Two Wheels move the Soul: Essaouira

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Essaouira

See our Dades Gorge video on the right side of the page.

Ibis Pool

Essaouira is a coastal village of 40000 people and is also listed as a UNESCO site for its intact medina and sea fortress. The drive from Marrakesh was simple, the road is virtually dead straight, very prairie-like and you start to see more European road markings such as double solid lines and passing on one side while prohibiting on the other. The 174 kms clicks by pretty quick and the last section is actually 4 lane divided and we arrive to a beautiful setting at the new Ibis hotel here. Another Oasis. Pic is from our room.

Medina Walls and Mineret

Sandra’s stomach is giving her a bit of a problem again and we are trying to figure out what she’s eating that I’m not that is affecting her. We sit out and use the gorgeous pool and even though we’ve had many days in the sun, the sun here 800 kms south of the top of Africa is apparently a lot more powerful because we get sunburnt, not bad, but warm.The next day we walk into the old medina area. We are about 5 mins from the beach and encounter some camel jockeying as they set up for their rides on the beach every day. The beach is super long and goes on out of sight. I find replacement sunglasses for the ones that broke in Spain, and Sandra finds a miniature tagine with Essaouira towers painted on it. We are doing pretty good with our small travel mementos.

outer ramparts

The fishing port is just outside the towers and we take a walk through there. The fish has just come in and there are huge long eels to see, something that is strange for us to see in the cold Pacific climate. There are 4 huge fishing vessels being built in the port, all of wood, and the fishing fleet as you can see is like everything else in Morocco, rundown. I do spot some Yamaha outboard motors and they look in good shape. They must be great engines to keep on running here.

The medina while being old is very well run and not as dirty as most others we’ve seen and the stall operators are well behaved. I think the tourist influence from Europe, especially Germany where Ruby mentioned her parents used to take her, has probably had more of an effect. . It is definitely in good shape here. Eastern Morocco obviously doesn’t see the tourism.