Today was a full day in Marrakech. On the the way to our first stop we passed by the water men. Historically these men provided the important role of providing water to desert communities. They wear funny clothes and now they make a living letting tourists take pictures of them.
We first went to The Bahia Palace, which was built in the 1890s by a powerful prime minister of Morocco. The palace was huge and ornate. It was designed to house his four wives and 24 concubines. Each wife had her own large room opening onto a courtyard. One thing we found interesting is that to be a concubine (part of a harem) was considered an honor and they became wealthy and powerful. The concubines were given some potions as a contraceptive. If they had a child the child was taken care of but could not inherit any of their father’s wealth.
After the palace we took horse drawn carriages, which was kind of fun, to the Yves St. Laurent Museum. Unfortunately I don’t have a picture that includes the horses.
Yves St. Laurent lived in Morocco for a long time, and was a fashion god. He designed a lot of very creative clothing. The museum was very modern, and kind of small. Yves-Saint-Laurent was able to live openly as a gay man in Morocco. He was inspired by the local colors and native Berber jewelry and clothes.
There was a temporary exhibit of artwork by Jacques Azema, which we enjoyed. Here is one of his paintings.
We then went to the Jardin Majorolle (Majorelle Gardens). There is a museum of Berber artifacts including clothing and jewelry in the garden that we walked through. The Berbers are the people who have lived in North Africa for thousands of years. Most native Moroccans probably have some Berber blood. I did not find the museum very interesting, but Barbara enjoyed it. We were not allowed to take pictures there.
After the museum we walked through the gardens, which is just down the street from the museum. There was a lot of different kinds of vegetation, including many cactuses that looked like they belonged in Arizona.
We enjoyed the gardens, then had lunch at Kechmara, which was nothing special.
After lunch we walked through the Medina, which was very active, to get to the bus. We saw snake charmers, which were not as polished as those in our childhood cartoons, but it was still cool seeing them. The snake charmers make their money by charging people to take their picture.
We had a little downtime at the hotel before taking a cab back to the Medina for dinner. Barbara and I had a romantic dinner on the terrace of a nice restaurant (meaning most of the people eating there were tourists & that you could trust that the food would not make you sick), Cafe Nomad. It was hard to find since the Medina is a big labyrinth, but Google Maps helped a lot. Walking through the Médina is a surreal experience, a throwback to another time. It was an enjoyable dinner. We had a vegetarian pastilla appetizer that was outstanding.
We heard the call to prayer while dining on the rooftop terrace. It was beautiful to hear and we could hear it coming from Mosques in many different directions. Here is a video of the call to prayer. I apologize if it takes too long to download.
We bought a small wooden camel and cobra on the way out. The guy started at $75 for the cobra and we ended up at $15. The owner of the souk where we made the purchase asked us if we were American. When we said yes he said to us “I like Obama, I like Clinton, I like Kennedy” and he said he didn’t like Trump. We told him he is a Democrat.
We then found our way out of the Medina and took a cab back to the hotel. This was a very full and enjoyable day.
Jim and Barbara's Travel Journal 