Names have been changed here – for privacy purposes

When the group I was travelling with left Marrakech – on day 5 of this trip, we went through ‘Oued Touama’, and our guide, talked about healthcare in Morocco over the microphone in the bus, and mentioned that doctors now have to work in hospitals in rural areas for 3 years before going to the cities, and they study and work for 8 years before qualifying, the government bought 5 helicopters to help with medical emergencies in mountain villages, and when you’re sick, you don’t get paid (i.e. you get paid for each day you work).

Then the radio in the van was turned on and a love song being sung in Moroccan was playing (our guide said it was really popular at the moment); we were entering Marrakech from the opposite side that we’d left from at 11.40am, and were told a bit more about it – there are 7 golf courses in Marrakech, the International Festival of Movies is held here, there’s a tower built in 1156 in it, an 8 day school holiday will start next week (all over Morocco), nicknames for the city include ‘the city of Palm trees’ and no one has the right to cut down a palm tree in Marrakech, ‘medina’ is an Arabic word that means ‘sense of humour’, ‘medina al pecha’ is another nickname meaning ‘city of happiness’, ‘medina al hamma’ means ‘the reed city’, you can’t build a building higher than 3 floors, so the sight of Koutoba tower isn’t blocked, and the International meeting of climate was here in November 2016.

We were driving down a long avenue lined with palm trees at that point, were told that the largest casino in Africa is in Marrakech, I saw a little shop that said ‘Lemonade Poisson’ on it, our guide said we’d get food from a supermarket for a picnic – which we stopped at.

I walked round it taking photos like a typical tourist and looking for traditional Moroccan stuff/stuff I couldn’t identify – and spotted ‘congolais’, ‘Discor Mabre au Chocolate’, Gouda cheese, and ‘Quadratini chocolate’ (which I sampled in the van – I thought they tasted a bit like the pink wafer biscuits sold in English supermarkets but a slightly chocolaty version)(and Bella told me she loves pink wafers). We arrived at this picnic place at 1.40pm, Gabby tried to open a packet of ham with nail clippers, Sara had a ‘sandwich au saucisse’ (and it was about 1ft long), my Gouda cheese was rather gooey, Tim and Sam had a bag of 10 croissants, the congolais was complimented by Sara and Chris (she called it delicious and he called it coconuty) (Sara swapped the end of her sandwich for 1 of them), Talia talked about the kids she teaches, and I shared out the coconuty things and got an Oreo type biscuity thing and a bit of dark Lindt chocolate in return; then Talia talked about shrimp flavoured crisps, and I tried a ‘Marsechal’ bar that I’d bought – which I thought tasted like a rather squashed chocolate éclair without cream (it was actually a biscuit).

We got going again at 2.15pm (and Bella had a can of Apple flavoured stuff – the brand name was ‘Mirinda’), and stopped 10 minutes later at some services (which had orange trees outside it) where there were Cheetos of various flavours and fridge magnets. Back in the bus, someone said something about goats in trees, and a song (in English) called ‘shout to my ex’ was playing on the radio; most people had dozed off by 3.20pm; I saw several donkey drawn carts while going down a dual carriage way, and a big sign saying ‘Valle D’Argone’, and the whole road had fields of Argan trees either side; our guide said the city had lots of building going up in it, but it’s a beautiful city and the weather is amazing (and then said ‘because you’re an amazing group’ – which made everyone go ‘awwww!’), the farmland (for Argan oil) is owned by Moroccan people (and I saw another couple of camels and vaguely wondered to myself if a mini camel could ever be created – i.e. like a camel version of a Shetland pony). Essaquirra – the city we arrived in just after 4pm – looked very very touristy and modern, our guide said some stuff about the medina and that he’d called a man that he knows with a cart to put our stuff in; and we got to Hotel Capsim (which was almost luxury) – our accommodation for that night.

The next day involved multiple encounters with camels (see post from 4th June – A camel ride in Morocco).