Wednesday morning we woke up and met up at CCFA early at 9 am. Mehdi, Bashir, and Omayma are great hosts. Along with Ms. Mandra, and led by the English teacher from CCFA, we went to an art museum and school (Medrasa). It's especially interesting to go to a history museum when the building itself is part of the exhibit.
He also took us through the souks in the medina. We plan on coming back when we have more time and our bargainer(Mr. Defaa). Marrakech is famous for its tanneries. In parts of the souks, there is this overwhelming smell of them. We stopped in to see one. Especially in the medina, where the roads are narrow and busy shops line each side, donkeys, horses, and mules are very prevalent. Next to pottery and tiles, this is Marita's favorite part of the medina.
Our late afternoon was spent on an excursion into the mountains. Marrakech is located in an oasis, so it is in the desert. But the Atlas mountainsn found in Morocco lie right next to Marrakech. This provides for many different ecosystems close together. Unfortunately we were never able to go on a trip through the desert like we wanted to, so we couldn't experience all of them. On our drive up the mountain, we yet again, saw more striking views.
Every time we stopped, there were lots of merchants ready to sell necklaces and fake geods to us.
They were very pushy, so it got annoying, but we felt bad for them. Matt of course tried to use his bargaining skills.
Here we saw our very first camels!
We stopped for lunch in the mountains and got the usual couscous. The food couldn't really compare to the food we were used to being pampered with. We are so lucky that we have gotten to experience all the traditional and best dishes of Morocco during our stay.
This merchant tries to bargain with Matt during our lunch.
We relaxed for a little bit at Ahmed's apartment before getting ready to go out on our special dinner. Ahmed is the sous Chef for an amazing hotel in Marrakech called the Sofitel. Chase plans on getting married there. We would post more pictures, but it was already dark when we got there so it's hard to show the real extravagance that we saw...
After exploring the place and rolling around in the beds by the pool, we headed to the dinner. They had a live Moroccan band playing and we had front row seats.
The food was SO good. They had some interesting meats like liver and lamb brains that some of us gave a try. More entertainment started up later in he evening which included singing and belly dancing. We were the royal guests of the night- Ahmed made sure all of Mr. Defaa's favorite songs were played and even got up on stage to sing.
Yassir, Mr. Defaa, Remy, Jeff, and Matt all got turns dancing with the belly dancers before all of us went up on stage to dance.
We had a such a great night and all headed back to Bashir, Mehdi, and Omayma's houses for much needed night of sleep.
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