After a lazy start, we packed up our gear and headed out to wander around the Medina again before catching up with some of the others back at the hotel at 11:30.
We decided to head to the beach, which is a short 10 minute walk, to see what it's like. There is a wide promenade which is very clean and the beach looks to be the same. At least it does at first, until you look closer and you see that there is still the problem of rubbish. The problem is that littering is so natural to Moroccans. A simple example was that we see a lady change her baby's nappy and then just leave the dirty nappy by the waters edge and walk away, leaving it to be washed out to sea. There's a lifeguard right next to her and he says nothing.
The beach itself is absolutely crowded. There's people everywhere and it stretches a good couple of kilometres from the port. Because of the high winds and very choppy seas further out, the water has a very dirty brown look to it, which I'm sure is just the sand being churned up.
They have lifeguards stationed every couple of hundred meters or so. They're not like what we see at home. It doesn't look like they're really watching what's going on. We saw some of them on their cellphones texting, playing games or talking. Or just sitting watching. They only became really active when they helped people move their stuff further up the beach from the incoming tide (and that was pretty slow too).
There was about four different games of soccer on the go at the same time. And some of the skills aren't to bad either!
We headed back to the square for some lunch before heading back to the hotel at the agreed time of 2:30. It was time to grab our bags and get on the Marrakech express - all aboard the train......(well bus actually, but that's how the song goes)
We arrived in Marrakech around 6:00pm and immediately felt the heat. The digital sign outside the train station said it was 37 degrees!
We got the best surprise when we got off the bus. There, waiting for us was our driver, Mustafa. He wasn't doing anything, so had come down to meet us to save us the hassle of organising transport to the hotel. What a great guy!
Our hotel is the Hotel Le Caspien. It's probably the nicest of the trip, so a good place to spend the last couple of nights.
We quickly checked in to Hotel Le Caspien and then jumped back into Mustafa's mini van and headed for Place Jemaa El Fna, the centrepoint of Maraakech. Wow, this place just blew me away. It's crazy, it's huge and there's people everywhere. It's literally shoulder to shoulder stuff and you need to make sure you protect your belongings from pickpockets.
As we enter the square, we were immediately greeted by snake charmers, with pythons sitting up with their wide necks flared as if ready to attack. Some of the charmers walk around carrying various types of snakes and will drapes them over you if your not looking. Of course they're looking for money, but if you ignore them and make sure they know you're not interested, they'll just head off the next unsuspecting visitor.
There are women doing henna painting, people with trained monkeys, others doing paintings and loads more. Stuck in the middle are the row and rows of eating places. Each place has their own speciality. One was cooking hooves, others on the heads of animals, there were the fish focussed ones and so on.
We headed to one that all the Intrepid travel groups use. We have a set menu which is drip fed to us - small buns with harissa sauce on the side, then the vegetables, vegetable skewers, meat skewers, chicken skewers, cous cous and frites - all very nice.
After that we wandered around the square before heading back to the hotel, about a 30 minute walk. On our way, we stopped at Dino's, the most popular gelato joint in Marrakech apparently. Turned out to be a great idea to stop - the gelato was delicious. Creme brûlée & cookies for me and chocolate, strawberry & nougat for Cindy.
Then it was back to the hotel for a good nights sleep before our last day in Morocco tomorrow. As far as the tour goes, there's nothing planned. Instead of just wandering around aimlessly we've arranged for a local guide to take us on a 2-3 hour walking tour at 9:00am.
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