Saturday 16th March

This day was one of the highlights of my trip.  We were picked up early by our guide for the day, Tarik.  We started with a trip to a couple of Berber villages.  One of them was an Argan oil producer, and apparently quite successful.  Argan oil is one thing that Morocco is particularly well-known for (I hadn't realised this before I went, but since returning to England I have noticed it much more). We were made to feel very welcome and the ladies working there encouraged us to have our photos taken with them while they explained the process that went into making Argan oil.  We had a look around their little shop and bought some products, it would be rude not to after all.  They had done well for themselves as a business but they still came across as very down-to-earth, family-orientated people, and I really liked that.

It turns out that family feel is not unusual in Morocco.  The city had felt very pressured to me, but the Berber villages showed a very different side. There were small developments on mountainsides that we were told would house whole families, maybe even as many as 70 people across the generations.  They are a predominantly Muslim country and there were mosques in every village.  Having been brought up as a Christian this was a very different culture for me to experience first-hand, but it was refreshing to see Muslims in their family environment, happy and playful and generally living out their lives normally, whilst occasionally stopping for the call to prayer.  Media can paint a nasty picture of all religion and I feel Muslim's can get a particularly tough image, but I experienced the people I met in the villages as a gentle, family-orientated, faith-abiding human beings.  It was really great.

After the Argan oil village, we also went to a more regular village.  We gave some money to the driver to pass on to the family who then opened their home to us and offered us traditional Moroccan tea.  I suspect it is the tourists like us who are willing to pay that help provide this family's income.  They had land and goats, but other than that they were just a regular family who had let us come in, have a look around and share tea with them.  

Oh, and I held a baby goat.... CUTE!

We made our way up into the mountains and then went on a walk.  Our guide was brilliant, a bit of a character but really funny and brilliant at English, which helped me as so far most people we met didn't speak much English and I was feeling like a really bad tourist for not being able to converse more in their own language.  Although it was difficult at times to work out what that was as they learn Berber, Arabic, French, Spanish and English in the schools.  Our walk through the mountains surprised me.  Firstly, it was baking hot sunshine, but I could see snow on the mountain tops.  I also hadn't realised how high up the mountains we'd climbed and as we started on our walk I felt very queasy as a result of the altitude. 

Poor Tim was scared of heights and on our drive there were times when he looked as queasy as I felt right now in the mountains.  But I'm glad I persevered, it was a lovely walk with great views and showed another side to Morocco.  After we went back down we had lunch at a restaurant, more Tagine and other local dishes.  The local food was lovely but it was beginning to feel a little repetitive!

We headed back home via another shop to get more snacks.  Jayne had renamed Tarik Derek, and Derek in turn had named Jayne Fatima.  He'd offered her to stay and be his wife, thankfully she declined the very generous offer as I don't think she would have been his only wife, and besides, I needed my travel buddy for the remainder of the trip!

So another great day on the mountains, spending time with great people.  We also saw camels, goats, cows, donkeys and chickens, all wandering free or being led around the mountainsides.  I would fully recommend a trip to the Atlas Mountains if you're ever in Marrakech.  I was just sad that we were unable to stay a little longer and venture into the desert.  We spent our last evening with Tim and Lucy who were heading home the next day and played more Tagine, ate snacks and shared a toast, with and courtesy of Francois.  We only had one more full-day ourselves and we didn't want to waste it, so we chose a final excursion and decided that we would go to Essaouira the next day.  It's a seaside town, quite a way from Marrakech so we would need to get up early.