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Beautiful....
"I went to morocco a few years ago on a trip with school. It was organised by a company called World Challenge and only cost £500 (my Gran paid for that, cheers Gran!).
We went trecking in the atlas mountains and climbed Mount Toubkal, the highest mountain in africa (well, 165 meters from the top, there was thick fog and it was snowing, our guide said it was too dangerous :o( There were fantastic views and interesting things to be found, there was a helecopter crash back in the 70s, so everywhere you look there is debris from the crash, spread over a massive area, we even came accross the shallow graves of the crash victims, a bit spooky, but sad never the less. There was also loads of live bullets spread around, our guide collected a load of them to share round as memories, but he was evenually convinced that we wouldn't be able to get them back into the country!
We had stayed for a couple of days in a cafe/hotel owned by out berber guide, it was precariously perched on the side of a 200 ft drop down to a river. On the other side of a river was a Berber village, the houses were generally made out of concrete, mud or wood with anything else that could find. The electricity only came on in the evenings, but the food was generally not that bad (usually a salad with pasta, olives, peppers, sardines served with bread and 'laughing cow cheese' as it is caled over there) the mint tea was actually quite nice without sugar, but it is only served in very small glasses and they put about 4 teaspoons of sugar in each!
We also stayed a few days in Marakesh, the hotels weren't bad, although in the first one the ceiling fan (which was directly above my bed!) wobbled quite drastically, but we left it turned on never the less! The room we had on the last couple of night after returning from the mountains was fibne, and a hot shower rather than showering with cold water from a mug was very welcome!
We ventured out into the city a couple of days, the souks were like a maze, and all they all sold more or less the same stuff (apart from the odd fake levis one!), so no help there! There was quite a lot of them selling oranges as well, dunno why! We were constantly hustled with them trying to sell us kif (the local marijuana) water, oranges and henna tattoos. A few from our group eventually gave in to an old woman selling henna, we were dragged round into a secluded area closley followed by a younger woman so we were not pounced upon by other henna sellers and the 2 women set about staining the skin of their victims, our leader from world challenge, David, an ex-marine who loved himself was given a scorpion on one arm, ok he thought, until the other woman grabbed him and gave him a MASSIVE flowery pattern on the other, of course, he never lived it down for the rest of the trip!
So what did I buy? Well hardly the typical Morrocan things (apart from a couple on necklaces for my mum and sister) I bought a silver Nike ring and a silver Coca-Cola pendant costing me just under £10. Others bought wooden masks, drum things and hanging stars (big glass lamp shade things, about £30-40 over here, over there, less than £10, difficult to get home though!).
We went on a pony and trap ride round the city, up to the palace walls and round the streets, its a beatiful country, but crime begging is quite a big problem, but we generally didn't have too much trouble. We were planning to have a steam bath, but after having a look at the place, it was full of fat men rubbing themselves down, so we took the pony ride instead!
I was very pleased that amoungst the dodgy food and drink, you could still buy Coca-Cola and sprite etc, but alcohol is forbidden over there, thusly the mint tea!
I would totally recommend the country to anyone, especially the mountains, it was an experience of a lifetime and I'd love to go back.
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