Last Day in Essouira

On my last day in Essouira we got up before the sun and took a cab a few miles south to a small village and walked back along the beach.

Jimi hendrix stayed in this village and legend has it that the island, rock outcroppings, and ruins were the inspiration for his song "Castles made of sand", but that was actually written a few years before he was here.

The Carthaginians were here in ancient times and on the little island was a roman villa about 2,300 years ago.

It was only a few miles back to the town but it took a few hours.....

It had been my first time in essouira and I hope to go back at some point. I would highly recommend it as a vacation destination....

Vacation 2011 Day 20 Essouira

And so.... the daily grind of vacation rolls on..... up before the sun, but before the moon is down..... the gulls all sit and look to the east....

And yet another glorious sunrise.....

And then to breakfast.... and after breakfast its time to lounge around in the hotel and drink coffee. By my usual standards it was a luxury hotel.... two riads joined together... light streaming down from the central courtyard...

And then off to wander the alleys in search of doors to photograph.....

I wandered into the old Jewish Quarter.... looked like a postwar bombsite with many shells of derelict buildings, but a few inhabitants still...

And then time to relax on the seawall and watch the sun goes down....

Vacation 2011 Day 17 last morning in Marrakesh

Sunrise from the roof of Hotel Ali on our last morning in Marrakesh.

We had a few hours to wait for the van that was going to take us to Essouira on the coast so I tagged along with friends who went shopping.

We didnt go to the souks, rather to the upmarket tourist shops that offered a shopping experience more comfortable to those who didnt like haggling. The prices were corespondingly higher.

I personally take no pleasure in shopping so I just wandered around snapping photos....

The red color of Marrakesh dominates everywhere..... and the bright sun created strong shadows..... kind of hard not to take good pictures.....

Vacation 2011 Day 16 Over the Atlas to Marrakesh

Heading back to Marrakesh by car after 10 days trekking, we retraced our route down the "Valley of the Roses". Some of the country reminded me very much of the Colorado Plateau in the SW U.S.

We then followed the Dades Valley known as "the valley of a Thousand Kasbahs" for obvious reasons.

After Ouarzazate we headed north into the foothills of the Atlas Mountains. The day we drove here the weather was overcast and rainy, but on this return journey we had good weather to the colors and shadows made it far more photogenic.

It was a long, slow , climb up the winding road that switchbacks its way to the pass. I recently watched an old B&W French movie about truckers in this part of Morroco and much of it was filmed on this road. Other than a bit more traffic and the fact that now it is tarmaced, nothing else has changed since it was filmed.

After lunch at the pass we started down to the plain below. This side of the Atlas is greener with more settlements. Parts of it looked just like the red-rock country around Sedona (without mosques :))

Late afternoon saw us arriving back in Marrakesh and Hotel Ali. After 10 days in the desert the noise and crowds of Marrakesh were too much for me so I spent the evening in the refuge of my room....

Vacation 2011 Day 14 In the Valley of the Roses

After leaving the gite we wandered through the alleys of the village before emerging on the banks of the river in the Valley of the Roses.

We followed the river upstream all day, sometimes needing to ford it. The water was cold and fast, being melted snow coming down from the Atlas Mountains.

Unfortunately we were too early to find any roses, however poppies were very much in abundance in the gardens of the villages we passed through.

One house had an unusual ornament on the roof......

Further up the valley the geology changed and we could have easily been in Arizona....

Camp was on the riverbank where the mules had plenty to drink and the chorus of frogs kept up all night....

Vacation 2011 Day 13 through Kelaa M'Goun

As we approached the town of Kelaa M'Gouna it became more and more built-up.

The floodplain of the river was green with trees and irrigated fields and tons of birds made more noticeable by the birdwatchers among the group. Lots of palms, barley, lima beans etc and a lot of red poppies scattered among the barley...

The town itself was incredibly busy and noisy, quite startling after a week in the wide-open spaces of the high country we had spent the last week in. We visited a hammam, a public bath and later sat in a sidewalk eatery for lunch before heading out of town into the foothills of the Atlas Mountains and the Valley of the Roses.

The Draa Valley is home to thousands of kasbah ruins, some of them quite large.

That evening we stayed in a gite in a village. The next few days through the Valley of the Roses will be greener, wetter, and more inhabited than the Jebel Sahro....

Vacation 2011 Day 10 in the high country

As with most mornings during our trek across the Jebel Sahro in southern Morroco I was out of my bag hours before the sun rose.

I sat on my perch overlooking the vast, wrinkled landscape stretching out and watched as the approaching sunrise brought color and shadow back to the world.

Gradually I was silently joined by other in our small group......

It was a fairly uneventful day, passing through no villages just the occasional nomads summer home...

We camped in a basin and so lost the sun early......

Vacation 2011 Day 9 to the highest point

On the third morning in the Jebel Sahro the dawn and sunrise were well worth waking early for.

The first few kilometers of the days hike was through a narrow canyon. We had come here yesterday afternoon to take advantage of the running water to bathe.

As the year progresses the water, originating as melted snow in the high country, will slowly decrease. There probably wont be any more running water till we come out of the jebel sahro.

We had lunch at a small trading post at the foot of a golden escarpment we would climb in the afternoon.

I headed off ahead of the group and started the climb to tonights campsite. Its not that I am unsociable, but for me its hard to enjoy the landscape with people chattering. Also it allowed me to climb at my own pace and not have to keep up.

The views from on top were sublime, so I plonked myself down and sat for the next few hours and watched as the vista laid out in front of me changed with the passing of the sun and clouds.

I knew I would be up before dawn to take in the dawn and sunrise.

Vacation 2011 Day 8 To Ali's Gate

I was so excited to be back in the desert that I slept little so was able to climb to a high point to watch the sunrise....

Mother earth was naked, pure rock with no clothing of vegetation. The homes were built out of the same material and blended in as well as being lost in scale....

As a general rule the Berber do not like to be photographed, but there are exceptions......

We climbed gradually and steadily all day, further into the Jebel Sahro

By lunchtime we reached bab'm ali, Alis gate, two huge outcroppings...

We camped at an intersection of 4-wheel drive tracks. There was a small gite here with a cafe....

Sunsets were as awesome as the sunrises.....