After the departure of boB's folks, we made our way to the bus stop in Marrakech and purchased afternoon bus fare to Essaouira. The 3-hour journey was a comfortable one, with many desert views along the way:
We amused ourselves by taking pictures of signs from the moving bus. Sometimes we were successful.
Sometimes not.
Essaouira is a coastal city with a unique history. Being considered on of the best harbors on the Moroccan coast, it's been the home of a variety of cultures over the years- Phoenicians, Romans, Carthaginians, Berbers, Portuguese, French.
When we arrived we wandered through narrow busy streets until we found the local youth hostel:
The hostel manager was one of the most genuinely friendly people we had met during our week in Morocco. He even set us up in a private room, although we had only reserved/paid for bunk beds- all for pproximately $7 per night. In this case we got what we paid for- our room was a bit run down with stained linens and an odor of wet dog. The staff however, was so friendly and accommodating that it made our stay enjoyable.
Just moments after settling into our room, we began to hear rhythmic chanting and drumming. At first we wondered if it was a recording, but then we realized it had an earthy organic feel to it. We became excited about the possibility of live music and decided to follow it down the street and around the corner, where we were invited inside of what we first thought might be a mosque. Later found out was a Zaouia- a place of Sufi worship. Here a group of men were playing ceramic drums on their shoulders in a half circle around two ghaita players. The music was hypnotic and enchanting. We listened and watched avidly as the men softly chanted and swayed in time to the beat. We felt very honored to have been invited to hear such sacred music. We later found out that Essaouira is home to seven Sufi brothersships, each with their own Zaouia.
After our time with the Sufis, we meandered down the the main crossroads and were amazed by the buzz of activity.
And we were pleasantly surprised by the notable lack of hustle as we walked along shop fronts and through the souk. Compared to Marrakech, and even Fés, Essaouira was a peaceful respite.
It was an adventure to simply walk around the city- off the main drag there were many narrow streets, often with these short tunnels that had been created by someone building their home over the street (as seen above and below).
A strange mix of cultures:
And, yes, that's a pay phone bolted to the side of the Coke fridge. The phone line runs in the open door behind, and presumably connects to a trunk line somewhere.
The next morning we took a walk along the Portuguese ramparts and the port. It was a gorgeous sunny day and we were excited to be on the Altantic seaside.
Here is a policeman of the Gendarme- the national police force.
These fishing boats are being built by hand. Curious, we ogled their beauty from outside the fence, a Moroccan man beckoned us over and invited us in to talk about the boats. Of course after a few minutes of friendly chit-chat and taking our photo he held out his hand and demanded payment. We didn't have much beside pocket change, and he was quite irate about it and practically kicked us out! Oh so Morocco.
The smallest of the tradional fishing boats are painted blue, and when they're all tied up together it makes quite a pretty scene.
The port was a busy place and we were under its spell. Men were fixing their large nets, some were building boats, and others were busy cleaning and spreading their catch out on tables to sell.
We were tempted to try the limpets (seen in photo below on bottom right), which we saw passerbys eating raw with a squeeze of lime. We ultimately decided against it. We were already suffering from mild dysentery, thank you very much.
Out for a stroll along the rampart walls we saw these brilliantly blue doors.
The old canons:
The Dutch cannons were made in the 1700's- made in The Hague.
"What?!"
We could have stayed for hours simply watching the gulls fly in the wind.
This a view looking through the tower window towards the medina of Essaouira.
We passed these two beautiful girls walking along the ramparts...they later asked if we could take their picture (with their camera) as a souvenir.
We saw this guy with his excavator doing .... Something. He was pulling material from above and putting it in the water in front of himself to build a base. Then he'd creep forward and repeat to extend his little road. We have no idea what the goal was, but left before we saw him submerge the thing.
We wandered through the Sidi Mohammed Ben Abdellah Museum and saw a beautiful display of historic photographs of the city, musical instruments, traditional costumes and crafts.
This is a rebab- a Moroccan version of the violin. (Please excuse the reflections!)
We were fascinated with the various geometric patterns we came across in the artwork and architecture in Morocco. It is interesting to note that, in general, art in the Arab world does not reflect human or animal forms. This aniconism has developed with an aim at avoiding the worship of idols and icons.
Thus, there evolved an incredibly sophisticated use of geometry, as noted in the marquetry above.
We later ended up at the beach, where we watch a group of guys attempt to fly a kite with no luck at all. And then we fell asleep and discovered why Essaouira is called the Windy City:
It's windy! After merely 20 minutes the wind had covered us in a blanket of sand!
Further down the beach we came across a number of kite surfers, and camel ... er ... dromedary jockies. The drom drivers were pushing hard to give rides across the sand. No, thanks, we've done our drom time!
It was entertaining to watch the kite surfers zip and jump across the water- it sure looks exhilarating!
We wandered further to the remains of the 16th century Portuguese castle.
According to local myth, this very place was the inspiration for Jimi Hendrix's 'Castles Made of Sand'. (However, upon further reading, we found out that this song was released on a 1967 album, and Jimi was in Essaouira in 1969..um. Doesn't really add up.)
Essaouira was a sort of hippie hang out in the 1960's, with the likes of Jimi Hendrix and Cat Stevens visiting. There is a lot of Jimi Hendrix paraphernalia to be seen around Essaouira. This poster featured above was hanging in lounge in our hostel. People here are proud to have had him visit their city.
We enjoyed some fantastic seafood while in Essaouira. Here boB's calamare tajine is captured in all its glory:
Yum!!!
After dinner, as we were heading back to our hostel, we heard Gnawa music floating on the evening breeze, we followed it to its source-
...and went in for tea and desert.
Needs a bit of paint, and the landscaping is a bit barren. But it's got potential! And being so far out in, well, the middle of nowhere, we won't have much to distract us from our music!
Next to the real estate office there happened to be a barbershop. boB was treated to a hot shave and trim at what was one of the smallest barbershops you could imagine. Haircut and a hot shave for 50 dirhams! (That's about $5 US.)
Inside there were two chairs for clients, although one appeared to be for storage.
Melinda sat on the bench and half-watched the western soap opera dubbed over in Arabic. Quite entertaining.
Later that evening we were on our way to dinner when we spied a very interesting music store with dozens of tradional instruments hanging from the wall. Of course we went in! Who could resist?
This is from a newspaper article about the young store keeper we met- a talented tradional musician that has traveled to the UK and to Poland to share Moroccan music. He was super nice, friendly, and seemed more genuine than any other musician/music-shop owner we'd met.
Here we are, after a wonderful hour of playing music together and learning about Moroccan instruments. We wished we could have stayed longer and learned more... we left the store with a set of krakeb (hand cymbals) and a couple of square tambourine-like instruments. Between now and the time we return to Morocco we'll be practicing for our go at Gnawa!
The next day it was back to Marrakech to catch to night train to Tanger-ville.
And thus we began the journey back to Spain for a final week at the molino...
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