Our hostel made up for that rude welcome with incredible hospitality. As soon as we arrived, we were presented with a plate of crescent cookies and mint tea. The actual hostel itself was also so beautiful! Everything was so bright and colourful and patterned and I just couldn't help but obsess over the Moroccan decor. It's hard not to feel joyous when surrounded by so many bright colours.
As we arrived late and only had the evening left, we decided to grab dinner at the famous Jemaa el-Fnaa Square. The square was what I had expected and more. It was definitely the mess that it's made out to be. Thousands of people crowded the area watching snake charmers, hearing tales from story tellers, watching magicians perform, playing street games and shopping for unusual goods (I saw a man selling human teeth, I kid you not).
I was super excited for dinner. We were having our first authentic Moroccan meal! We went all out with food and when it arrive,d I was in tagine and cous cous heaven. I was definitely okay with eating like this for the next week.
I'm not too proud of the photos that I took while in Marrakech, but am disappointed at the ones I took at the souk in particular. My photos don't do any justice AT ALL to the beauty of Marrakech and are quite frankly absolutely rubbish. While at the souk though, I didn't want to get too close to any of the merchants because they were quite insistent on trying to pull you into their stores to sell you their wares so all my photos were taken inconspicuously from a distance.
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| Marrakech souk |
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| Marrakech souk |
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| Marrakech souk |
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| Marrakech souk |
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| Marrakech souk |
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| Marrakech souk |
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| Marrakech souk |
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| Marrakech souk |
If we thought that Jemaa el-Fnaa Square was chaotic during the day, the transformation that it went through during the night was even more chaotic. The empty square quickly filled up with temporary restaurants and the amazing smell of food was ubiquitous. All of a sudden, tens of thousands of people were there eating dinner, shopping for fine textiles, getting henna tattoos, watching magicians and listening to story tellers. I could have sat there and people watched all night. It was one of the most hectic but captivating places that I have ever been and I still can't comprehend how many people were there at once! I have no photos of the square at night so you're just going to have to take my word for it. Imagine a square completely packed to the brim with people, and then triple that.
We were all quite exhausted from our day of travel so headed back to our hostel for a relaxing night. We spent hours on our hostel's rooftop talking, drinking tea, eating cookies and smoking shisha. It there a better end to a day in Marrakech?
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| Jemaa el-Fnaa Square |
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| Rare photo of my travel companions and I (first for this blog I think!) |
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| Moroccan tea and biscuits |
Day two in Marrakech happened to be Morgan's birthday too so it was an extra special day! We began the day with a traditional Moroccan breakfast at our hostel which was absolutely delicious. Moroccan breakfast is officially my favourite breakfast, it even beats brunch! I was way too excited to eat and forgot to snap a photo but our breakfast included eggs, beghrir (semolina pancakes), msemen (another type of pancake, my favourite!), various spreads and jams, various different breads, various different pastries (including the Moroccan version of croissants!) and of course Moroccan tea and coffee. Fun fact courtesy of Lauren: Moroccan coffee has cinnamon, black pepper and seeds ground in with the coffee beans.
After an extremely filling breakfast, we visited Bahia Palace to see the beautiful Moroccan architecture. I loved the intricate colourful tile work on the ceilings and floor. I wish Melbourne was a little more colourful! The palace gardens were filled with orange trees and there were stray cats and kittens everywhere.
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| Stray kitten |
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| Bahia Palace |
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| Bahia Palace |
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| Bahia Palace |
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| Bahia Palace |
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| Bahia Palace |
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| Bahia Palace |
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| Bahia Palace |
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| Bahia Palace |
From there, we decided that we wanted to explore the rest of the medina but navigating is a task within itself. It almost seems like a rite of passage to get lost in the medina of Marrakech, I doubt any visitor has made it out of the city without winding up completely and utterly lost. Almost every street in Marrakech looks the same so it's easy to lose your bearings. The winding alleyways are so small that there are no maps that accurately depict the medina. GPS is useless as well because of this reason.
Strangely enough, there seemed to be a man following us during our explorations. We clearly looked lost and he seemed to realise that. We couldn't figure out if he was trying to help us or take advantage of us so tried to get away with him for a while. Eventually, we decided to just follow him so he'd stop bothering us. What was the worst that could happen?...
He ended up leading us to a leather tannery where we were greeted by a man who handed us mint leaves to mask the (putrid) smell. The experience was an interesting one. Never had I ever thought about how leather is made, let alone thought that I'd see a crucial part of the process.
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| Street of the medina |
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| Streets of the medina |
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| Streets of the medina |
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| Streets of the medina |
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| Leather tannery |
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| Leather tannery |
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| Leather tannery |
Next up, we sought shelter from the afternoon's scorching heat at the Jardin Majorelle. Because we visited Marrakech in July, it was dead in the middle of Morocco's summer and the heat was absolutely sweltering. On top of that, us girls made sure to always be dressed in a way that covered our legs and our shoulders, just to be respectful to the local culture and this only made the heat even worse.
The walk from the medina was a long one and if we'd realised, we definitely would have opted for a cab. I am glad we walked though, because the journey there had us encounter so many different things and I truly felt like I was in another world. The streets were narrow, the traffic was insane, the people were loud and the roads were cracked so bad that I had to jump at times to make it across. This difference in culture and scenery we experienced is exactly why I love travelling.
Jardin Majorelle was like a little oasis in Marrakech and when inside, the chaos of the nearby medina seemed like it was continents away. The garden was originally created by the artist Jacques Majorelle, and later owned by Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Berge. The hundreds of different plants, carefully placed fountains and calming blue buildings acted as a great escape from the madness that Marrakech can be.
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| Jardin Majorelle |
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| Jardin Majorelle |
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| Jardin Majorelle |
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| Jardin Majorelle |
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| Jardin Majorelle |
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| Jardin Majorelle |
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| Jardin Majorelle |
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| Jardin Majorelle |
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| Jardin Majorelle |
For our last night in Marrakech, we had to stop by Jemaa el-Fnaa square again. There was no way we could leave Marrakech without one last visit to the iconic square. That night was even busier than the first which I didn't even know was possible until I saw it! We had dinner at one of the stalls in the middle of the square, making sure we got the complete experience for our last night. We also wanted to have a nice dinner for Morgan's birthday.
We had an early start the next morning (we were going on our Sahara Desert tour!) so we headed back to our hostel early. On our way back, we happened to stumble across some sort of street parade but we couldn't figure out what it was for, and no one around us seemed to be able to speak English so we were left wondering.
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| Some sort of street carnival game |
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| Pastilla |
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| Jemaa el-Fnaa Square |
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| Street parade |
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| Street parade |
I can confidently say that Marrakech is one of my favourite cities that I have ever visited, and I've visited in excess of a hundred cities by now. There's just something so magical about being in a place where EVERYTHING is completely foreign. I miss Marrakech so much, and once I've visited a city I'm not usually itching to go back so soon. I'm very much someone who would prefer to visit somewhere new over somewhere that I've been before and loved, just because the opportunity to experience a new city is really exciting for me. However, I would, without a doubt, return to Marrakech and Morocco ASAP if I could. It was so magical and I just felt like I was on cloud nine the whole time I was there. Not many other places that I have been to have filled me with a feeling of such bliss. Even thinking of Marrakech makes my stomach flutter.
Marrakech was only the beginning of our Morocco trip. I fell in love with the city but crazily enough, the country just got better and better and compared to the other places within Morocco we ended up visiting, Marrakech kinda sucked. That just puts into perspective how AMAZING this country is though. Stay tuned to hear about the rest of my Morocco travels. Hopefully I won't take as long to update my blog this time!
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