Essaouira

We are now back in Marrakech after a relaxing 4 days in Essaouira, which is a seaside resort town on the Atlantic. It has a very nice medina with no honking cars, but the occassional speeding moped. The town is predominately painted white with blue shutters on the windows, very similar to Chefchaouen up in the Rif Mountains. The blue is supposed to scare away evil spirits. The main attraction in Essaouira is the port area with the colonial ramparts and the sweeping beach. On a clear day the sunset is quite spectacular against the town.

We spent our days lazing on the beach and I managed to burn my feet even though I was diligent with the sunscreen. Hopefully that will be the last burn for the trip, but somehow I doubt it. We didn't venture into the water as the looks on peoples faces who had told a rather frigid story. Instead we finished off our books and watched the locals play football all along the sand. They wait until the tide goes out then use the flat hard packed sand as the pitch, after seeing some of the fields around the country those beach pitches were probably the best in Morocco.

We have one night here in Marrakech then we are catching an overnight train to Tangiers then onto Barcelona. Morocco has been a good introduction to the year long travels, relatively easy to get around but enough of a challenge to keep us on our toes. Onwards we go!