Journeys Near and Far

Morocco Therapy: An Antidote to the Economic Crisis

Find out what ails you!

Do you suffer from Acute Furiosis?  Miserableitis?  What about Severe Gloomalgia?

If you do, don't worry!  The Moroccan National Tourism Office has just launched a new site called Morocco Therapy, and it's sure to offer you the solution to your problems. 

I read about this clever new website in the June issue of the UK's Real Travel Magazine.  In the hopes of helping travelers beat the credit crunch, Morocco Therapy is offering bargain trips to Morocco, especially geared for UK Travelers. 

I wanted to share this with you because Morocco is one of my favorite destinations, and the site is fun and entertaining. 

You begin by taking a five-question test to determine which "illness" you suffer from -- but don't worry - it's easy.  You'll be laughing before you reach the end.  Then the site will offer some "cures" for what ails you.

According to Real Travel Magazine, Morocco Therapy will offer an array of good deals for budget-strapped consumers.  They are planning to feature more than 30 UK tour operators, as well as extra touches that add vacation value such as free spa treatments and complimentary transfers from hotels.

[Tip:  Real Travel Magazine, by the way, is fabulous.  If you live outside the UK you can subscribe to the digital version to avoid high postage costs.]

Photo:  The Drâa River Valley, Morocco

El Jadida, Morocco

A Resort for the Moroccans

Just sixty-three miles south of Casablanca lies El Jadida, a quiet beach town on Morocco's Atlantic Coast.  During the summer, city-dwellers from Casablanca and Marrakech flock here to enjoy the town's focal point --  16 kilometers of soft, sandy beach -- a nice break from the city heat. 

An elegant promenade dotted by lively cafés lines the beach, which stretches far off into the distance, becoming more deserted (and more pleasing) the further one ventures until the dunes meet a forested nature reserve.  Nature lovers will appreciate the string of lagoons 15 miles south of the city, with wetlands which are a stop for dozens of species of migrating birds.

I visited this town during the off-season, in April, when it was quiet and peaceful.  It almost seemed deserted, but it was pleasant to be somewhere so calm and relaxing after a few hectic days in Casablanca. 

El Jadida was created by the Portuguese, who built a fort here in 1502.   Four years later they expanded the fort, constructing a fortified and moated medina adjoining the harbor.  They called the town  'Mazagan'. 

After years of resisting assaults, the town fell to Sultan Sidi Mohammed in1769, and the Portuguese escaped by sea.  A new Muslim quarter was built.  The town was renamed El Jadida, meaning 'The New One', and was reconstructed by the Sultan in the early nineteenth century.

The city, almost a perfect survivor of its period, has many traces of its Portuguese past in its lanes and alleys, bastions and walls.  This has attracted a number of film directors, including Orson Welles, who filmed scenes from Othello in the fabulous Portuguese Cistern.

This stunning chamber, halfway along Rue Mohammed al Hachmi Bahbah, was built in the 16th century as the arsenal of the citadel.  Pillared and vaulted like a gothic cathedral, the cistern is illuminated by eerie shafts of sunlight that beam through a skylight.  Flooded with a few inches of water, the light creates an astounding architectural reflection -- take one look and you'll know why this astonishing setting was chosen by Welles for his film.

If you continue down Rue Mohammed al Hachmi Bahbah, you'll see Porta do Mar, the seagate through which the Portuguese governor departed for the awaiting evacuation fleet.  The wide arch, screened by an iron grill, is protected by flanking bastions.

You can climb up the Bastion de l'Ange for a nice view of the harbor and town.  The walls are lined by bronze cannons.

I didn't stay overnight in El Jadida, but rather headed south to Essaouira.  But any guidebook will have information on places to stay and eat in this amazing little town.   I used the Cadogan Guide to Morocco by Barnaby Rogerson.  The guidebook suggests you book your rooms  in advance during the summer or on weekends.

The town is easily reached by bus, train or petit taxi from Casablanca (2 hours, 30 minutes); Rabat (4 hours);  Essaouira (8 hours); and Marrakech (3 hours, 30 minutes).   

If you are in Morocco, try to include El Jadida in your travel plans -- the Portuguese Cistern alone is worth the trip!

Aït Benhaddou -- Night in the Kasbah

Secrets Hidden Amongst Ancient Walls

(This is my third post about Aït Benhaddou, an exotic Moroccan Kasbah in the Land of Mud Castles.  Missed the beginning?  My story starts here.)

My friend Fatiah and I followed our guide as we climbed Aït Benhaddou's narrow, rutted stairs to turreted rooftops, where clear sunlight captured the richly decorated towers with its warm rays, and sun-kissed fields stretched for miles to the desert beyond.

Our guide left us to daydream of the caliphs and sultans of the past, of veiled princesses and of the deeds of conquering tribes, of a time when sultans traveled from Kasbah to Kasbah with their harems and held sumptuous banquets rich with entertainments of music and dance.

Then, below in the alley, a man in a sapphirine-blue robe led his camel into the shadows, dismounted and embraced a slender, dark-eyed woman.  Reluctant to let go, they looked around anxiously -- then stole a lingering kiss in the dark.

"Utsch! Utsch!" he called as he got on the camel, coaxing it away.  The silence of the empty alleyway whispered to me of stolen kisses and secrets hidden amongst ancient walls.

After leaving the rooftops, Fatiah and I strolled to the river where we picnicked until the golden orb of the sun dipped beyond the horizon, casting shadows upon the ruined Kasbah.  Night came quickly, showering the sky with a million glittering stars that seemed so close I wanted to reach out and touch them.

Finally, we said good-bye to the crumbling remains of the mighty Caliph's palace.  In time, I knew Aït Benhaddou would become one with the desert from which it had sprung, and its inhabitants, nomads for eternity, would move on.  I, too, would have to move on, saying good-bye to Fatiah, my Aladdin, who'd given me a magic carpet ride that I'd never forget.

Where exactly is Aït Benhaddou?  If you're trying to find it, here's some help:   first, read my previous posts for the whole story.  Second, here are some statistics:  Ouarzazate is 204 km from Marrakech and 434 km from Casablanca.  To get to Aït Benhaddou, you'll need to travel by car or hire a grand taxi in Ouarzazate.  Or, you could visit the Hôtel Palais Salaam in Taroudannt, keeping your eyes open for one Abdelfatiah Khalifa, who may be pouring tea in the timeless Moroccan ritual...  And get ready for a magic carpet ride of your own!

Note:  If you want to follow in my footsteps, aside from my day-long adventure with my magic carpet-toting friend, I traveled through Morocco with a company called Adventures Abroad, and thought they did an excellent job with the tour.  Visit their website for more information!

Aït Benhaddou -- In the Time of the Caliphs

Both Old and New

Named after the Caliph Benhaddou, a royal delegate sent from Marrakech to subdue the southern Berber tribes, Aït Benhaddou (which I began to write about in my previous post), was fortified by the warlords who held sway over the High Atlas.

Until a century ago, this area was part of the lucrative trans-Saharan trade route.  Thousands of camels made the hazardous two-month journey across the Sahara to the great market towns of the Niger River -- Timbuktu and Gao -- carrying salt, dates, barley and goatskins.  On return, they brought the gold dust, slaves, ivory and ostrich feathers that made North Africa wealthy.  With the arrival of coastal shipping in the late nineteenth century, this overland route went into decline.

Now, the only reminder of these ancient caravans is a lonely road to the desert south from Ouarzazate, which snakes through the Drâa Valley oasis, then through a dramatic, desolate landscape to M'Hamid, where it ends, literally disappearing into the sands of the Sahara.

Fatiah and I had no plans to traverse the Sahara this time, and, rather than loneliness, the Kasbah exuded serenity.  We crossed the shallow, reed-strewn river on stepping stones, then walked through orchards of almond trees, entering the ancient village through a gate that still sports the gash made by the airplane Michael Douglas snatched in the movie The Jewel of the Nile.

Despite the occasional presence of Hollywood filmmakers, life still moves to an ancient beat here, where sheep and goats are kept in indoor pens.  Only ten families still live in the old village.  Most have left or moved across the river to the more accessible modern town.

We climbed the Kasbah's steeply ascending maze of alleyways, our feet raising little whirls of soft red dust.  A young djellaba-clad Berber, face shrouded in a blue veil, offered to guide us through a local home for a few dirhams, and we entered the dwelling's thick pisé walls, made of mud, mashed palm trunk and water -- the only materials at hand.  The walls rose from the earth to protect us, keeping the dwelling cool in the afternoon's blazing sun.

We followed the guide through the kitchen and then a living space lined with mats where the men sit and talk and drink tea.  In a bedroom, photos of the late Moroccan king hung on mud walls beside a "Cinéma Sahara" poster of Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet from the movie Titanic...

Read the last part of my visit to Aït Benhaddou...

Aït Benhaddou -- Morocco's Kasbah of Dreams

In the Land of Mud Castles...

Abdelfatiah Khalifa would have been equally at home in an indigo robe with a black cotton chêche wrapped around his head as he was in his Levis and faded T-shirt.  I watched him, bronzed and darkly exotic, as he deftly maneuvered our jeep along the rutty Ouarzazate road.

Fatiah worked in the Hôtel Palais Salaam in Taroudannt, Morocco, where we'd met when he'd prepared me a cup of tea in the timeless Moroccan ritual -- pouring the tea over a chunk of sugar, holding the kettle a foot above my glass to give the brew the required head.

"I'd like to see Aït Benhaddou," I'd told him.

"In the land of mud castles?"  he'd asked.  "I can take you there."

I'd smiled, imagining my own private Aladdin whisking me off on a magic carpet ride to Moroccan Kasbah country.

A bump in the road jolted me from my reverie as we rounded a grove of date palms and, there, like a great mirage, a honey-colored Kasbah rose from the shimmering sand, resembling a palace out of the Arabian Nights.   I was smitten by the numbing beauty of Aït Benhaddou.

This UNESCO-listed world heritage Kasbah, just east of Ouarzazate (pronounced Wahr-za-zat), rests at the foot of the Atlas Mountains near Morocco's Dades Valley, aptly named "The Valley of a Thousand Kasbahs." 

Now that I was here, I understood why Hollywood directors have chosen this site for filming time and again.  Aït Benhaddou's stark beauty is so spellbinding that more than twenty movies have been filmed here, including Lawrence of Arabia, Jesus of Nazareth, Jewel of the Nile, The Man Who Would be King, and the recent blockbuster, Gladiator.

We walked towards the pebbly river Ounil while the sun rose high in the cerulean sky, painting the landscape in the muted shades of the desert -- salmon, dusty pink and tawny gold.  Across the river the Kasbah's chaotic jumble of red-ochre dwellings seemed to spill down the rocky bluff, coming to rest at the village's outer walls...

To be continued in my next post!

If you're interested in Morocco, read my posts about Essaouira, Morocco's peaceful seaside town, and see Essaouira in pictures.   Or check out my story on GoNomad.com to learn more about Aït Benhaddou and the surrounding area.

Africa's Windy City -- Essaouira, Morocco

Essaouira,  Morocco, the peaceful seaside town I started to write about in an earlier post, is known for its crescent beach and interesting medina filled with stonework and blue-shuttered houses.  In this city, with its windy but mild weather, all the main tourist attractions can be reached by foot.  Essaouira is attracting more and more tourists, in addition to fishing and small handicraft industries.

The town promotes itself as "Windy City, Africa"; indeed, the wind, known locally as the alizee, can be fierce, but the waves it creates are coveted by surfers and windsurfers. 

We stayed at the Hotel de Iles, which was conveniently located outside the medina and across the street from the beach and had bungalow-style rooms built around a large swimming pool.  Each night the wind howled outside my window, as if to tell me it was still there.  Each morning, I awoke to the call of the muezzin, which reminded me that I was in exotic Africa and an exciting new day was beginning.

The town began in the 8th century as a small Phoenician settlement, but it wasn't until the 15th century that the Portuguese occupied it and built the fortifications around the harbor.  They called it "Mogador," from the Berber word amegdul, meaning "well-protected."  The town was abandoned in 1541.  It declined until 1765, when the Alawite sultan Sidi Mohammed Ibn Abdellah transformed it and it became an important commercial port.  Following Moroccan independence from France in 1956, the town was named Essaouira, which comes from the Arabic es saouira, meaning "fortified place."

Since the 18th century, Essaouira has drawn poets, scholars and craftsmen from all over Morocco.  This was evident throughout the medina as we explored art galleries and wood workshops and examined wares such as carpets and silver jewelry.

A highlight of our stay was a visit to the Sidi Mohammed Ibn Abdellah Museum, which features extensive displays of Moroccan handicrafts and marquetry, a craft in which the burls of thuja, an African tree, are inlayed with citron, wood, walnut, ebony, mother-of-pearl, and silver and copper wire.  Fascinating! 

And one last little tidbit of information for this post... in the 1960s, the town attracted many hippies and their icons, including rock star Jimi Hendrix, whose song "Castles in the Sand" was inspired by the buried ruins of an 18th-century palace on a beach south of town.

To see a more photos of Essaouira, look here.

Morocco's Peaceful Seaside Town

Looking through some of my photos from the North African Kingdom of Morocco last night, I came upon a picture of this cat, sleeping peacefully on a merchant's pile of rugs in the midst of the Essaouira Medina.   

Essaouira (pronounced ess-ow-EE-ra), is a peaceful seaside town situated on Morocco's Atlantic coast north of Agadir, and it's the perfect place to experience the mystique of Morocco without the hassles.   Here, life and hustlers move more slowly than in larger Moroccan cities and tourists can browse shops without feeling harassed.

I found this gentle city -- which is amazingly inexpensive, safe and exotic -- to be one of the most relaxed, likable resorts I visited in Morocco.  Surrounded by whitewashed walls and fringed by the waters of the Atlantic Ocean, Essaouira is especially popular with independent travelers and in-the-know Europeans.  Yet it still remains largely undiscovered by most travelers.

To find out what there is to see and do here, keep a lookout for more posts about this serene Moroccan city.  I'll also continue writing about India and many other places.

Meanwhile, look here for more photos of Essaouira!