So ... Morocco

Gerry was 40 this year. I will be 40, and also felt some 'event' to recognise the fact that I finally got my M.Sc. was in order. Opinions will forever remain divided as to whether the wives in question were sacrificially allowing their husbands get away for a few days, or sending their husbands away to get their mid-life crises over with!. Either way, after weeks of gear collecting, organising and a little hiking in preparation, we headed to the airport on the Sunday morning, stopping at Gerry's to pick him up and organise the gear into bags. At the airport Zeph made a strong case to be allowed come as our handluggage.

The flights were uneventful until we were nearly at Marrakech. Then the pilot announced that there was a storm over the airport, so we were going to circle for the foreseeable future and hope it went away. I guess it did as we landed about 45 minutes later. A shared taxi brought us into the centre of Marrakech.

My memory of arriving in Marrakech is bedlam! It was dark, and althoguh we were close to the central square, we couldn't see it, or any other landmark, street sign or anything else to identify where we were. But there were people everywhere, many clamoring to get our attention, shop windows galore, gaudy signs and general hustle and bustle. We were wandering up the road, vainly trying to get our bearings, and waving off the folks looking for our money under a variety of pretexts, when one young man waved a little sign and tried to convince me to come to his hotel. I was busy waving him off, explaining that we already had a booking, when I saw the name - Riad Agnaou - the same hotel as we had already booked! I thanked him and allowed him to lead us down a little alley, where sure enough, was our hotel.

After finding our rooms and dumping the gear, we headed out for some food. The main square (d'Jemma al Fna - hereafter called Jemma) had been recommended as the pace to go so off we went. Again: organised chaos, people everywhere, shops, stalls and eateries all competing for our attention. Great fun, so we wandered for a while, checking out the souks and the square before settling on one food stall which seemes to be mainly for locals. The delicacy plate was sheeps brains and tongue, but we also managed a plate each of 'normal' meat to have with our bread. And little glasses of sweet tea of course.

(Brain photo to be added!)

And back to the hotel to get some sleep.