Hotel Perla Fes

... 1089;точ 85;ики удивл 77;ния неисс 03;каемы. Туале 90;ная бумаг 72; за деньг 80; (4 дирха 84;а). Горяч 72;я вод ...

Very quick one here as it's after 6pm and I'm off to Merzouga (the Erg Chebbi desert) tonight on the 8:00pm Supratours bus (FWIW 140 Dh ~ $17) An 11 hr. ride through the night, but I have my iPod audiobook, movie, etc. plus will hopefully sleep some) Arrive in Merzouga at 7 am tomorrow morning and the plan is to negotiate an overnight camel trek into the Saraha for tomorrow night. Possibly a 2nd night in the desert, but in any case ...

... to hail a cab yesterday afternoon, and as we were walking around pretty clueless, Fettah's children pulled up in their vehicle and drove us to our host homes. That was very nice of them! Di has talked to governor Fettah about being us being uncomfortable with just "hailing a taxi" from place to place, so he's going to help us with transportation. Everyone has taken such good care of us, that this came as a surprise I guess ...

... this night. We joined in some energetic singing and drumming on buckets. We had a nice feast of chicken and meat tajines and melon to finish plus the mint tea again and again. We slept in our sleeping bags outside and woke to a light drizzle and camels walking passed our heads at daybreak the next morning. One of the camels had a good go at trying to bite me. We all piled into the tiny tent and chatted before waving goodbye to the other crew. We played songs on my ipod ...

... I start climbing straight up, rather than walking around to another side where there is a longer, but much shallower slope. Climbing the sand dune is gruelling - every time I put a foot in, the sand from up to a half metre above pours down and covers my lower leg. But as you all know I'm a stoic, so I keep going, even though my heart is pumping away very fast and my leg muscles are screaming, and finally I make the ridge, and a short while later I reach the top. I am gratified that I ...

... well yes but only because it is a completely different culture being in Morocco and Macky D's here is THE cool place to hang out and eat, apparently especially on saturday nights. All of the chique teens were there along with more of the upper class in comparison with what we as US citizens associate this fast food chain with- poor, poor quality food, poor for your body overall. I indulged in a McArabia sandwich haha. It was not actually that terrible. From what ...

... ate quietly. He then jumped up and started the tour by taking us to the Kings Palaca and leting us walk around the grounds. The grounds itself were quite beautiful and the gates were so intricatly decorated. Then it was off and through the Medina to the old Jewish section. It is an absolute maze of crazy streets and back alleys disguised as streets. The Jewish cemetary there is quite interesting and it is a sea of white grave stones that is almost blinding in the sun. Then it was a ...

... cause I had decided to take the night train to Marrakech that night, so he invited me to his family's house.

Invitation to an evening with a Berber family
At Mohammed's home there were loads of people and everybody tried as hard as they could to say something to me, in the little French they knew. I was offered a super-overly-sweet mint tea - which is very normal in Morocco, and with it a simple, quite dry cake. Once there was nothing left of the cake, Mohammed's wife ...