Day Six - Gorges de Dadès, High Atlas Mountains to Tinghir SPONSORED BY NAJOUA AND GRAHAM JOHNSON

Monday 6th June 2010

Wow! What a day! A little bit of a shaky start when the tour of the gorges D arranged with our 'guide' was looking decidedly suspect (several guide changes and very hazy details of what we would be visiting) but he turned up trumps when he arranged for a real guide, Hamou to take us round the Gorges. What a dude, slim, fit, friendly, so knowledgeable and for the same price as our faux guide. After sorting out what tour we were after in his little office we packed into a grande taxi (literally – seven in a car meant for five) and headed up to the second of the three gorges (we were walking down to the first and the third was too far away for us to visit in one day). Our walk started at 10 am, 27km away from the little town we were staying in and lasted until 6/7ish.

From Gorges du Dadès, Morocco

We started off on the road, impressed by the magnificence of the second gorge – we only saw a little of it but it was huge, we walked down for a few minutes before turning off onto a dirt road and from there we were balancing on the little ledges surrounding the plots of farmland on the riverbed, scrambling through bushes and trees, climbing over the monkey fingers, wading through the river, jumping over the little canals which irrigated the crops and taking dips to cool down - just your average Indiana Jones'esque day, we were blissfully, childishly, pigs in shit happy.
Hamou pointed out different trees, flowers and crops, it was the first time I'd seen an almond tree, a walnut tree or a pomegranate tree and it was all amazing. We passed by some cascades which fed the river and climbed up for an amazing view out over the valley.

From Gorges du Dadès, Morocco

Another part of our tour took us through an old Kasbah which I think was still inhabited but only a few people, it was impressive – all built from mud and stones, immediately after the Kasbah were the monkey fingers or brain of the Atlas mountains, incredible.

From Gorges du Dadès, Morocco

We weren't able to walk through the first Gorge because the current was too strong but D climbed down to have a look and confirmed that it was beautiful but impassable so we headed a different way home. We made it to a small hotel in the Gorge which we had planned on staying in, and waited there for a grand taxi to take us back into Boulmaine des Dades were we thanked Hamou for his amazing tour and got the next bus out of town – onward to Todra Gorge. We arrived at Tinghir (staging point for trips to Todra Gorge) less than an hour later (love the short bus trips).

By this point the day had well and truly started to take it's toll on me and I was flaking out big style, we sorted ourselves out with a couple of terrace mattresses after a very friendly guy called Majid, asked if we needed a place to stay, we dumped our bags and the three of us headed out to find some dinner. I was so tired I could barely walk let alone help make a decision about where or what we should eat, it was all I could do to keep my eyes open to chow down some chips and a salad before thanking Majid and going to sleep on the terrace in our thousand star hotel.

Day Five - Marrakesh to the Atlas Mountains

Sunday 6th June

It's helmet day – the first time we've seen helmets on any of the moped riders.
Up and out gain by 8am in the deliciously cool air and got some bread with honey for breakfast.
We walked to Bahia Palace which was stunning. It had beautiful gardens outside and mosaic heaven inside.

From Marrakesh, Morocco

We spent about an hour there and then headed back to the main square for some mint tea and to buy olives and vegetables for our packed lunch, all of which got squeezed into a big juicy mess on the way back to the hostel and then on the way to the Cyber Park (very green and beautiful where there's an internet cafe and free internet spots in the gardens). We had a long hot walk to the bus station ending in a quick dash, packed lunch swinging from my backpack, to make our bus, which then sat in the station for a further ten minutes, fantastic.

The bus trip through the Atlas mountains was awe inspiring, the immensity in terms of size, range, rock pattern and colour was incredible. I never expected to see so many different colours and shades in a mountain range; pale mauve, dusty aubergine, dirty chocolate, deep tan, khaki green, forest green, rich marmalade and an abundance of russet earth all layered together and dusted with pale sage colour plants and dust (D said it was beige, so wrong) and along the river bed golden wheat and such bright green that it made me happy just looking at it from our passing bus. There were lots of small houses built into the mountain side made from mud and brick, all were short and square including the small restaurants with hand made coca cola sign that occasionally lined the road.

From Gorges du Dadès, Morocco

The whole place was majestic, jaw dropping and earthy. Women harvesting wheat in the small pockets of gold and chatting to each other, children were out in the street playing moved to the sides by the horns of passing cars, a group of boys were playing football in a flat patch by the road and the men were siting outside their restaurants and shops waiting for customers they could wave in (and probably over charge). The road follows the edges and curves of the mountains occasionally crossing over patches of flat land. Wow.

We decided to stay on the bus instead of getting off where we had planned to (in Ouarzazate) which meant that we arrived in Boulmaine des Dades at around 10 at night, we were greeted by an 'official government guide' at the bus stop (a big load of twaddle) and ended up on the rooftop of his cafe getting to sleep under the stars for the first time.

Day Four - Marrakesh

Saturday 5th June 2010

Up and out early – it's so cool in the morning. We found a wifi connection in a gorgeous riad, so gorgeous that it decorated the fountain in the inner courtyard with fresh blood red rose petals and the floor and walls with hand painted tiles and mosaics. We dropped our bags back at the hostel and wandered round trying to decide what to do – we'd both been reading but not absorbing any of the information in our guidebook.
On our way to find the start of the walking tour, we were briefly befriended by a young man who gave us directions to get there, he also asked if we wanted to see the tanneries. We'd seen loads of really cool photos of the tanneries so we said yes and decided to pick up our walking route later on. He passed us onto another younger man who worked at the pits and happened to be walking past us. So we followed him through the maze of streets which although weren't central, were no less crazy than the main square and arrived several minutes later at the Berber tanning pits.

From Marrakesh, Morocco

We were then passed onto another man who gave us mint 'gas masks' for the smell (some of the dips are pigeon poop) and gave us a very brief tour with equally brief explanations of the tanning process, 1 week lime dip, 1 day pigeon poop, 2-3 weeks flour dip and some time in the dyeing pit (the dye pits were all the same colour unlike the pictures we'd seen before) all in it took about 45 days for the goat, sheep or camel skins to be ready for the artisans. We were allowed to take pictures and ask some questions (although he didn't always understand or know the answer). We were then taken to a shop, naturally, where one of these artisans showed us different products from the different skins. The man we spoke to was very understanding about our non purchase of any of his products once D explained what kind of trip we were on (the non buying kind) and for how long we had to lug our backpacks round for. Once we said goodbye and left the shop, the 'tour guide' approached us again, hand out demanding money.
I have to mention again at this point that many people help or do things for others (including tourists and therefore us) without expecting or asking for any kind of payment, so it's very difficult to know when the services or help being given or offered is for free or comes with strings attached.
When we said no, because he hadn't told us before our 5 minute trip around the tannery, he insisted more and became angry, getting other people involved to whom we explained the same thing. The whole process of getting away and out of the mess took a while and a lot of repeating, we said that if he had told us before we would have been happy to pay something but he didn't and so we wouldn't, we were prepared to give him something as a token but it was rejected and eventually we were told to give back the mint gas masks and go. It left a really nasty taste in our mouths and we spoke about it for a while, I did wonder if we had done the right thing not paying him and I can honestly say it was principle that won in the end, that and his attitude which counted against him, getting nasty doesn't get you much.

We went back to Djemaa al-Fna the scenic route, the very scenic route which involved doubling and tripling back on ourselves getting very lost. We got something to eat on the way from a 'hole in the wall restaurant' which couldn't have measured more than 3x5m. The guy had some pots on a hot plate and we choose from; lentils, beans, sheep's stomach and mutton, surprisingly enough we didn't go for the stomach but what we did have was delicious (and most importantly cheap).

From Marrakesh, Morocco

We then found the Ali ben Ali ben Youssef Medersa Museum which was included in a collection of three buildings, it was interesting to walk around, but we didn't really know what we were looking at - our French being so minimal. They did have some cool tiles though.

From Marrakesh, Morocco

We got lost again, found the main square and had an orange juice and then a three hour nap.

At 7ish we went back out to the square and got some food from one of the main open air restaurants in the middle of the square. We then wandered up a long road which lead to the Ville Nouvelle (nice to get out of the Medina) looking for a beer. Not finding one, we went back to our bed and slept like hot, sweaty babies.