Ryanair

We are just arranging our autumn trip with some friends who would arrive Malaga-Marrakesh with Ryanair. They have done wonders for tourism and there was a blissful year when they flew Liverpool-Agadir which ended, allegedly when the morrocan government subsidy finished.

However I found this link on Tripadvisor and had to share it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPyl2tOaKxM

Marrakesh Gardens - The Marjorelle

We pass through Marrakesh frequently. After Taroudant we are unimpressed by the "genuine" "moroccan" tourist atractions  or the frenetic activity of the souks and Jemaa el Fna but we relish the restaurants in Gueliz, particularly the Casanove, and , if sweetheart is with us, the Vietnamese on the Boulevard Mohammed Zerktoun. Also my pet passion is the gardens of which the city has  several.

Louis Marjorelle was the son of the famous art nouveau furniture makers (try the Louvre for some spectacular examples). He became a painter, took himself off to Marrakesh and made a garden which was then outside the city but has since been enveloped by it. It is an interesting and striking garden and seems to have acted as a template for other schemes round the country but like other painters' gardens (Giverny comes to mind) not really a plantsman's although the planting is of course the antithesis of your standard Gertrude Jekyll/Edward Luytens english garden.

The garden is based on strong lines and very strong painted colours on walls and pots. The predominant colour is generally described as cobalt blue although it reminds me of International Klein Blue. It is a colour which does not translate to our dim northern light but is vibrant and ubiquitous in  morocco and close to the traditional blue of the Toureg. Together with yellow and orange it is in contrast to the deep greens of the foliage, although this is by no means a green garden ,there are bright blossoms which remain in flower most of the year round. It is strange to see plants such as Kalinchoe and Begonia Rex which are small pot plants in the UK growing as huge almost weed-like thugs.

After Majorelle's death the garden was taken over and restored by Yves St Laurent and his partner and he brought a replica to Chelsea in 1997 which caused a sensation. There is now a memorial to him in the garden.  There is a pavilion usually containing a small museum of Marjorelle's collection of exquisite moroccan handicrafts and an exhibition of his paintings. Last time we were there it had been replaced by a temporary exhibition of YSL's couture designs -no photos allowed unfortunately.  It made me very discontented, wanting to be 40 years younger, 6" taller and size 10......Well one can dream.

Windy Kaouki

Sidi Kaouki is about 20km south of Essaouira and one of the few places for a day trip. It is not much developed but has a good beach with camel rides. Its main attraction is that it is very windy ( with attendant wind turbines) and so is established as the best place for kite-surfing but only for the very experienced.

Essaouira - The Windy City

Essaouira is everybody's favourite Moroccan town. This is partly because it is half an days drive from Marrakesh and in summer is welcomingly cool with a breeze after the frying pan of the city.For me it is pleasant enough for a day or two and a couple of excellent fish dinners but as I am not a  beach person the attraction palls after a couple of days because it is a way from anywhere else and the wind gets irritating. It has an old town with a walled medina and souk, cheaper and friendlier than Marrakesh and a long sandy beach fronted by upmarket european hotels with swimming pools. It is a seasonal resort like Rhyl and definately is down in winter. However it was February when we first went there and walked into the Sofitel without a booking, got the best 1st floor centre rooms overlooking the beach and experienced the most wonderful sunset from the balcony.

Jimi Hendrix stayed there for a few days in 1970 and hippy wannabees and surfer types still make the pilgrimage and take rooms in the medina. There is an artists' colony and many galleries and vegetarian restaurants but the majority of the people live a little inland in the newtown where are such essentials as Marjane and Kitea but few tourists. The advantage over the medina is that one can use a car and park it.

The height of the Essaouira year is the music festival in July featuring the best of African music,mostly free in the square. The town is full to bursting and as you drive in you are met by young men waving keys, indicating they will rent out a room or roof for latecomers to sleep in. The Sofitel is entirely booked up by the organising committee and artists but booking early does not always guarantee of bagsing a good room - see my review of the Hotel des Iles on TripAdvisor. One of the best spinoffs of the festival  is that there is a quite excellent small record shop selling all my favourite griot artists with a very knowledgeable young proprietor.

The walls next to the sea are quite spectacular and were used by Orson Welles as a set for Othello.You can fish off them and there is a port area with booths selling fried fish and prawns straight off the boat.

More upmarket is the Cafe de Plage, a wooden structure built in the 19C and cantilevered over the beach with spectacular views over the sea which swishes beneath at high water. The food is french cuisine, specialising in seafood, and extremely good - worth the trip up for an overnight from Taroudant.

View from Cafe de Plage, Essaouira

Lunch, Cafe de Plage, Essaouira

  

Sea of Sand

South of Zagora the road continues to Mohammed. Generally the tourists do not go that far but there are numerous trips from Zagora to around Tinfou to see the "sea of sand" which is what we think of as the true Sahara.

First the road passes throughTamegroute where we stopped to see the library. I did not know it at the time but the library forms part of a renowned zaouia founded in the 17C by Abou Abdullah Mohammed Naciri whose sufi brotherhood maintain it to this day. It is very influential in the Draa , traditionally being a source of dispute resolution between caravanniers. The zaouia ministers to the poor and in fact maintains a group of people suffering from mental disorders and learning disabilites. They are nursed by the routine and thinking on a particular sura of the koran or a sufi teaching story rather than being given drugs and the only income to sustain them comes from donations so remember this if you view the library. The custodian there will show you the books for a donation. There are still several thousand although many have been dispersed to other religous foundations. The books are extremely old and are valuable for their religous content, including many ealy commentaries on the Qu'ran and histories of Islam made as early as the 11C. There are also works on astronomy, herbals and a 15C street-map of Alexandria. Islamic scholars travel from all over the world to read them. The books are handwritten mostly on gazelle skin - British Library eat your heart out.

Tamegroute also has a small pottery producing characteristic green-glazed ware which it is developing with the increased tourist  interest.

About another 15km south you come to Tinfou which is where the sandunes start. There are numerous tours from Zagora both by 4x4 and camel taking you into the dunes and to camp (somewhat luxuriously) under the stars in the desert. In fact if you park by the road in near Tinfou and climb the dune you can see one of the camps beneath you. Presumably the tour approaches by a much more circuitous route to enhance the feeling of isolation whilst of course supplies can be brought in relatively easily from the road.

This is still a launch-point fro trade and smuggling into Mauretania through the supposedly closed borders and given the situation in the Western Sahara and parts of Mali it is to be supposed that the occasional arms deal follows the caravanserai route. Plus ca change....

The road to Timbuctoo

If instead of going east from Ouazazate you go south down the Draa valley you enter the land of caravans, Beau Geste and the foreign legion.

The metalled road to Mohammed is only as old as the century and guidebooks lament its draw of the population from the old pise houses on the pistes of the palmeries to modern concrete homes with electricity and by the road but I know which I'd prefer particularly as cycling along the road would allow my children to get an education.

Initially the road leaves Ouazazate passing over the Anti-Atlas again the mountains getting progressively more barren and the contrast with the river and the palmeries more pronounced. Here the main tourist baits as at Tinehir are the carpets woven by the women and sold through cooperatives ( professional hitch-hikers invite you to their home to see the women weave and perhaps to sell you a carpet; all westerners want a carpet) but eventually it breaks through into the Draa valley proper and everything changes. The land is now bare stony desert except for the oases of which there are several and it is boxes of dates which are being sold to you by the small boys standing by the road. The valley is flat, crisscrossed by pistes and littered with Ksaurs; the river snakes through and the date palms line the river and protect the green palmeries. The effect is magical; probably more Arabian Nights than Arabia. 

Many of the Ksaur and Kasbahs have been turned into Hotel/Restaurants and it is from here that any reasonbly tall young man associated with the tourist industry or carpet trade will be dressed in full Toureg blue costume complete with curved dagger. The effect is probably most western women's  romantic ideal. Eventually you arrive at Zagora. This was an important centre for the French administration during the "protectorate" and the traditional departure point for camel caravans across the Sahara. The famous "Timbuctoo 52 days" sign has gone in the building of the new administrative offices, recognisable as such to a bureaucrat such as myself without any identifying signage but outside a large concrete replica sign has been erected, doubtless to facilitate the taking of snapshots by the growing number of tourists bussed in from Ouazazata and Marrakech.

Zagora has a twice weekly market and a growing number of hotels providing comfort, swimmng pools, and the true morrocan experience with romantic lighting and traditional musicians. It will also sell you a trip further into the desert.



Camels on the road to Zagora



The Dades Valley

If you continue east from Ouazazate parallel to the Atlas you follow the Dades Valley, first through Skoura and then to el-Kalaa M'Gouna. This area is famous for its roses; a traditional industry founded on the Damascene rose reportedly  brought back by soldiers returning from fighting the crusaders. (Sometimes you just want the myths to be true). If you visit as we did in late May /early June, the harvest season you won't see a single rose on a bush. They are hand-picked in bud at the crack of dawn. But if you go to the market you will see the wholesalers with their scales weighing sacks of the dried buds from the locals and pouring them into huge piles. They will happily sell you a bag, probably at a huge markup but it is a wonderful  way to buy pot pourri. The roadside is littered with shops selling rose products; shampoos, soaps and potions of the most shocking pink hue, they must surely contain a colouring agent banned in the EU, and rosewater and essential for cooking , baking, and re-aromatising your potpourri.

If you continue you come to Boulme el Dades where the Kasbah is a comfortable Hotel but to Beloved 's despair appeared to be an entirely dry town, and then beyond that you come toTinerhir, a centre for local carpets and leading to the entrance to the gorge. Take off you shoes and wade through the cold , cold water such a welcome contrast to the blistering sun, the shadow of the walls providing welcome shade. It isn't the grand canyon but it is truly spectacular.



Sunset from Boulme el Dades Kasbah




Dades Valley




Dades Valley




Dades Gorge




Dades Gorge




Dades Gorge




Dades Gorge




Dades Gorge





Dades Gorge