Southern Excursion Recap

So I’m apologizing right now for what I anticipate will be an extremely lengthy post. I got back from Southern Excursion Friday evening and I’m still in shock over how incredible the entire week was. I rode camels in the Sahara, drove through the snowy Tizi n’Tichka (pass in the High Atlas), stayed in renovated kasbahs, drove past countless crumbling kasbahs, explored the Marrakech medina, had a cobra (that was foaming at the mouth…) lay across my shoulders in the Djemma el-Fna, and had an all-around absolutely amazing time. I’ll try to recap the trip as best as I can, but check out my pictures to get a better idea of this whirlwind week. If a picture is worth a thousand words then mine use the entire English, French, and Arabic language. I'll post the link as soon as I can get the internet to work.
We left Saturday morning and spent most of the day driving in our tour bus through the Middle Atlas with a few stopovers at places like the cedar forest (saw a tree that was over 300 years old!). There are about 28 students in the group, our Program Assistant (Nawal), another Center employee (Fayrous), one of our Academic Directors (Lahcen), the bus driver, and his assistant and we were getting in some major bonding time during the long bus rides. We spent the night at an old kasbah that had been completely renovated and was one of the most gorgeous places I’ve seen…they’re definitely picking some great hotels.
While this is mainly a vacation for us, we still have academic assignments from time to time and this includes debriefing on the previous day’s activities or presenting on a topic relevant to what we’re experiencing. I ended up having to present on almonds on the day we drove through the winding and snowy High Atlas roads while facing backwards…I think it was a miracle I didn’t get sick! We also have lectures from time to time, but it’s nothing to high-stress because they really just want us to absorb as much as we can from this trip…and let me tell you, it’s a lot to take in.
On the second day we drove some more through the mountains (had my first snowball fight in Africa!!) and arrived to Erfoud for lunch, about 80 kms from Merzouga to do our camel trek up the dunes. After eating, we loaded our small overnight bags into the Land Rovers that were waiting to take us the rest of the way to the Sahara, over the unpaved arid land. Speeding through the desert (the guy drove like you, Mom!) was one of the most exciting carefree things in the world…we’re talking “hiked-out-on-a-trapeze-on-a-catamaran” kind of happy go-lucky. When we got to Merzouga, we visited a local nonprofit called Hasi Labiad that focuses on educating women and children, and preventative measures for keeping young boys in school (Sidenote: many of them drop out to work with tourists, so when traveling it’s best to not exacerbate the problem by accepting tours from school-age boys or buying souvenirs from them. I’ve taken to giving young children pens instead of money). We then made our way over to the camels and rode them up the dunes so we could play around like little kids in a large sandbox and watch the sunset. Again, see the pictures for a better idea of what it was like! Later that night we spent the night at an auberge (their version of an auberge was a gorgeous old kasbah) in Merzouga. After dinner we had a Gnawa musical performance…Gnawa is Moroccan music with sub-Saharan influences. The next morning, we woke up before 5 am and spent an hour hiking up the sand dunes in complete darkness in time to watch the sunset from the peak of one of the higher dunes. This was definitely one of my favorite parts of the trip and while the trip up the dunes was pretty intense, it was all worth it once we saw the sun rising over what we could only assume was Algeria (I don’t think we were all that far from the border). After the early wakeup call we had, it was (I never thought I’d say this) a relief to be back on the bus…we drove by the Todra and Dades Gorges, through the Dades Valley, and stopped at, yeah you guessed it, a kasbah for lunch. Bad planning on the program’s part because the salon we ate lunch in was so comfortable that two other girls and I fell asleep for a little while, and almost missed our afternoon lecture. Don’t worry, I managed to catch a few more minutes of sleep in the Berber tent set up by the pool when they weren’t looking. Sneaky, sneaky.
In Ouarzazate we had a tea reception and dinner at Association Tishka, a girls’ high school. We actually spent the night in the dorms they had built for the girls who come from rural villages to continue their schooling. While we weren’t staying in the same area as the girls, we got to eat dinner and socialize with them throughout the evening. The verbal language barrier wasn’t as difficult to overcome as I had originally thought; some of the girls spoke small amounts of French, I spoke enough Arabic to get basics across, one or two of the girls used this opportunity to practice their English, and everyone got to polish their charades skills. We ended the night with an impromptu Moroccan dance party complete with drums and various other noisemakers (they just kind of appeared out of nowhere).
The following morning we were on our way to Marrakech through the Atlas. I can’t write anything else about this day without mentioning the fact that it was Rob’s 21st birthday...HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! Honestly, I don’t know how you’ve made it this far, but congratulations :) We spent more time in the bus today…I know it seems like we’ve been in the bus nonstop, but I’ve gotten to see so much of the varied landscape that Morocco has to offer and I know I wouldn’t have been able to see it any other way. We started that morning off in a southern oasis, had lunch in the High Atlas in the middle of a snowstorm, and arrived to Marrakesh by late afternoon.
Marrakesh has to be one of my favorite cities in all of Morocco, by far. The main square, Djemaa el-Fna, has cobras, entertainment monkeys (DON’T give them money), delicious fresh-squeezed orange juice, spicy herbal tea, and it’s basically heaven for anyone who likes to people-watch (aka me). The massive souk then stems off in various roads and alleyways off of the square, with different sections for shoes, leather, jewelry, carpets, sheepskin, wool, etc. You will all be impressed to hear that I managed to keep my money in my purse for the most part, except for one occasion when I got so caught up in the competition aspect of bargaining that I ended up with a colorful cotton and silk blanket. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love the blanket and can’t wait to put it on my bed at home, it’s just that I probably wouldn’t have bought it if that darn salesman didn’t start talking to me. I blame him. I managed to avoid the souk on the next day, and visited some of the more historical points of interest like the Koutoubia Mosque (the minaret is almost 70 meters high!), the Saadi Tombs, and the Majorelle Gardens. The Majorelle Gardens, owned by the late Yves Saint-Laurent and decorated in the Art Deco style, was one of my favorite places, besides the Djemaa el-Fna.
We finished off our Southern Excursion with a trip to Essaouira, a beach resort town about 7 hours south of Rabat (unless you’re taking public transportation…). This was a very low-key end to the adventure, and I spent most of my time walking along the beach, in the souk, and throughout the medina. Walking along the Skala (the great sea bastion a.k.a. ramparts) at sunset provided the perfect conclusion for such a sweeping tour of Morocco. After this whirlwind adventure, I was completely exhausted and slept for about 5 hours out of the 7 that we spent on the bus.Now it’s my turn to play tour guide because my grandma (Oma) is here visiting. She brought me the necessities…more hand sanitizer, travel bottles of Febreze, granola bars, and a Tide To-Go pen so I should be good to go for the next month before my parents come to visit. She also brought laundry detergent, so who knows…maybe I’ll convince Mama Z to throw some in the next load of laundry and start a trend. I’ll let you know how that goes.