My Second Moroccan Holiday - Day Four - Tiznit

Thursday October the 19th

  Our breakfast was quiet compared with how the bikers breakfasted. From our table we could say that it was enough to enjoy their high spirits, as after eating they put on their leathers and got on their bikes, and the furniture van was opened up again and bike parts and tools were stored for easy retrieval at the next stop. 

  Our own breakfasts seem to have been prepared with a lack of forethought, as if the breakfast chef was also distracted by the sights and sounds going on outside. Anthony had to ask twice for what he ordered and the orange juice was bitter. Partly because of the way breakfast was served Anthony suggested that we leave Sidi Ifni that day. He felt that the place seemed to be done with us. He had looked up hotels in Tiznit, where we had stopped briefly en route for Sidi Ifni. There seemed to be plenty of characterful places to stay there. The inattentiveness that was with the staff over breakfast was still present when we settled the bill, over which there seemed to be some initial muddle. Eventually it was clarified that Anthony had paid quite a lot up front well before we arrived in Morocco. All I had to pay extra was 500 Dirhams before we packed our bags, put the bags in the car, made sure that we had left nothing behind in our room, We were set to go.

  On the way to Tiznit I very much admired the mountains. They were majestic rather than dramatic, slower in how they impressed me than mountains I'd seen before. Every mountain was spotted with dark foliage that seemed to be small at the distance we were from it, but close up the foliage must have been much larger. It was hard to take the scale of views we were taking in except by how small vehicles looked on the narrow roads next to what was beside them.

 Tiznit was slow to come into view, and then there is was. Tall thick sand coloured walls with entrances at several different points all of which which led inside the outer walls. The first thing we had to do was park the car to work out where we were and where we wanted the car to be. This was when we first realised how labyrinthine and narrow the streets of The Old Quarter were, how much it was a place best explored on foot. And even then the goods on sale in small hole-in-the-wall sized shops were often repeats of what was in other hole-in-the-wall sized shops. 

  We eventually found the right road into the city square, and parked where our car would be watched, but we would have to tip the watcher, to have more coffee before we started looking at the different hotels. I have not been a tourist very much in life, and the habit of having small amounts of money to give away, say, to the person who guides you safely out of the car park was something to adjust with.    

 

The hotel we chose was, well, on the decent side of being run down. Our room gave us a view of the rooftops and the street sounds below were highly audible as we looked across. This was not good for an afternoon snooze but the windows and shutters that quietened and darkened the room at the same time. The toilet and shower facilities were communal, and primitive. But again atmosphere made up for positivity where there might have been seen to be a lack of privacy. nice was 

  Anthony rested whilst I went off to explore the old market, not wishing to buy anything-I had most everything I needed-but wanting to see the sights of the place for myself. It was part of the tipping culture that a person, usually a young man, would latch onto a tourist and take them directly to where they thought the tourist wanted to go. I got caught in that a bit, but also resisted because what he showed me on the way was more interesting than where he wanted to take me. I thought the doorways sunk into the outer walls of the fortress were

rather splendid. They had a character and variety that reminded me of how I imagined the doors in 'Lord of the Rings' to be. The history of Tiznit is that it was originally five villages or communes, until 1880 or so when Sultan Hassan the !st built a fortress that became an administrative and commercial centre for the five communes. drawing all life from outside the fortress walls inside, or close to the walls.

Jewish silversmiths found themselves a new base there when they made the town famous for it's fine silverware. 

  In the early evening Anthony a guide soon found him and helped him find the restaurant mentioned in his guide book. The guide took us part of the same route that I had been unwilling guided early in the afternoon. We had the nearest experience of the week to gay, or camp, fun at the restaurant. The food was very good and we were offered beer to drink. It was all served to us by a young waiter who having to decided that we were 'gay'. He clearly enjoyed flirting with Anthony, who good humouredly flirted back. I have gay friends who like visiting eateries with young waiters who are nearly always wearing tight fitting trousers. This young man was never going to be that knowingly louche, but there was a distinctly non-literal tone to the conversation in French, which I was surprised at. Anthony was charmed. 

 And so, after a last late night walk back to the hotel, we came to rest at the end of another day. The communal washing facilities were easy to navigate, there were very few of them.

Please left click here for Day Five of this diary.