Morocco - Marrakech

Let’s start from our late arrival to the Riad Dar Saad. The taxi left us on a narrow street in the quarter of Medina (old town) and we winded our way to our riad without a bigger hassle. What’s enchanting about Marrakesh is that in the end of a small bland alley you may open a door to an oriental paradise- and this is exactly what we did: entered a small fairytale. 

The lady in the riad welcomed us with fresh pastries and delicious mint tea, which we enjoyed in the lounge that was filled with elegant Moroccan decor. To our surprise she gave us a tour of the entire place, ending it to our very own suite- Chiba. So we’ve seen some nice hotels in our days, but this just blew our minds in its cultivated beauty: Berber carpets, crafted mirrors, colorful textiles, dim lamps and even rose petals in the bathroom- every smallest detail was set up so carefully. We had our own spiral staircase leading to our private rooftop patio, where we could chill the day away…

Of course the hospitality didn’t end there. Not only did they cook for us a traditional tajine (slow-cooked stew served from a tajine pot) dinner upon our late night arrival, the next morning we could choose when and where to have our breakfast served.  

Talking about the rooftop terrace- it definitely had the charm of its own- we knew we were right in the middle of medina, yet it was oh so peaceful. If you would ever get tired of getting lost in the souks, you could just climb up to the roof and forget about the street fuss. If that wasn’t magical enough, once we heard the Muezzin’s call for prayer, it made it even more surreal…

We twisted and turned our way through the souk to meet up with our polish friends, Aga and Jacob, on the Jemaa el-Fnaa square (the biggest square in the African continent). We grapped some freshly brewed orange juice on the market place and made our way to the Koutoubia Mosque. 

Eventually the day got so hot that we wanted to hide ourselves to the labyrinthine souk. We totally let ourselves go and got lost to its fascinating narrow alleys, and visited its famous Souk des Teinturiers (The Dyers Market). As the name suggests, we could see tons of colors on every material possible. We were all bewitched by everything we encountered, and snapped photos like the most maniac Japs (no offense!). 

Finally we recognized a familiar corner and we were back to our riad to escape the heat. Cooled local wine (yes, most definitely the best riad in town), shaded rooftop patio and new great friends to share it all with- we were in for a rare treat. 

Later on we got on a horse carriage that took us outside the city walls and further out towards La Palmeraie (Palm grove) via a luxurious residential area inhabited mainly by rich sheiks and government officers. On the palm field we got to make friends with camels and snap some photos of the sunset. 

One of the must sees on our list was to experience the Jemaa el-Fnaa square by night. As the night falls, the square comes alive: endless food-stalls, tons of people and mystical smoke that vanishes into the night sky…

That night we had reserved a table in an upscale riad to get a taste on the Maroccan gastronomy. We dined in the inner garden under the stars and by now it was already quite clear to us that the Moroccans knew exactly how to create a perfect atmosphere! Not to mention the food was delicious...

The next morning, or say, the day, was for sure unforgettable. We hang out on the main market square to wait our friends to arrive, and took off to a small alley leading us to the El Badi Palace and the Royal Palace (Dar el Makhzen). As we stood by the entry, we suddenly heard a massive explosion. We all rushed out to the street to see what had happened- but couldn’t see anything being out of place. Everything and everyone seemed to go on about their lives just as they had few minutes ago, so we just shrugged it off and got inside the palace. The architecture was just amazing, again, with such details that it was hard to believe someone did all that…but just a moment later Aga’s phone went off: it was her mum calling from Poland who apparently was watching Reuters News about bomb explosion in Marrakesh…but wait, as in HERE?!  Quickly we realized that the sound we had heard about half an hour earlier was the explosion that was now broadcast all over- we panicked. Still, nothing special on the streets and no one seemed to care about it, so we had hard time believing something had actually happened. Jacob’s dad, a polish ambassador, was also keeping us posted on whatever was going on. We then ran into some familiar faces from our Toubkal expedition who told us they saw everything: the 2^nd floor of a restaurant terrace on the Jemaa el-Fnaa square had blown off with devastating consequences. But it was rumored that it was just another gas explosion (which are unfortunately pretty common in buildings) but we decided to stay away from the scene anyway.

City Gate Bab Agnaou

With a sense of obscurity we headed out of the town to spend our afternoon in the Majorelle Garden, which is a botanical garden, partially owned by the late Yves Saint-Lorent. It was also possible to visit The Islamic Art Museum there, which exhibits everything from ceramics to paintings. We chilled in the garden with a bag of local pastries and tried to make a best of it, although none of us could stop thinking of what had just happened…

Later we had to get back to the town, and it wasn’t until then that Denis’ colleague from France sent us a text asking if we were OK. We didn’t know why he was so worried until he redirected us to the French newspaper article about a bomb attack in Marrakesh. We couldn’t believe it and we got to the square. The crowd was insane with police and security everywhere we looked…and the scene of terror was inevitably there- the whole place had been blown up into million pieces, with nothing left but white-men going through the ruins. We couldn’t stop but thinking we had been waiting for Aga and Jacob in front of that place just about half an hour before this had happened…we were all in slight shock. 

Not feeling very comfortable in doing anything after that, we decided not to let it take over our last night together in the otherwise so peaceful place. We decided to dive into the souks again and try to distract ourselves with searching for the souvenirs: carpets, jewellery, slippers, babouches, belts, leather-work, basketry, metalwork and much more was thrown our way! Me and Aga got so many bracelets to bring home to our friends, and we surely had to get a pair of babouches (traditional leather slippers)…

As we finally got back to our riad, the lady rushed to us to check if we were fine. She told us she had tried to reach us all day long and that she had been so worried about us (especially after hearing that many of the victims were French). We felt so bad it hadn’t occured to us to check in with her right after…

We ended up having a nice calm night in our riad with some water pipe and wine…a much needed event-less relaxation!

The waking up on our last morning was rather out of the ordinary: we got to the bathroom and ran into a big turtle on the floor! I had trouble believing it got down the staircase by itself, but apparently it was a one tough cookie (or otherwise Denis was pulling a prank on me) ;) We returned it back to its own place- the rooftop terrace. We spent the last day just wandering around the Medina and the souks, and of course eating! Before the departure from the riad, they offered us the same delicate tea time as upon arrival, yummy! Despite everything that had happened, we fell in love with Morocco and its people, and were sure to back one day...

Invader turtle ;)