Riad Imlil

... I adore mountains. I wish I had the opportunity to hike to the summit, but I had to be satisfied with the shrine. Apparently single women are supposed to go up there if they are in need of a husband, so I stuck my hands in the water and hoped the djinn liked me. It was a beautiful walk, regardless.<br><br>After lunch we walked back down to the village before our hot, hot drive to Essaouira on the coast. <br><br>

... the first morning wandering down to Imlil to explore. We chat to a local who teaches us how to say,"no thankyou" in arabic to Berber rug sellers, although the vendors are not as pushy as I thought they'd be. Maybe its different in the bigger cities. Imlil is quite small - really just one long street. The everyday shops are more interesting than the ones for tourists. The butcher has his meat hanging up out in the open and at cafes tagines sit on pots of ...

... that they still retain these qualities even in the face of an onslaught of tourism - or at least the commercial part - as our entry into this world was met with an assault of dozens of offers to guide, feed, or house us. So much for a quaint small town mentality but it was certainly better natured than Marrakesh. This element did not create any kind of negative impact on our stay here, which was most excellent. With Jen's bargaining and procurement ...

... a couple of full on days. Arrived late into Imlil and sat in our lovely guest house in front of the fire, playing cards. Similar to China, I think we have now taught our Moroccan friends the game of ********. I really should think up a better name for it!

... por uma estrada mais que sinuosa e muito estreita que circundava a cadeia montanhosa por quase 200 km e verdade dita, o cabrão do austriaco/paraguaio atendendo pelo nome de Francis é um doente mental, travava em cima da curva, a 2 m do precipicio de mais de 2000m de altitude. Por mais de 4 vezes nos vimos face a face com um veiculo circulando em sentido inverso, em cima da curva. Epa foi um pedaço de trajecto algo ...

... 4pm, checked into our rooms and set off exploring. The town does smell a lot of horse/donkey poo as that is the main means of transport. A few of us set off for the 20 min walk up the hill to the Kasbah du toubkal, a former holiday house of the local ruler that has since been renovated by a UK company. We climbed all the way to the top and ordered a hot chocolate and admired the views. You could see the village that was transformed ...

... resolved to share it. The drive out and back from Imlil desensitizes you to impending death moments while in a car. It's like that scene in Hunt for Red October where Jack Ryan says he can't sleep on planes because of the turbulence, then has the experience in the helicopter over the submarine then in the end of the movie you see him sleeping on a plane. I'll never be proper scared in a car again I think after witnessing some of the stuff we did on that drive.

... He scores! Gooooooooooooooooooooooooooal! It was late in the day and the rays of the sun were sliding behind the peaks as we headed down to the Berber village of Matat. We were greeted by our host at his gite, this one was built of concrete block and covered with a cement finish. He pointed us to the room we would share, an elegant chamber with plush carpets and a long upholstered style bench. Another tangine supper followed and this one too was different ...

... French and Spanish and was very loud and animated and excited and happy and all of that. I just looked and smiled and said "yes" or laughed when I thought it might have been appropriate. He didn't care that I didn't understand him and I certainly didn't care. I have held worse conversations with people I actually understand. The night started to get interesting. The square was winding down it was about midnight but Zachary said we should watch some of the story ...

... without the driver having to slow down. As temporary fixes, they were pretty creative, but about 40 km shy of Fes, a huge swath of tape studded with glass shards flew off the window and hit the guy sitting directly in front of me in the head, causing a nice little 5th row bloodbath, causing some anxiety in the 6th row. I offered up a minute sterile gauze pad which the bus assistant used to vigorously rub any remaining glass shards further into the guy's skull, apparently from the ...