Hotel Barcelo Casablanca

... We arrived at the Casablanca airport around 11:30am. <br><br>Right away at the airport, after collecting our bags and going through customs (they asked us a LOT of questions &#8211; I realized that maybe a US attorney and an Australian Naval officer may not be such an innocuous pair after all&#8230;), we heard our first call to prayer (or adhan) from the muezzin at the nearest mosque (located in the airport!). It was a good sound, and, I suspect, one we will ...

... next morning we woke up and had breakfast and then took the bus back to the ship. We had one night on the ship in Casablanca before we left the next day. It was nice to be back on the ship and get back to a routine and see everyone that we hadn&#8217;t seen for a while. We have just been going to class and taking care of school stuff so far. Yesterday it was really nice out and we played a lot of volleyball and hung by the pool. I got pretty burnt. Today ...

... fact about Morocco: Education at public universities is free Best hotel laundry service: Ibis (Casablanca) Best hotel overall: Hotel Charf in Tangier (laundry service, good restaurant, charm, wi-fi in lobby, clean rooms) Things I learned about rotary: their good work and generosity, their people and kindness, their politics (probably unavoidable and common as in any organization) Things I love about Moroccans: their ...

... people have better access to water! We had a great (and busy) day, but what I will remember most is thinking about how we take so much for granted in our country - running water, electricity, enough food, etc. It was very humbling. I'm also amazed how Rotary does so many wonderful things all over the world, yet many people have no idea. Our hosts have been just terrific. They are so gracious and so kind, and we all keep joking that we're not coming home (just kidding mom!). :)

... napping (Mike did, I didn't). As we started flying over Morocco, the thing that stood out was the green fields - I had expected only desert. We arrived in Casablanca, finally got through several passport and customs checks and headed out to find a taxi. The ones that leave from the airport are big, old, dirty Mercedes and we found one easily and negotiated the fare 250dhs into the city. Mike sat in front and chatted to the driver - he found that Moroccan ...

... saw the ship, it was the most beautiful site I have seen :) Our last day in Morocco was really fun because I was with my roommate, Megan. We got a pretty early start and headed to the Hassan II Mosque since it is one of two mosques open to non-Muslims in Morocco. It was gorgeous, absolutely beautiful. Obviously, I have never been inside a mosque before and I was just blown away. Seeing it and hearing our guide tell us about it was just mind blowing. I wish I could ...

... every couple of streets by a person with their hand out for the spare change from the ``rich western'' tourists walking around. I think on day one I was approached about 5 times in one hour; and while in the first case I did give 5dh (it is never enough, they ask for more of course), if you were to provide for every request you would go broke quickly. All of them (bar the youngest) had a rudamentary grasp of multiple languages other than arabic including english, spanish, french ...

... o tinha conhecido ninguém no meu percurso marginal que falasse francês ou espanhol ou outro mambo. Ou melhor, desde que me despedi do Raki, em Tânger, tive momentos algo estranhos ao nivel da comunicação, onde acabava por me remeter ao silêncio, por não saber mais como me exprimir. Também gosto de silêncio, não faz mal a ninguém. Estavamos a chegar a Casa e eu disse ao Driss que me deixasse sair onde ele saisse da auto-estrada que eu ia seguir o meu rumo e foi ...

After Paris we had fly via Madrid to Casablanca. Famous name, huge city... but not worth of spending there a lot of time. We need to do it, coz we were planning to go to Mauritania and we were in need of visa. Till that day we were sure, like almost all tourists that u can have only visa in consulate of Mauritania in Casablanca. Procedure was easy: before 12am u r giving them 2 photos, 1 form, copy of passport ...

... staff had no knowledge of the Jewish Museum nor the location of the road. Moroccan hospitality and friendliness prevailed though, as one of the ...