Breakfast in the middle of nowhere was oddly calm, restful even. If the meal was not the premium meal we might have hoped for, then hearing the birdsong whilst we ate more than compensated for any indifference in how the meal was served. Some of the calm came from how, beside our host family, we were on our own. Fresh orange juice, and coffee, was not going too far with the liquids when there were soft boiled eggs, pancakes, flat bread, and a choice of four spreads to serve on the pancakes. I took my man bag with me so we had our lunch sorted. Anthony said he was rested after yesterday's stressful drive, out of respect for him I took him at his word. Though I could see that he was keen to make the most of the time in Morocco which may make him want to try some things even when tiredness might cloud his appreciation and judgement of the experience.
We had to go out for the day for three reasons. The first was that we had to use the day well, the second was that there was a site that Anthony wanted us both to see, the third reason was that close to this site there was supposedly a money point and we both needed some money to continue on the week. The site was called Aït Benhaddou and it is a fourteenth century fortification, a castle as we would think of it, built from impacted mud. The journey there was relatively straight forward, even though the weather en route was unobligingly hot. From then on our experience of the discomfort that everyday tourists put themselves through got rapidly worse, until the only solution was to stop under shade and buy something in a cafe. The touts were out and ready for all comers, I was ready to compare them to locusts, with a choice of collective noun for the touts, plague, cloud, or swarm. We parked and locked the car. I had in my man bag the car keys, some now warm water and our lunch. We had barely moved a yard before a tout apprehended us and tried to say he was the way to go if we paid him. We told him that we had our water and were going to see the fort, where is the hole in the wall for getting money out of? He gave us instructions for finding the hole in the wall, and how to find him online if we were ever interested in buying carpets. We thanked him and walked in the direction of what we thought was the fort, which was not as easy as we thought it would be. After one or two short wrong turnings and fifteen minute slow walk in the heat we got our first viewing of the fort. Walking fast was definitely a bad idea, it would have made us perspire rather a lot in a short period of time.
The village, where carpets and other crafted goods were sold from every third house, is called Aït Benhaddou. The fort is called the Ksar of Aït Benhaddou and seemingly most of the village and people from well beyond the village occupied the rooms of the fort to sell their modern art and craft goods, because that is where the tourists wanted to go and where the money was.
We walked across the river in front of the fort at the shallowest point to go in, and were immediately charged the equivalent of ten euros apiece for entry. After being nearly misdirected by a youth whose aggression we had not recognised for what it was soon enough, we joined the regular trail of tourists ascending along long zig zags of paths with small dwellings, now shops, going upwards towards the highest heights of fort. At least four very long and crowded paths. We passed I-don't-know-how-many stalls and shops seeking to extract a living from the queues of tourists who passed them, including us. It was unpleasant and that was without taking into account the added effect of the heat.
When we saw a path that descended, and one that went higher, Anthony guessed that that the lower path led to the bridge, which would take us back to the village. We took the descending path and filed slowly past ever more stalls that we did not want to buy from, and knew that if we had any thought about buying, then the next question would be where would it fit in our luggage? In our homes? The high spot of the excursion was the chilled orange juice we stopped for, in the shade on our way out of the village. It was not a new experience to be around younger people fiddling with their phones but it kept them quiet in the heat, something everybody needed. We were relieved when we finally returned to the car, I got the car key out of my man bag, and we got sat inside. Seeing the fort was an overwhelming experience, and not in a good way.
Our next task was to find the money point. We had been told that it was on our left as we drove down the street. We expect the money point to be facing the street, and could not see it. What I could see but Anthony was less observant of, for him being an observant driver, was that there were two turnings on the left hand side of the road. We had to inspect down both turnings to find the money point, a column that stand apart from the wall behind it down the narrower second turning. It took Anthony four runs up and down the length of the main road for me to recognise the right to turn off. Being a tourist will do that to a person, scramble their ability to think and see clearly. We got our two thousand dirhams, equivalent to two hundred euros, apiece in the end.
Reflecting later on the visit to the fort, I took at face value the idea of visiting the fort when it was put to me. I did not know what to expect. I doubted Anthony had much forethought as to what to expect either. With hindsight what that experience of being a tourist being slowly moved along with so many other tourists down the many narrow paths in the fort reminded me most of were the descriptions of purgatory I'd read, when wanting to get out is the one thing that those there want, and it is the last thing that they can arrange.
We were glad of our rooms and beds when we found them, late in the afternoon. The Auberge was rather quiet when after our rest we sought out the landlord to say that we would be eating out for dinner. It took three attempts for me to find his wife, and get her to call the husband with the smart phone and tell him we would not be requiring him to make a meal for us that night. In the phone call we both overcame my speaking poor French and his speaking poor English, thankfully. I did not want Anthony having to do more than he needed to because I seemed to be helpless/useless.
Going out in the evening seemed to be simple business at first. We took the route where we had been refused a bed for the night two nights earlier where the hotels were all booked up due to online booking filling all their rooms well in advance. This time we looked for eateries on the same road. One eatery looked promising, but it proved to be full of belligerent Russians who were shouting at each other and the manager. When we saw the menu we found that it did not serve serious food anyway. In the working class town that had not offered us a bed before there was a restaurant that served us meaty tagines, mine was lamb, Anthony's was chicken. There was not much choice. Tired as we were, the food was filling and cheap, and we were happy. In our rooms for the night I read more of 'Confessions of a Fallen Angel' and Anthony did things with his smart phone including reading The Guardian.
The day ended with a cuddle, both of us in our pyjamas, which was one of the treats of the holiday, and of most of the times with Anthony, for me.
Please left click here for part six of this diary
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