España Dia 4

Recognize this lady? We are all dressed up for Morocco today. Bright and early to meet the bus at 7am. We read that you should dress appropriately to not show disrespect to the culture. Women are supposed to cover their knees, shoulders, elbows, and hair (not face), men just need to wear a shirt, and cover their knees (so simple). However, while both our clothes were fine, Allie later realized that the headscarf was not necessary since not even all Muslim women in Morocco wear them. This is because Morocco is considered a more "modern Muslim" country. Oh well.

We boarded our bus and met our tour guide Pedro (he speaks 4 languages). The bus drove us 1 hour to our ferry port at Tarifa, Spain which takes 45 minutes to get to Tangier, Morocco. It was the nicest ferry ever! Extremely comfortable seats, lots of leg room, tables, and a restaurant to eat at. There was also a duty free store, nice restrooms, and almost no rocking from the waves. They also served old school coke cans with the pull-tabs.

MarHaban! (it means Welcome in Arabic) We arrived in Tangier, and then met our tour speaker (not tour guide). His name is Hassan and he teaches Moroccan culture and history at the local University. He was very funny and spoke very good English.

Our first stop on the bus tour was a camel park. You could even ride one if you wanted for 1 Euro (about $1.50). Who wouldn't opt to do it for that price! Very strange feeling, but very cool once you get the hang of it.

Then the bus takes you through the various districts of town. We travelled through Little Spain, Petit France, and Little California(America). Various districts where the language is dictated by the town's nationality. They have 2 national languages in Morocco: French and Arabic. However, most people also speak English and Spanish as well. The architecture is fantastic, and we truly believe that is for one reason....no cookie cutter houses. In fact, Hassan tells us that Tangier has very strict rules. They state that all work in a home must be done by hand. All tilework, painting, woodwork, etc. This prevents pre-fab work, and makes all homes unique and true to the Moorish style.

We continued to the point where the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea meet. That picture is below. However, I will warn you, if you are looking for a big sign or landmark, it isn't there.

Then it happened. We got a visitor on our bus. Not a human, but a donkey. Yep, a real donkey climbed aboard our bus and hung out to be petted by tourists. He didn't sneak on, our tour guide let him on. He paid some street kid a couple Euros to bring him on to show "us tourists" what a donkey looks like. He was a baby, only around 3 months old. Cute, but smelly.

All the street signs are both in Arabic and French, and they are on the sides of buildings, not streets.

Hassan took us to a house where someone famous lived: Henri Matisse. Who you ask? Yeah, we didn't know either, but we were told if you google him you will find a painting that he did which was actually of the very house you see in this picture. However, I searched for 20 minutes and still couldn't find it. Apparently he is a very famous painter in this part of the world.

After that he showed us that some houses have a large hand on them. It is a welcome sign. It is on all hotels and B&B places to show you that you are welcome to stay there.

Lunch time. We ate at a very cute restaurant with live music, couches with cushions for tables, and carpets used as wallpaper to decorate the restaurant. Very quaint.

First course was soup. Its kind of like an egg drop soup, but spicier, and it had sprinkled cinnamon on top. Not bad.

Second course....meat on a stick. This was lamb on skewers, and we washed it down with a Coke Zero with Arabic writing on it. Mike washed his down with a Moroccan beer.

Third course was the main meal. It was chicken with cooked sweet potatoes and carrots with olives on top of couscous. Very good, and quite delicious.

Then, dessert. It was kind of like burnt pie crust with carmel drizzled over it. It wasnt bad, but it wasn't good either. It was washed down with traditional hot mint tea. When I say hot, I mean temperature hot. We couldn't even pick up the shot glasses they came in or you would burn your hand. However, once it cooled, it was very good.

After we left lunch, we headed out to the Bazaar, but before we got there, you had to pass through a couple small alleyways where people are selling some some strange items.

First item up......the item below is not pudding, or chocolate, or jello.....can you guess what it is? Soap! Somehow I dont know how you could use that and still come out of the shower feeling clean.

Next item. Below is a bunch of rocks in a ziploc bag....any guesses as to what it is? Shampoo. They dissolve in water and turn into shampoo. Our guide Hassan says that is how he went bald (funny joke, but a real item).

Now, off to the real Bazaar Market. This is like a smorgasbord of everything you could want. They sell flowers, fruits, vegetables, clothes, shoes, furniture, etc.

They also had these women selling goat's cheese and coconut milk with various spices. Also we saw the biggest watermelons we had ever seen before, except when they cut them open, they werent pink on the inside like normal watermelons, they were orange. However, they were real watermelons!

Then we came upon the meat section. What is strange about this meat section is that when you order it, as the lady below did, they cut it right there in front of you, but not with any ordinary knife, but instead, a hacksaw (notice the guy to the right in the 2nd picture below).

We stopped at a very modern Moroccan rug store where they explained how different rugs are made and how all Moroccan rugs are hand made and not sewn by machines. We bought a rug for the kitchen from Mo. He and Mike haggled for a bit and Mike got him down an extra $75 Euros. Their rugs are not cheap. Mo gave Allie a nice pink and orange scarf. He said she was pretty like wife.

As you look for souvenirs, the tour provides you with a Bazaar guide named Abdul (1st pic below) who was from Morocco and spoke excellent English. Bascially, you tell him what you are looking to buy and he takes you there, waits for you to buy, and makes the beggars leave you alone, and then walks you back to the group. Nice guy (kind of like a personal shopper). He claims he was Matt Damon's assistant when he was there filming The Bourne Ultimatum. We went to a store that had postcards and generic souveniers on one side and jewelry on the other. Two brothers owned it. We met Yusef (2nd pic below) who runs the jewelry section, and he told us that Harry Connick Jr. bought jewelry from him. We didn't believe him until he showed us the picture he had with Harry in his store next to his cash register. Kind of crazy actually.

The peddlers/beggars can get kind of intense at times, and our bus driver (man on right in pic below) got angry that one guy would not leave our group alone. He started yelling in Arabic and then they got into a fight and he stole all the man's shirts he was trying to sell. Rather awkward moment, yet picture-worthy.

All the people were very friendly here, although I think because I actually wore the headscarf (called a Hijab by the way) people thought I was actually Muslim, so they treated me nicer than the other women in my group who did not wear the scarf. Mike and I got some postcards and stamps and 3 different people showed us where the post office was (not really a post office, but a big mailbox rather).

Now, the tour is over. We got back onto the ferry to Spain. We re-boarded the bus once we got back which took us to our hotel. We said goodbye to Pedro (he is the one in the bright red shoes) and walked back to the hotel room.

Sans plans for tomorrow so far, we are a bit tired from today, so likely a relaxing day, but we do have a Sangria making class at noon. Buenos Noches!

*credits--thanks to youtube for teaching me how to wear my hijab properly

España Dia 3

Long day = long blog.

Crazy day from start to finish! We got up early so we could head into Ronda, about an hour north of our hotel. Mike has a head cold, so he walked to the Farmacia to get some Spanish medicine.

Shortly after, we drove up to Ronda along a scenic mountain road(not for the faint of heart). Along the way there were many signs, many of which we had no idea what they meant. However, Allie took a picture of her favorite one (she wanted to steal one and take it home).

Once you get to Ronda, the town is everything you would think of when you think of a village in Spain. The people are friendly, the streets are narrow, mostly cobblestone, and the architecture is phenomenal and old.

Our first stop on our walking tour was the Iglesia de la Merced or the Church of Favors. It's not known exactly when it was built, but sometime in the 16-17th century.

From there we strolled down to the main attraction in town, Plaza de Toros, or the Bullring. It was built in 1785 and still hosts bullfights today, although it's mostly a museum and tourist attraction. This was by far our favorite stop. They let you walk all the way through it. We sat in the upper and lower bowl, went onto the dirt infield, walked through the interior hallways, saw the bull pens, and the stables(the horses drag the bulls out, once the matador kills them).

Next stop was for lunch. We ate at an outdoor cafe next to the bullring. Allie had a huevos con la patata y el jamón (ham and cheese omelet). Mike had a croissant del verraco (wild boar in a puff pastry). Both were excellent.

From there it was onto historic Ronda. We passed through Almeda Park to snap some photos of the cliff-sides and homes.

In historic Ronda the streets are narrow and mostly for pedestrians. We toured the Iglesia de Santa Maria la Mayor or the Church of Saint Mary's. It was built in the 15th century and is very ornate inside. We were blown away by the details. You aren't allowed to take photos, but we snuck in a few.

From there we did a little shopping at some local stores and moved onto the Puente Nuevo or the New Bridge. It was built in the 18th century over the river Guadalevin. It is how you get into town. The river is several hundred feet below the bridge. We took some great photos of it from the Convent of Santo Domingo. At the top of the photo and behind the bridge is a hotel, and to the right, you can see a cafe built into the side of the cliff. In the next photo you can see the Convent and bridge from the cafe(we stopped in for Sangria and a Coke Light).

This town has about 35,000 people and is busy, but well worth it. Little English is spoken here, but we got along fine with the few phrases we knew.

From there it was back to Estepona. We made a stop at a roadside fruit stand and bought a watermelon, oranges, bananas, some sort of honey dew melon, and some sort of flat peach looking things. We think the farmer told us they were juicy. It was the only English word we picked out from our conversation with him.

Now for the comical part. We stopped at a gas station in San Pedro on our way back to the hotel. Mike put it $20 Euros of gas and off we go...or so we thought. Turns out, our car is diesel! Oops! Anyway, after about a mile, the rental car breaks down. Here to find out, in Spain, "petrol normal" means regular gas and "gas-oil" means diesel. There we are, in the middle of San Pedro with a broken down car. A nice old man sitting on a park bench tried to help, but he spoke no English. He explains to us there's a mechanic just up the street. We proceed to call the rental company instead and they tell us they will send a tow truck and get us a new car in Marbella. In the meantime, 3 mechanics (the friends of the old man) came walking up to us and offer to fix our car for about half price. Then Pedro and co-workers (literally) push our car uphill to their shop and it took them about an hour to drain the gas and put in diesel. They were in a big hurry and short-staffed because Spain was playing Honduras in the World Cup at 8:30pm. The mechanics were awesome and totally hooked us up! They laughed at us and said the wrong gas in the tank happens almost daily. Pedro for President!

Anyway, after the "gas incident", we went to the Auld Dubliner Pub for fish and chips and to watch the second half of the Spain/Honduras match. Overall, best day yet! Off to Morocco tomorrow!