Morocco - June 14, 2014

Today we experienced three forms of transportation: by land, by sea and by camel.

In the early morning we boarded our coach and travelled to the port of Tarifa, Spain. We then boarded our high speed ferry to embark on our next adventure to Tangier, Morocco. Hello, Africa!

                                 

                                                               

 

We met our guide and our bus driver, both called Mohamed. So we had Mohamed squared not Mohamed pie. As you can see, Mohamed is a very common name in Arabic countries. Mohamed our guide was dressed in the traditional garb of a kaftan which is a long robe without a hood.

He explained there were two garbs, the kaftan and the djellaba. The djellaba has a hood. The assistant guide sported a kaftan and the banana slippers known as balgha. Our bus tour began with a short stop where many of our choir members enjoyed a short ride on a high camel ride.

We then did a walking tour to see the old city, Medina, the Kasbah and Zoco Market. The Zoco market was wacko! We retreated to a traditional lunch of flat bread, soup, shish kabob, chicken, couscous, sweets and mint tea. The relaxing lunch was followed by the most craziest shopping spree ever seen. The ladies quickly learned the bartering system and although we were all very smart looking in our green golf shirts and khakis the long trail of men following us was not because of our assemble... It was because of our pocketbooks and the eager look to buy in our eyes. We learned that relentlessness and persistence takes on a whole new meaning.

After a very tiring day of bartering and beating off pursuers we embarked  on our ferry ride back to Spain and to meet our coach driver. We ended our day with a lovely bus stop for a picnic of shared sandwiches, tea, chips, cheese and crackers. We were very tired campers when we got back to our hotel.