The Valley of 1000 Casbahs
The Sahara, a small most Western finger of it which reaches into eastern Morocco is a favorite tourist destination for visitors to Morocco. We booked a three day, two night tour with our guide Abdul who drove us first into the High Atlas Mountains where we stayed overnight one night in a venerable chalet-like hotel up in the mountains. The next morning we woke to drive down into the Valley of the Dades and got some great photos of an old casbah (sort of an ancient castle) in the morning light.
The day
before on the way up the mountain we stopped at a famous casbah where
many Hollywood films have been shot. In fact there was filming going
on while we were there, a new one called the Queen of the Desert to
feature Nicole Kidman. We didn't see her but we did take some photos
with some of the extras.
Abdul, our guide with the film extras |
Yata had the opportunity to share some tunes with a Berber musician. His instrument was similar to a banjo.
But on to the desert. We drove most of
the day, stopping at the Anti Atlas mountains to shop for fossils.
This is the area from which many fossil, especially ammonites come.
We arrived at the the camel loading
area in time to get saddled up and out into the dunes to witness
sunset from on top of a high dune, then onto the traditional nomadic
tent camp for dinner and cot
sleeping. The camels were pretty
comfortable and mild mannered. Mine was a bit of a complainer but
she didn't buck me off. It was amazingly cold. I needed three heavy
wool blankets to stay warm! Up at about 5:30 so we could get back on
camel to see the sunrise from the dunes. Dramatic and striking.
Then back to Marrakech for one more
night at the Riad Shaden. We had booked a bus to Marrakech and got
to the station to board and realized we had chosen the wrong busline.
One of the dirtiest buses we've ever been on. When we got to
Essouira our host Bruno helped us book new tickets on the SupraTour
bus which was great.
Essouira, on the Atlantic Coast is
another old Moroccan city known for it's consistent winds so it
attracts windsurfers. We booked a wonderful room at Villa Gonatouki
operated by a French family and felt pampered for three days. They
had a great chef Samila and she gave me an informal cooking lesson one
day. We made Safa, a pasta dish with chicken and olives, etc. We
also made an eggplant caviar and a dessert smoothie with cooked
carrots and fruits. Fabulous meal. We wished we had stayed there
longer. The villa was actually eight kilometers south of the city so
we only went into town one day but it was small enough to see most
of the old city along the ramparts. I did a little sketching in one
of the town sqares. Lots of photography too.
Then one night in Casablanca to catch
the plane to Paris.
Comments
Post a Comment