Essaouira, Morocco
Friday, April 10, 2015

An early start, and an early breakfast were the precursors to our day today. We had booked a day trip to Essaouira which meant getting the taxi at 8:00am. After our pleasant breakfast we eventually boarded our taxi ( rather posh people carrier thingy ) and began the 3 hour trip to the Atlantic Ocean. The driver gave a sparce but interesting commentary as we trundled along the smooth roads towards the sea. We stopped for a break after about 90 minutes and then another one an hour later.

The second stop was at a women’s cooperative which produced a type of almond oil. We were shown the process by a charming guide and then were encouraged to buy the product – it wasn’t cheap but it was a very labour intensive method. We escape with minimal outlay !

Essaouira appeared over the brow of a hill, a white jewel against the azure blue of the ocean ( please stop me if I get too poetic ). We left the taxi by the port and began a self guided tour of the self-proclaimed “Windy City of Africa” the port being literally our first port of call, a busy, smelly, noisy habour, full of blue boats and silver fish. We watched one boat being unloaded, the catch was thousands upon thousands of small mackerel, which were packed into trays and sold on the wharfside.

After filling our senses with the reek of fish we make tracks into the medina, looking for a place to eat. We settled gratefully into a small cafe and dined on fish tajine for me, beef something for Belinda and braised camel ( I kid you not ) for Lucia. We all agreed that it was pretty yummy. We then left and wandered the back streets managing to buy some pottery and getting caught up in an open air daily prayer outside the mosque ! No one was put out and we patiently waited the 10 or so minutes until it finished.

A long walk on the rather beautiful beach including running away from erratic waves which studiously ignored my commands to “Do not dare to cross this line” was followed by a swift coffee in an equally beautiful hotel before we returned to our waiting raxi for the trip home. We all manged to “rest our eyes” for a bit on the trip and arrived back at the riad in time for a quick rest before ploughing back into the warren of alleyways in search of an evening snack.

A random walk brought us out at the small square we discovered on the first day. We elected to eat at Nomad, trendy eatery in the modern Morocco/French style. The food was excellent but the service less so. We were given “second hand” bread and when this was pointed out it was met with the North African equivalent of the Gallic shrug. Won’t be going there again !

I still haven’t been allowed to buy a carpet – but it is only a matter of time.