Hotel Kasbah Caravanes M'Hamid

... would be stayingin a very basic camp where we may even have to set up our own tents. We were amazed and pleasantly surprised when we reached our camp, there were many large canvas structures set up in a cirlce. A large communal tent was where we were to have our meals. The ground (sand) was completely covered in carpet. The walls had carpets and pieces of material hanging from them which gave a very cosy effect. There were tables and chairs and out melas were served to us on ...

... brick walls or through the heavy doors. I yelled some more. I was concerned about the random men hanging around the front of the hotel thinking they may start to harass me and there was nowhere to escape to and also started to think i would be out all night with the cats. After 45minutes a local man from the big Kasbah palace came over to offer me his room there for the night. Turns out he was a driver for a wealthy tourist who had paid for a room in the palace for him to ...

... sinful or having to hide under a table or be chased down the street by locals reminding us that it is Ramadan. This not eating is public is a *******e because i am an all day food grazer. Abduls father owns the hotel so he said and is also who we decided would be our man for a tour so we could get accquainted with the city without being followed by hustlers. These guys are brutal. Everybody in Fes seems to have a satelite dish on their roof and Abdul tells me it is so ...

... their face. One day we explore the Mellah with a very knowledgeable old gentleman as guide (he asks us at the end for money to buy a large bottle of beer). Most of the Jews arrived with Muslims driven out of Spain in late 1400s and they played an important role in the city, and Morocco as a whole (one of the ministers in the current government is Jewish), although very few live there now. We visit the synagogue (which has remained in excellent condition) and stroll through lanes lined ...

The road ends at M'hamid. There's a sign as you roll into town stating that the furthest place of my imagination is 50 days to the east by camel. A town named Timbuktu. But the times are a changin and the Algerian border put a stop to the ancient camel caravan routes of the Tuareg people. The locals aren't insane either. Of course they prefer their new Landcruiser to the old beast of burden. So I hop in the 4X4 ...

... au bord d'la route" disent les marocains). Un guide nous fait visiter la ville, qui est construite sur 3 mini-étages souterrains. Comme il y a très peu de pluie dans la region (il n'a pas plu depuis 4 ans, nous explique le guide) l'activité des habitants est centrée sur la poterie. La production de Tamegroute est célèbre pour sa couleur verte très particulière,à base de cuivre et ...

... a great rotisserie chicken dinner, complete with fries and a mix of onions and sauce which was delicious. Throw in a soda and the meal was a whopping $ 7.75 for both. In the morning - Wed. - we wandered around Tangier and then got on another ferry. This ride was another four hour ride on even rougher seas than the trip over. At one point the staff even had a concerned look as the ship listed far enough to move furniture and people ...

as you idly do, we were wondering if the word "myriad", is linked to the word "riad" - these Moroccan homes and buildings seem to have such beautiful mosaics and designs..... anyway, we thought we would put up some of the ones we took photos of...........

... and interesting scenes. The Moroccan men have to pay to dance with other women. So it was kind of nice not to be molested and harassed like girls are at clubs in the USA. One of the other students here, Matt, is getting married when he gets home. So we treated this night out as a bachelor party for him. Needless to ...

... It's rutted, dry, hard-packed moonscape, a sort of pinkish creamy mud colour, dotted with tenacious, scraggy bushes. There are lots of rocks too. Then, all of a sudden, it's coppery gold, powdery and drawing you towards towering hills of sand, sharp ridged against a cobalt sky. About then we ground to an ignominious halt as the front wheels started to scrabble and slowly sink into a ludicrous quagmire smack in the middle of the second driest place on earth. Mr Iriqui ...