square to get a quick bite to eat before our walking tour. Along the way, Lily experienced some pretty aggressive catcalling and it made us all pretty uneasy. Then we grouped up and went out on a walking tour with our guide, named Ali. The first place that we went to was called Rosa Huile which was an herbalist and cosmetics store. We saw women making argan oil, which is an extremely long process, and then we were given a presentation about all of the spices, oils, teas, and creams that we could buy. They taught us what real saffron looks like and only three strands of it come from each flower. Next on the agenda was to go to the Bahia Palace which was converted into the Museum of Confluences. Interestingly enough this museum featured many pieces of the private collection of Patti Birch, an American philanthropist. Also in this museum, we saw a bunch of beautiful tiles and some of Yves Saint Laurent’s traditional Moroccan dresses. 

At the end of the tour, Ali offered to take my friends and I around to all of the places that he took the rest of the group to that we had missed out on Thursday. These consisted of pashminas, straw bags, handmade leather shoes, spices, art, his wife’s handmade clothing shop, and the most fabulous rug store of course! The souks consisted of what seemed like a million of the same types of stores so it was so nice of him to show us the best ones. The rug shop was definitely my favorite. From the outside, you would have never known how big the place truly was. The owner showed us around, a woman showed us how they make the rugs, and then we were led upstairs. This turned into an hour-long ordeal of Lily bargaining with the owner. Two older men were non stop pulling out, opening up, stacking, and folding back up dozens of rugs for Lily to look at. At the end of it, she came out with a beautiful Moroccan rug! Unfortunately, she won’t see it until May because they packed it up so tightly so that she could carry it on the plane. At the end of a jam-packed day exploring the souks, we were exhausted from all the bargaining and ready for dinner!

Our last meal was at a beautiful rooftop restaurant at sunset. We had grey wine, Vin Gris, which is basically just rosé. For starters we had lots of olives and a caprese salad. For my meal I ordered the beef tanjia which was amazing! It had beef, candied lemon, cumin, and saffron. They told us that you can only get this meal prepared this way in Marrakech so I of course had to try it. The dish came in a clay container and the server poured it on my plate in front of me. It definitely was not very pretty but it was the best meal that I had the entire trip. To top it off, we had a raspberry cheesecake, a chocolate souffle, and saffron Crème brûlée.

That night we went back to our hostel, packed up, and took an hour-long nap because our time to meet up with the staff to go to the airport was at 2am. We connected in Casablanca, the capital of Morocco, and we were home in Barcelona by noon. My hair was the greasiest it had ever been my entire life and my body ached from the intense hike. After a borderline cold and lukewarm shower happy energy hit me like a ton of bricks. The weekend I had just had was so surreal. The beautiful country that I had seen, the magnificent culture that I had experienced, the delicious food that I had eaten, and the charming people that I had met filled my happy heart with extreme gratitude. This weekend in Morocco was definitely one that I will never forget.