Amazing Morocco and France round 2

                I found my hostel, Rainbow Hostel, dropped off my stuff, and headed up to the roof where there was a nice patio with several couches, hookahs to use, and tons of travelers chilling out with a hash joint or six after a long day of exploration (sorry future employers, but you’re going to have to face the reality that there is a shit ton of ridiculously cheap hash in Morocco, and it’s part of the experience. When in Rome, ya know?). I met some Germans, a Swiss guy who walked all the way from Switzerland to the Strait of Gibraltar over the course of 4 months and then bought a moped to travel around Morocco on, and several other people of various nationalities from around the world. I chilled with them for a while and then went out to dinner with a Brazilian and an Estonian guy. We ate at one of the tents in the main square of Marrakech, which is incredibly touristy but still delicious and cost about 4 euros for a dinner of Tagine—one of Morocco’s specialties consisting of steamed vegetables and meat in some mysteriously delicious sauce. The rest of that night was a blur and I woke up the next morning groggy but ready for an adventure.

          As I ate the free breakfast at the hostel I started talking to a Dutch guy, Rutger, who had also recently arrived in Marrakech, and we decided to go explore the city together. We walked quite a ways through the markets in the city center with mopeds zooming past us on tiny crowded alleyways, past other fruit markets outside of the center, and up a hill next to the train station with an intriguing castle wall on top of it.

gas station in the middle of the market, surrounded by clothing and food stands on what seemed to be a walking-only alleyway taken over by mopeds

 

they still use donkeys for labor in Morocco

 

the fruit market in Marrakech

 

tiles on everything, even the train station

 

the hill with a castle wall on top

                When we got to the top of the hill we were greeted by a barbed wire fence on top of the wall and signs that said “military zone, keep out”. So unfortunately our plans were thwarted by the Moroccan army’s continued use of castles in the 21^st century, but we at least had a really nice view over the city.

Marrakech. You can sort of vaguely see the Atlas mountains in the background but unfortunately it was too smoggy to see them well

 

a farmer with his goats and sheep grazing just a block outside the city

                The next morning Rutger and I woke up bright and early at 7am to go to the Sahara Desert. We had booked spots on a desert tour. I had mixed feelings about going to the desert in a tour group, but the day before we had managed to haggle the tour company down to a price which is roughly what it would have cost to go on our own, and it saved a lot of time on organization. It turned out that the group of people we were with was really fun and we had an amazing time, so in the end I’m glad I went with the tour. On the first day, the minibus took us through the Atlas Mountains, stopping at a couple of points along the way for photos and tea, through the charming town of Ouarzazate and a few other villages, and to the Dades Gorge in the Southern Atlas, where we would spend the first night.

snowy Africa

 

the Atlas mountains in central Morocco

 

a hillside village whose name I don’t remember and couldn’t pronounce

 

no longer tile architecture like in Marrakech, the desert is all adobe castle-like buildings

                Our group consisted of 3 German guys, a Dutch guy, an American girl who happened to go to college in Iowa (only other person from Iowa that I’ve met so far while traveling!), 2 Italian girls, 2 Japanese girls, and a Scottish dude who had done some really amazing things in his life which I found to be really inspiring. He studied molecular biology but quickly afterwards realized that lab work is not for him, and has been travelling the world doing random jobs in random places ever since, including starting a hostel in Guatemala, living in Canada, Israel, and traveling basically everywhere possible. I find it inspiring to meet people who haven’t taken the traditional college–entry level job–promotion–stay there forever route in life and are really happy with their lifestyle how it is. Since I know my parents are reading this, I’d like to note that I can’t see myself living that same lifestyle, but it’s refreshing to know that there are multiple ways to live happily without taking the “normal” route in our work-over-everything society.

                The next morning we got back on the bus and headed to the sand dunes. Along the way we stopped in another desert town for a short tour by a guy who struck everyone as kind of a misogynistic asshole which culminated in a rug salesman showing us about 50 rugs one at a time and an extremely awkward 5 minute silence while nobody offered to buy his overpriced rugs. This was the shitty part of being on a tour and not on my own. It was over quickly enough though and soon we were back on the road to the Merzouga dunes. When we got there, there was a line of camels waiting to take us out to the campsite.

a truly Moroccan experience

 

how many cameltoes can you count in this picture?

 

                Halfway to the campsite, we stopped to hike up a sand dune and watch the sunset. It was pretty difficult to walk up since our feet just sunk into the sand, but the view was amazing from the top. The only disappointing thing was that from the top of the highest dune we could see where the dunes ended on 3 sides, so it no longer felt like we were lost in the Sahara. I guess that’s all that’s accessible for a short desert trip in Morocco though, and it was still pretty awesome.

The Sahara Desert

 

no better place for a handstand

                When we got to the campsite it was getting dark, but we still had about an hour until dinner and the moon was bright enough to see pretty well, so a few of the other guys and I decided to try our luck at sandboarding under the full moon. There was a snowboard at the campsite and we took it up a tall dune, hoping to shred some Sahara pow. Unfortunately it didn’t work out quite as planned, as the friction was too much to gain much of any speed, but it was still a pretty cool experience.

Stefan with the sandboard

                For the rest of the evening we hung out around the campfire, getting to know the people from the other group who were staying at the same campsite. The full moon was so bright in the sky that it seemed like 4:20 in the afternoon all night. It was so nice outside that I dragged my sleeping pad out on the sand and slept under the stars. I woke up the next morning with perfect timing—just as the moon was setting and the sun was starting to rise. It was the second time that I had witnessed this amazing moonset/sunrise spectacle, the first being on a camping trip with some great friends in Joshua Tree, California. Both were equally amazing. I walked up to the top of the highest sand dune in sight and got to the top just as the first ray of sun broke out from behind the dunes on the horizon.

sunrise over the Sahara

                As I gazed in awe and stared for an unhealthily long time at the rising sun, I realized that the rest of the group was mounting their camels and I was about to be stranded in the Sahara (doesn’t sound that bad, really, apart from the whole lack of food and water thing). I raced down the hill in a combination of running, jumping, and sliding, and made it down just as the camels were about to take off. We rode them back to the bus and began the 11 hour drive back to Marrakech.

                Shortly after our arrival back in Marrakech, I met up with my friend Tim, who is currently working for the United Nations in Rabat, Morocco, and came down to meet up with me for the weekend. He got in pretty late so we went to sleep on the beds on the hostel roof and woke up with the decision of whether to go to the mountains or the beach. We went for the beach, because the forecast for the mountains wasn’t so great, and it ended up being a great decision. We got a bus to Taghazout, a small surfing town on the Moroccan coast.

the Atlantic coast in Taghazout, Morocco

                Upon arrival in Taghazout we headed straight for the beach—after a hot sweaty 4 hour bus ride we wanted nothing but a good swim, and we’d figure out where we’re staying later. We asked some dudes to watch our bags on the beach and ran into the water. The Atlantic currents coming down from Iceland were frigid but felt great in the hot Moroccan sun. We swam around for a few minutes until we got cold and then went back to where we left our bags, outside a little café called Rasta Pasta. At this point it must have been around 4:20 in the afternoon and we got to know the other guys at the café a little bit. A few of them spoke mediocre English and Tim was able to speak to them in French too. After a couple minutes of French that I couldn’t understand, Tim turned to me and said “dude, we got a place to stay tonight! This guy has a 4 person tent.” One of the guys at the café, a Moroccan guy named Rabie, was on a trip down the coast and was camping on the beach the whole way. He had a big tent with him and was happy to share it with other travelers.

Rasta Pasta not only has great vibes, it also has kittens

                By that time we were getting pretty hungry and we were about to order something from Rasta Pasta when Rabie told us that we didn’t need to, he had met some Germans earlier who were cooking cous cous in their hotel and were going to bring it out to the beach for us. This was the second of a string of acts of kindness that night that really gave support to the theory I’ve been developing while travelling that the vast majority of people on this planet are incredibly kind and generous. These two people, who we had never met before they brought out a giant bowl of dinner for us, and Rabie, who offered us his tent, were exactly the kind of people that make travelling so amazing. As the clock hit 4:20 in some time zone somewhere, we ate a delicious meal of cous cous with vegetables and some incredibly good Moroccan spices that made every bite taste like heaven.

After dinner it was dark out and was time to find a spot to set up the tent. We walked down the beach a ways trying to find somewhere semi-out of sight and where the tide wouldn’t flood us in the morning. As we were searching, a family came out of their beachside apartment and said something in Arabic to Rabie, which apparently translated to “hey, you guys can set up your tent on our patio if you’d like, and we’ll give you some free tea and food as well!” So, in the third amazing act of kindness of the night, we set up the tent on their patio and ate and drank tea while elevated above the stoney beach and the high tide. One of the most amazing realizations I’ve come to while travelling is that “stranger danger” is 100% a figment of overprotective suburban moms’ imaginations, but in reality, for any given stranger, there is a very good chance that they’re an incredibly kind and generous person who will be willing to help you in any way possible given the right chance.

Annika, Tim, Philipp, and I in front of the tent on some random peoples’ front porch

                The next morning we got up, had some breakfast, and went for one last swim before leaving Taghazout to head up to the next town on the coast, Essaouira. We walked down the main road a bit past Taghazout’s one block downtown and held out our thumbs to see if any friendly travelers would give us a ride up to Essaouira. In about 5 minutes a big blue Mercedes pulled up and the driver told us he could take us to Essaouira for 50 dh ($5). We figured that’s a pretty good price for an almost 2 hour drive and jumped in. The car was called a Grand Taxi, which are pretty common in Morocco, and they are regular-sized sedans which somehow manage to cram 7 people in for super cheap intercity trips. There were 3 people in the front seat jammed against the doors to leave room for the gear shift, and 4 people in the back. It was hot, smelly, and incredibly cramped, which was quite an experience. The guy next to me didn’t speak much English and what he did say in English I couldn’t understand because of his thick accent and his breath smelled so horrible that I couldn’t pay attention to anything else. He seemed strongly opposed to the idea of opening a window even though it was swelteringly hot, and started mumbling something about Allah when we asked him to open it. But after a weird 2 hour taxi ride, we paid our $5 and got out in Essaouira.

                Essaouira was a beautiful city giving off great vibes, and we wandered around the streets until we found the hostel which had been recommended to us, appropriately named “Cloud 9 Hostel”. For the rest of the evening we wandered around the beach, got hopelessly lost in the city, ate some food, and hung out with a bunch of people from my desert trip who were also in Essaouira.

castles and beaches

 

Tim and I in Essaouira

 

                The next morning Tim had to leave to go back to work in Rabat so I said goodbye to him and went to explore the city some more since I had one more day there. I didn’t do anything super exciting that day, just hung out on the beach, ate a lot of great Moroccan food, explored the market in the city, and chilled at the hostel with all of my new friends.

in Morocco it’s safe to have half of a dead cow hanging out on the street unrefrigerated

The next day I was leaving Morocco so I got a bus back to Marrakech in the morning and got on my flight to Madrid. My destination was actually Sisteron, France, where I was going to visit some high school friends, but I already had a flight booked to Madrid that I had bought for my ex-girlfriend and me before we broke up, and it was only 20 euros to get a Ryanair flight from Madrid to Marseille. I had a day in Madrid in between my flights, so I used that time to take my suitcase from my ex-girlfriend’s apartment to Matt’s apartment in Caceres. After a really awkward but surprisingly unemotional visit to Evelyn’s apartment (I think travelling cures everything), I got in a blablacar and spent the day wandering around Caceres with Matt. It was great to see him, but a few hours later I had to get back in a car headed towards Madrid to catch my flight.

I landed at Marseille airport and didn’t really want to pay for a bus or train so I thought I’d try to hitchhike to Sisteron instead. Hitching a ride from the airport took about 2 minutes but the driver was only going to Aix, a city about half an hour away. He dropped me off by the highway in Aix but it was in a spot where the highway turned the wrong way. I waited with a sign that said “Sisteron” but nobody was headed that direction that was willing to pick me up, and the better spot for hitching that direction was about a 5 mile walk. So after an hour of nobody picking me up, I gave in and got a train.

It was awesome to see Kylie and Braden, who I hadn’t seen in quite some time, and Sisteron was a really beautiful little town in the foothills of the Alps. Braden is currently teaching English in Sisteron and Kylie is living with him to get the chance to travel around Europe. We explored the town a bit, walked down by the river and climbed around on the rocks, and went to the castle on top of a cliff over the town, and cooked some dank food.

the impossibly blue river in Sisteron

 

the citadel

 

the view from the castle

 

It was great to chill out and relax for some days after such a busy few weeks and even though we didn’t really do all that much, the time went by very quickly. The next thing I knew I was leaving Sisteron, headed to Aix for the night to catch a flight early in the morning. I figured it would be much easier to hitchhike from Sisteron into the bigger city of Aix, and I was right. Literally the first car to drive by picked me up and took me about halfway to my destination. The driver didn’t speak much English but we bonded over shared music taste. He dropped me off along the highway where he was turning off and I waited there for someone else to pick me up. About a minute later, an ancient Mercedes version of a VW Bus pulled up and waved me in. The driver was an awesome dude who had spent the winter living in his van and working as a photographer/snowboard bum in the Alps. He spoke pretty decent English and we talked about music festivals and skiing for most of the ride. He dropped me off in the center of Aix where I met up with my couchsurfing host. She turned out to be a very generous person, although quite weird—basically exactly what you would expect of someone who plays Dungeons and Dragons regularly. She was very opinionated and didn’t seem to like the USA very much, but I tried not to let that bother me and was grateful for her letting me sleep in her apartment with such little notice.

The next morning I woke up early, had some baguette and jam for breakfast, and got on the bus to the airport. I was headed to Sofia, Bulgaria to start a new chapter in my adventure.

To be continued…