Some friends and I took off for a weekend in Morocco. We started off in the city of Marrakesh, which is pretty rich in Morroccan culture, and very well known for its huge market:
We walked through the inside of the market for over an hour, and never reached the end...
The market included all that you might hope to see in Morocco, including snake charmers. These guys seemed pretty cool... until they walk up behind you and put a snake around your neck. Then they ask you for money.
The meat was cooked on these skewers... outdoors. Definitely a new taste, but it was pretty good.
Morocco is a Muslim nation, so we definitely experienced some culture shock walking around the city.
This guy was the musical entertainment at the restaurant we ate dinner at.
The city is built around the town mosque. The Muslims pray 5 times a day, and when its time to pray, a really loud announcement comes from the mosque and can be heard throughout the whole city. It lasts about 15 minutes... and the first one starts at 5 am.
After a night in Marrakesh, we took a four hour bus ride to the coast and the small village of Tahkazout. It is a small town where people visit mainly to surf - the waves are great year round, and if you have a wetsuit, the water isn't so cold.
This is the view from the house we stayed in.
We spent three days in Tahkazout at the beach. After some lessons, most of us got the hang of surfing, and spent most of the time doing just that.
The beach was not the cleanest that I've seen, but it felt great to get away from the Spanish winter for a couple days.
It was about a 15 minute walk from the house down to the beach, but it was definitely a scenic one.
The constant reminder that this beach was not in Florida was the presence of CAMELS. They literally walked right up to you. Here is a picture of our group getting some sun, and we had some large, smelly visitors.
I couldn't get over how the camels just hung out with us...
Days in the sun were ended by photography sessions of the African sunset. All in all, it was AWESOME.
