The Rest of Marrakech

One of the great things about Morocco as far as North African countries go, is that the second language there is French.  This may not seem that exciting since I don’t actually speak French, but I do know a little bit and French is sure a heck of a lot easier to understand than Arabic.  It’s actually written in the Roman alphabet!  Plus, there are also quite a lot of people in Morocco who speak English as well, at least in the tourism industry.

On my second full day in Marrakech, I finally got the chance to see the insides of some places, including two of the old palaces and the Museum of Marrakech.  The first palace I went into was the El-Badi Palace, which I had not been able to find the entrance to the day before.  This was an older building constructed at the end of the 16th century so much of it was in ruins.  It was built by the sultan to celebrate the victory over the Portuguese Army in the Battle of the Three Kings.  They seemed to be doing quite a bit of work to try to fix it up so that made it a bit more difficult to get around.

The second palace I went to was the Bahia Palace, which was quite a bit newer having been built in at the end of the 19th century like most of the Arab palaces in Morocco.  The ornate courtyards were filled with trees, flowers and fountains and there were quite a few students there sketching different architectural elements of the building.  Most of the signs were only written in Arabic and French so that was fun for me to try to figure out what the heck they said.

After lunch, I walked over to the Museum of Marrakech, which is also located in an old 19th century palace that has been renovated.  Since I had a bit of trouble finding the place as I wound my way through the narrow streets of the old Medina, I let some young kids show me the way.  When we arrived I gave them a very small tip and they seemed rather disappointed, but since I only had large bills otherwise, I just ducked into the museum courtyard before they could put up too much of a fuss.  One whole section of the museum featured mostly contemporary Moroccan art and the rest focused on traditional handicrafts and artifacts, such as jewelry, pottery, fabrics and weapons. 

I had purchased a three attraction pass at the museum so after browsing through the exhibits and having a cup of tea, I walked right next door to the Qoubba Almoravide.  The Quobba is a kiosk featuring a cupola decorated with interlaced stucco work built in the 12th century.  The site was pretty small so it didn’t take me that long to walk through it before I headed over to the Madersa Ben Yousseff just down the street.  I had just about half an hour before it closed so I went first into open courtyard with its long reflecting pool and then climbed the stairs and walked down the long corriders lined with small rooms used by students for studying.  The Madersa is the largest Koranic school in the Maghreb, but I don’t believe it is still in use.  It was dinnertime by the time I left so I stopped at a small local place to eat before heading back to my hostel for the night.

On Friday, I had a mission to replenish my supply of US dollars because I knew I would need them down the road when applying for visas in various countries.  My plan was to cash a few traveler’s checks that were issued in US currency, which I didn’t think would be too big of a challenge.  I started out by going to all the banks near Jemaa El-Fna Square, but none of them would take the checks.  They all told me that I instead had to go to the hotel at the end of the street.  I had no idea which hotel they were referring to so after trying a few different spots as well as a few more banks, I finally found the right place.  I explained to the guy that I needed dollars, but he said that he would first have to change the currency into Moroccan dirham and then change them back into dollars.  I told him that was fine since I didn’t have any other choice, but I ended up losing 30 bucks in the process.  Talk about frustrating!

By the time I had dealt with my money exchange, I was ready for lunch so I went to a place near the square and then walked over to the Dar Si-Said Museum.  I only had about 45 minutes to walk around before it closed, but luckily it wasn’t too large so I was able to get through the whole thing.  It is housed in a building constructed in the same architectural style as the Bahia Palace with a nice garden courtyard in the middle.  Like the Museum of Marrakech it displays traditional Moroccan carpets, pottery, weapons and jewelry, though from an earlier period of time.

Once I left the museum, I planned to head to the Garden of L’Agdal, which borders the Dar el-Makhzen Royal Palace, since my map indicated that it was open on Friday afternoons.  When I got close to the palace (where I made sure not to take any photos) I saw some cars and motorbikes going through an opening in the gate.  However, that only ended up leading to a road that went through the garden, which was walled off on every side.  I kept walking in the hopes that I would eventually get to a spot where I could go in, but I got to the end of the wall without ever finding an entrance.  I knew it would be getting dark soon so I realized I had to give up my quest.  As I was trying to determine the best way to get back to the Medina, a middle-aged Moroccan man approached and tried to give me directions.  He told me he would show me the way as soon as he had unlocked his bicycle.  I told him it was fine, that I would just walk, and then continued on my way until he caught up to me a minute or two later.  He started walking his bike and I had no choice but to respond perfunctorily to his questioning.  I was afraid he would expect me to give him money even though I clearly did not ask for a guide (letting someone walk beside you as you head in the direction you’re already going can be the equivalent of hiring a guide in Morocco.)  He did ask me if I wanted to come to his house for dinner, but I told him I had an appointment to meet a friend, which wasn’t entirely untrue.  Eventually he sped off on his bike in a different direction saying he also had an appointment to make (so then why did he ask me to dinner??)

I walked back the rest of the way on my own, past the Koutoubia and into Jemaa El-Fna Square.  Shortly after I arrived, Teresa from Austria also returned after spending two days in the coastal town of Essourias with some German travelers who had also stayed in our hostel.  We ended up eating dinner together on the rooftop balcony of one of the restaurants lining the square.  We hit a bit of a language barrier when Teresa and I both thought they were trying to tell us they wouldn’t have any food until the following day. Instead they were just saying their menu wasn’t going to be printed until the following day so they couldn’t show us the list of dishes.  After clearing up the confusion we were successful in ordering and eating couscous with chicken, in spite of the missing menu.  On the way back to the hostel we stopped in the square for tea and henna tattoos, which we probably seriously overpaid for (the tattoos, not the tea) but I’m sure the woman who did them could use the extra money so I suppose it’s okay.

Teresa flew back to Spain on Saturday morning so I was on my own again for my last full day in Marrakech.  She had said really good things about Essourias, as had the other two girls from Austria, so I decided I would try to go there for the day since I had seen most of what I wanted in Marrakech.  I made the somewhat foolish decision that I would walk to the bus station, which was right next to the train station.  It was a good walk, but it took me much, much longer than expected.  More than an hour later I finally arrived only to discover that the next bus after the 11:30am bus I had already missed, wasn’t until 3:00pm.  That meant I would be getting to Essourias at 6:00pm just as it was starting to get dark.  I realized there was no point in trying to make the three-hour trip just to turn right around so I had to remain in Marrakech for the day.

I was in a newer, more modern part of town near the Royal Theater so I found a sidewalk cafe across the street from the theater and sat down there for a leisurely lunch.  Since I no longer really had any place to be, I figured I might as well relax and enjoy my day.  After I ate, I walked to the Menara Park, which had been recommended to me by the manager of my hostel.  There’s a large, though rather dirty, reservoir right in the middle where some young Moroccan kids were actually swimming.  I circumnavigated the pool and then found some shade under an olive tree where I lay down and fell asleep for a while.

After resting a bit, I headed back toward the Medina, hoping to make it to the Saadiens Tombs as my last stop of the day.  I knew the general area where the tombs were located near the La Kasbah Mosque.  However, I neglected to notice that they were right next to the mosque and instead thought they were located somewhere deep in the winding maze of the Medina.  In spite of asking multiple people, I got hopelessly lost and couldn’t find the tombs amongst any of the little streets where I thought they were located.  I came back out of the maze and walked to the mosque where I saw a door that was set back a bit with a sign on the front for the tombs.  Of course, by the time I had actually found the right place, the tombs had closed just minutes before.  Since they opened again at 9:00am, I thought I may have time to return the next day before heading to Casablanca, but of course that never ended up happening.

I went back to my hostel and told Ali who was working there that I wanted to go to a hammam bathhouse.  He asked if I wanted a tourist hammam or a local hammam, which he said would be much less expensive.  I opted for the local hammam and he suggested one right outside the riad.  Though I’m really glad that I decided to brave the local place, it was very clearly for Moroccans and not at all for tourists.  There wasn’t really even a steam room, just old cavern-like spaces with tiled floors where the locals filled buckets with hot water from the tap.  I was able to put on a bathing suit bottom, but didn’t wear anything on top.  I found it so interesting that women who are so concerned with staying completely covered up out in public, feel perfectly comfortable just bearing it all amongst each other in a “semi-private” place.  A larger, middle-aged Moroccan woman placed a mat for me to plop down right on the floor and then scrubbed me all over with an abrasive loofah, shampooed my hair and finally rinsed me off with water from the bucket.  There would be entire stretches of time where she would get completely distracted and start chatting away with the other women in the room in Arabic.  It felt a bit odd to have this stranger pulling me in closer to her straddled legs so she could more easily scrub away at me, but I know she didn’t mean anything by it.   It was definitely an experience that I won’t soon forget.

On my way out of the baths and back to the hostel, I stopped at the local food stand where I ordered another delicious liver-and-brains ground beef sandwich to have for a late dinner.  The next morning, I was so busy trying to send e-mails and arrange a hotel in Casablanca that I didn’t make it to the tombs before I had to catch an 11:00am train.  I did have it together enough that I was able to take a public bus to the station instead of having to flag down a cab.  On that note, I bid farewell to Marrakech and set off toward Casablanca.