Well, I feel as if I have gotten quite long winded these days so I will try to keep this short before I dump a massive one on you for my first five days in Tunisia.
Turns out the reason for our tardiness to the nice couscous dinner was that Wyonetta finally managed to get out of Briaham what he really wanted. At some point during out expedition, he decided that he wanted to go travel with her and see some of the sights in Morocco. I couldn't figure out if this was a ploy to get more money and continue as a guide or if he was sincere. Well, gee, gosh, golly, he really wanted to come travel for a bit and then have Wyonetta help him get a visa into Spain. Never mind that he did not have a passport...minor detail. Then it also turned out that the reason we had to go to the couscous dinner, despite the fact that the rest of the family had eaten and gone to bed was because Mohktar planned to squeeze in an extra day on our tab and he considered the lunch and dinner with his family as part of his package. That all came out the next day when we discussed the final price. We spent much of our last morning in M'Hamid trying to get away from all these men trying to tell us what we should be doing, where we should be going and who we should be going with and escaped off to a local restaurant. That didnt' help much as Briaham found us and hovered around where we were sitting trying to chat. At this point it was pretty unclear if Wyonetta wanted away from him or wanted him to come with us but she agreed for him to come with us...lucky me huh???
So after much frustration and annoyance we jumped in a not so grand Grand Taxi and headed off to Zagora to replenish our funds and to catch the bus to Ourzazate. This all went pretty smoothly other than the cost of the Grand Taxi to Ourzazate, which Briham was not happy about paying but which Wyonetta and I secured without telling him. I think he had grand plans about keeping us in Zagora for a couple of days with his mates from the store as they had an entire lunch cooked up and kept saying, "Oh, Why don't you stay a couple of days here, it will be nice!" No thanks!
Off we went to Zagora and here is where things got very strange. Brihams brother and Hassan were calling him non-stop asking where the rest of the money was for the hotel - Wyonetta did not have enough to cover both the camel trek and ht hotel and so had to take money out over a couple of days. Briham did not have enough money to cover many days of travel - only 500D and was eating next to nothing and every time we went to eat, he wandered off to his cousins shop to wait for us. He also had some weird document that needed to be signed by Wyonetta, with passport details and approved my the local tourist police to allow him to travel with her. I pressed upon her that she should not sign anything until she understood it completely and in the end, it restulted in quite a discussion between the two of them in front of the general police office while they discussed what they would do. She finally refused to sign anything, espeically since half our day was already wasted and that meant we could no longer get to Ait Benhaddu, the largest most impressive Kasbah in Morocco. I was pretty unhappy about this but more eager to get rid of Briham and be on my way.
Wyonetta had problems with her ATM card as well so this did not add to the fun of the situation. Ultimately, she got the cash and tried to give that and the wine we had bought to replace Hassans wine that we drunk, to Briham. He called Hassan to approve it all and that resulted in another big mess and finally with Wyonetta paying extra to save Briham's ass if he did not return with the correct amount of money and with her breaking and telling Briham that she did not want him to travel with us any longer. I was quite relieved with that. Although she did keep emailing and chat lining with him and almost decided to stay another week to meet up with him again. Never quite understood that for all her complaining about him, she was thinking about changing her flight to hang out with him more...whatever...
Quite happily we arrived at the bus station to find a bus heading out immediately to Boulmaine du Dades where we could catch a taxi out to the gorge. That went well enough and, of course, at the other end, we were greeted by a nice man in a blue robe who wanted to help us get there. We let him, knowing full well that he was a guide for the area and that we were not going to be quided anywhere. In any case, it was very useful him arranging a grand taxi for us and also getting us to a good internet cafe while we waited. The entire way up the gorge he kept telling us about the walks he could take us on and the fact that he was an expert on massage, Berber Massage to be exact. Just a side note here, Berber Massage is something that should be avoided at all costs. Bascially these guys just want to take the chance to rub their hands all over the Western women and to see how far they can go and how much clothing they can get off. It is truely vile this habit of theirs and very annoying. The hotel that we were brought to was quite nice and VERY cheap. We had a nice Berber Whiskey (mint tea) on the patio with the owner and were then shown all of this guide guys photos of various trips he had done and the people that were his "friends" all over the world and that loved his hikes. Ugh!
In any case, we had a lovely night that eve listening to the river gurgle by our window, eating nice food and watching the locals play their drums and a chzec girl give it a go as well. It was nice. Of course guide guy came by and insisted on giving us hand massages and wanting to give us feet and leg massages as well. We escaped quickly to our room hoping not to see him the next day. Oh well, too bad for that, we did have to see him the next day and sure enough he thought we would go on a hike with him. We took a pass and went out and wandered the gorge on our own. It was lovely and we found a little offshoot that was carved out by the river and looked like parts of Utah...can't remember the parks name as I have never been there but there are always pictures of it around. The brillant glowing orange canyons. Anyway, it was a nice walk and then we jumped on another bus in the afternoon to head out to the Todra Gorge. Figures that we would bump into guide guy as we changed from Grand Taxi to bus and he was quite pissy with us. He even asked for money for the hand massages. We both looked at him like he was crazy and said no and then he explained he thought we were going to go on a hike with him and that he had lost money. I replied, "too bad, I thought you were just being nice!" I have had it with these arab men and am quite disgusted by their behavior.
Todra Gorge was beautiful...rising 300 meters or something like that out of the ground. Unfortunately they have built a road through the center of it so it is packed with big tour buses half of the day but it is still stunning. We spent one night there and then headed out in another Grand Taxi - eight of us this time...all crammed in there...We joined up with a German couple for this bit and the afternoon bus to Er Racchidia where we would change for buses to Fez and Casablanca. The overnight bus was not too bad and as it was quite empty, we managed a good nights sleep.
Fez was not quite the exciting exotic city I expected it to be, in fact I did not love it too much. It was OK but nothing like the energy and excitement that you get from being in Marrakesch. It did have a very neat souq with lots of tiny, twisty lanes lined with shops. I was too overwhelmed to bother to look in them and they had the usual stuff that was everywhere else so I wasn't too bothered either. The salesmen also did not help their cause by being very verbose and yelling out at us at every turn, " hey sweetie, gazelle, come into my shop, what you looking for". They grab at you in Fez, which was particularly annoying. At dinner time, we snuck a bottle of wine into the restaurant - there is pretty much no alcohol anywhere - and the waiter helped us by pouring it into a coke bottle (it was only a half bottle) so that we could have it on the table. Funny thing was that we had to drink from the coke bottle - very strange feeling, wine from a coke bottle - and when I was brought the back to pour it into the bottle, the cook took the little bit that was left, put the bottle to her mouth and knocked it back. Then she gave me a big grin with her pudgy face and a twinkle in her eye and went back to cooking.
We only spent one night in Fez and then headed to Meknes to see the Roman ruins in Volubilis. They were quite spectacular, as are most Roman ruins (at least to me). We had hired a Grand Taxi with a Dutch couple so got there and to another city (can't remember the name but it is a pilgramige site) qutie easily and had an enjoyable afternoon. In the evening we poked around town a bit but it was not a very exciting place. The next day we were off again to spend out last night in Rabat.
Rabat was quite nice - clean, amazingly clean! It had a nice cosmopolitan feel about it and actually had women sitting in cafes in the Nouvelle Ville. The city was really geared towards locals and that was nice. The souq was packed with food vendors and junk clothing vendors and there were very few tourists around. I would have liked to have seen the Kasbah there as well but it was dark and it did not seem prudent to be wandering the street aimlessly at night. Also, my stomach was grumbling. Had a good dinner in a really local place (kofta sandwich, frites and Harrira - had to have the soup on my last night). We met up with some local rasta guys and they chatted away with us while we ate adn then showed us a nice little cafe with good mint tea. They were friendly enough and we enjoyed talking to them but really, I spent half the night wondering what they really wanted and when "my brothers shop" was going to come out. I hate having this feeling that everyone is out for something when maybe they really are not.
Early up the next day and off to the airport.
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