LYNN’S SPAIN/MOROCCO
JOURNAL
Day 14, Wednesday, May 22
Rabat
We had a really nice breakfast in the hotel—complete with eggs, bread, orange juice and coffee—the best and most complete we have had. We walked south to Chellah, a walled city built by the Merenids in the 13th century. Also within the walls were the remains of the ancient Roman city of Sala Colonia. Actually most prominent were the storks in the trees, on top of the minaret, flying about, taking care of their young—everywhere. It looked like a bird refuge. We could see the ruins of a mosque, complete with a medersa. There was also an eel pool (I saw a couple), presided over by a semi-official person. He fed boiled eggs to the eels to make them come out; women having trouble getting pregnant do the same. He also was taking care of six kittens whose mother had died. They looked about the age where they could be given away. There was a man with an identity card drawing the designs from some of the ruins, as a way I guess to preserve the heritage.
Storks
in the Chellah
The rest of the morning was spent looking for and touring the archaeology museum. We had read earlier that the bones of a huge dinosaur were to be transferred to Rabat, but they were not there yet. We did get to see some of the things that had been found at Volubilis, which we found particularly interesting since we had been there: bronze statues, marble statues, glass, jewelry. There was also a lot of jewelry from other areas. It wasn’t much of a museum but worth a short visit—the art of exhibit display was definitely not world class but very representative of the third world. We stopped back at the hotel to rest.
Andulusian Gardens Gate next to Kasbah
We left at 2 and got lunch at the café across the street—seafood pizza, which later caused a lot of trouble for Philip. It wasn’t even that good a lunch! The afternoon program was the casbah and the souq in the medina. We were going shopping first but took the wrong street through the medina so decided to go to the casbah first. The entrance to the casbah is a very beautiful gate—ornate and large—the Bab Oudaia. The casbah is built on a bluff overlooking the estuary that goes to the Atlantic. From the lookout, we could see jetties, beaches, restaurants. Unfortunately, a false guide attached himself to us and showed us around for a fee. We didn’t need him, but he did show us a rug-weaving factory, where we paid more money to take pictures—hopefully some woman is making our rug! I would have preferred to walk around by ourselves—the houses were very pretty, white-washed and accented with Mediterranean-type colors, and the paths went up and down. We didn’t spend a lot of time there.
From the Kasbah
We went back into the souq to do our shopping. I found a shop selling pretty nice scarves, cotton with silk embroidery. There wasn’t time to negotiate as Philip needed to go back to the hotel. So we did that and walked back to the scarf place on the Rue des consuls. We had priced some scarves in some of the modern shops near the hotel so had some idea what to pay. He said 150 DH for each or 200 DH for two—I thought that was more than fair. I was very pleasantly surprised because I had expected a lot higher price. I bought a blue one for me and a green one for Marleen.
We went back to the hotel to shower and change. Philip went out to find an English language bookstore he had read about but didn’t succeed in finding it. All he got were sore feet. Tonight’s restaurant, La Clef, which we had targeted earlier, was not as elegant as La Bamba—but better priced by half. The food was pretty good despite less elegant surroundings. I had harira and lamb tajine. Philip of course had chicken couscous—I put some in my tajine bowl to soak up the yummy sauce. We got back early enough to pack up and retire early. Before that we had gotten some money out of an ATM and settled in cash the hotel bill. Always many travel matters to take care of.