Morocco – The Land of the Berbers (3 of 4)

The Land of the Berbers
Morocco

Camel Trek, Dunes of Merzouga
photo by Kristin Piljay





After breakfast, we rode back to the town, met our bus again and were on our way to our second adventurous evening in another desert. We drove through a wasteland with the appearance of having no life around whatsoever. Desolate, grey and dry – it was rather uninviting. Then we finally approached Erfoud and later, Merzouga, where the large dunes of the Sahara begin. These dunes were amazingly beautiful – sculpted by the wind into a sweeping vista of sand hills, rising and falling, always changing. This camel ride was softer due to the sand dunes, while our previous one was much more ‘bouncy’ and caused a little bit of pain for us on the return ride. We were dreading another camel ride, but this one didn’t hurt at all. It was shorter too, about one hour. Couldn’t be much longer than that or we’d end up in Algeria, which is definitely NOT a place to be right now.

This experience was similar to the previous evening, with music and dinner and waking up at dawn the next day. This time I slept in the tent, but it was much warmer anyway. We rode back to the hotel by the dunes where we left Lausan and returned to the road. This day took us through the Todra Gorge (kind of disappointing if you ask me) and to the village Tinnehar, where we visited a kasbah and a carpet factory. They gave us the hard sell and I ended up buying a small, red Berber carpet. At the end of our trip, all three of us ended up with carpets!

We then proceeded to the Dades Gorge, and wow, is this place beautiful. It was one of the most incredible landscapes I saw in Morocco. Rocky cliffs with perched villages, green, lush valleys, bordering on paradise. We stayed in a hotel that night, and had a much-needed shower. We left the next morning for our return to Marrakesh, stopping in Oarzazate on the way to visit a kasbah and serpentinely wound through the High Atlas mountains once more – my favorite part. We were planning on leaving for Fes that evening with a night train, but found out from our German friends, Anne and Andreas that there was a one-day trip to the Cascades d’Ouzoud. These are beautiful waterfalls about 167km from Marrakesh. Tiina had really wanted to see these, so we thought, why not, and stayed another night at Hotel Ali. We went for one day to the falls, and it was quite worth it. They were amazingly beautiful and we enjoyed our day there, hiking around the falls and having a picnic beside them.

We returned once more to Marrakesh and then left for Fes. I was under the impression that there was a couchette on the night train to Fes. Oh, but no, there wasn’t. But at least there were only four of us in the car, so we could get some sleep (or sort of sleep).

Fes was the most ambivalent time of our trip. I had been to Morocco three years ago and Fes was the first place I visited. I was amazed by it, the medina particularly, it seemed like a medieval village – a place lost in time. That was my first impression. My second impression was that I actually preferred the medina in Marrakesh this time around, and that Fes didn’t seem so special after all, in comparison to other places we’d been. Worst of all, the guides hassling you in Fes were unbelievably irritating. It practically ruined our experience there and even set us at odds against one another!

The “faux” guides (meaning they’re not official guides) in the medina, offer their services to you, but even if you say ‘no’, they don’t go away but continue following you. After Janet and Tiina, continually telling him to leave, he started becoming abusive and we only got rid of him by finally hiring another faux guide who was a little less aggressive and nicer. We arranged for him to guide us again the next day, but after only about one hour this ended, as we got in an argument with him for taking us to the wrong tannery. This was when we all became angry and were even upset with each other. At the time, I just felt like returning the hotel and sitting on the terrace and reading in peace. I had had enough of that BS.

Slowly we calmed down and by asking directions found ourselves heading toward the big tannery we had wanted to see in the first place. We ran into a young girl (10 years old) who said she’d take us to the tannery. She met a friend a little later and then we had two young girl guides. After this experience, I wish we always had girl guides. They were much easier to deal with than their male counterparts (although other boy children were fairly easy to deal with as guides too). One of the girls invited us to her home and we visited there, having tea with her family. They showed us photos of their family and were quite welcoming.