The new day dawned bright and sunny in Marrakesh, and I caught up on a few zzz's on the terrace while waiting for breakfast.
We hooked up with our guide for the day, Mustafa, who was waiting for us in the lobby of the riad. More on him later. We got into the car and said hello to the driver, also named Mustafa. First stop the Bahia Palace, which translates as "Palace of the Favourite". Outside in the courtyard, Mustafa gave us a good overall lesson in Moroccan history, and then we proceeded into the palace.
The palace was occupied by the vizier to the Sultan, who was a very powerful man, almost a kingmaker. The site was the where his original house stood, and then he expanded it by usurping neightbouring plots. Hence the decor of the palace evolves from middle class simplicity to sumptuous luxury as we go deeper into the palace.
The main courtyard is in the heart of the palace, which was built on one level so as to allow the quite obese vizier easy access to all of his property. The courtyard was used by his concubines, and is paved with marble and decorated with zellij.
The courtyard faces the main reception hall with its beautiful cedar wood ceiling and detailed decoration.
Our next stop was the wonderful Maison Tiskiwin, just a stone's throw away from the Palace. Home to the Bert Flint museum, it is a wonderful example of a 19th century Marrakesh house. Bert Flint was a Dutch explorer who painstakingly amassed a collection of artefacts from the Saharan region. There is a printed guide handed out and one follows the information marked on the pages, correlating them with the number on the exhibits.
The care and detail that have gone into putting this collection together is truly admirable. Perhaps we connected with it even more after visiting the Sahara ourselves.
Onwards to the Saadian tombs, which enjoy a reputation as one of the finest examples of Islamic architecture in the country.
In the courtyard is the newer mausoleum that was opened to the public in 1917, and it is set in a garden planted with flowers to symbolise paradise. People of all sects were buried here, and graves of Muslims are identified with the head shape on the tomb, giving the direction towards Mecca.
The Saadien princes decorated their mausoleums with great ostentation, as compared to the relative simplicity of the Almohad dynasties. They date from the 16th to 18th centuries. The central mausoleum consists of 3 rooms with decoration that is reminiscent of the Alhambra. The dome of stalactites, the lavish mihrab, and carved cedar wood ceilings embellished with gold leaf can just about be made out, as lighting has been kept to a minimum to preserve the rooms.
We found this cat sitting outside the walls of the tombs. Given its distinct colour, we have named it the Marrakesh Cat. The rose red colour of the city is its identity and building facades cannot feature any other colour.
We headed out of the medina into the Ville Nouvelle for our next stop, the Majorelle Gardens.
In 1923, the painter Jacques Majorelle fell in love with the city and built himself a beautiful villa with traditional decoration, surrounded by a magnificent garden. The house was later bought by the designer Yves St. Laurent. The garden features 1800 different species of cactii, bougainvillea and other tropical flowers and 400 types of palms.
It seems serendipitous that I wore red today, as it made for striking pictures with the classic Majorelle blue.
The gardens are a wonderfully peaceful place, crowds notwithstanding, and one can easily spend a couple of hours here. There is also a small cafe and a gift shop.
Various posters that were painted by the designer are displayed in a special exhibit.
The monument to Yves St. Laurent lies deep inside the gardens.
We walked around enjoying the cool air and the colours, and slowly made our way back out.
We stopped for lunch at this garden restaurant in the Ville Nouvelle. I had an average pasta, and Gordon made a meal of his salad and brochettes.
Mr. Mustafa had been the perfect guide so far. However, the "commission" side of things started coming to the fore. He asked us what we were looking to buy and we told him nothing special, Gordon wanted to look at trying out a pair of babouches, and I was looking at some contemporary Moroccan stuff for the home. He took us to this antique place in the Ville Nouvelle, which of course, "happened" to be next to the restaurant he had suggested for lunch. It had photographs of the owner with Hollywood stars, and everything there was very antiquey and superlatively pricey. So we walked out of there and told him that that was not what we were interested in and he said, "but you wanted stuff for your home". I gave him a list of shops that I had compiled as being more contemporary, and he just said, "these are all the same as the one I have shown you, and since you say you don't like that kind of stuff, there's no point going there". We decided not to make a big deal out of it as we wanted to get along with the visit to the souks, but the worst was yet to come.
We returned to the medina and after a short walk came into the very interesting and colourful Dyers souk. Skeins of wool and silk like the ones below are dyed and still wet, hung out to dry in the sun, making for wonderful pictures.
We visited a small shop that showed us all the natural dyes and we bought a small scarf as a memento. Mustafa did not look to happy, he probably wanted us to buy out the shop.
We walked around more of the souks. Mustafa was of the opinion that most medersas were pretty much the same as what we had seen in Fes, and so we needn't waste time looking at them.
Since Gordon had evinced an interest in trying out babouches, he took us to a very non descript average looking shop. We had a wait a long while there because the sho did not seem to have any colour or size range in any style that we wanted, and the attendant had to keep going out and getting them from somewhere else. We finally got fed up and decided to leave with just a small red pair for me to use at home, and that did not go down well with Mustafa again. He started walking ahead of us, muttering, "the tour concludes at 5, so you better hurry up". He refused to let us stop anywhere else enroute. I told him I had to buy a couple of lanterns for my family as gifts, and since we were passing through the metalworking area, may be I should stop and look so that I could pack them away safely that night. I found what I was looking for in a small shop, and Mustafa got into a fight with the shopkeeper, telling him he was taking too much time bargaining with us. He threatened to leave us there, in the middle of the souks, if we did not leave immediately, and if our stuff was not in the car, I would have gladly told him to get lost and found our own way out. The shopkeeper finally managed to convince him to conclude the sale. We walked back in silence to the car and drove back to the riad. Enroute, he tried to make a feeble apology, but we were having none of it. We got out, and walked into the riad without a look back.
This was the single most infuriating thing that had happened to us on the trip, and that too, right at the fag end. Unfortunately, none of our photos feature this person, or else I would gladly blacklist him online, but he is over 50, normally dressed in a black shirt and suit, has a moustache and green eyes. He seemed to be very knowledgeable, indeed the first half of the day was ok, its only when the greed kicked in that his true colours came through. If you are in Marrakech and have the misfortune of being assigned this person as a guide, immediately request a change.
Our mood was dour, to say the least, and in part to alleviate it, we decided to walk back to the Djemaa el Fna, which was on our itinerary, but skipped over as many other things by that wretched man. It took us about 15 minutes to walk down the busy street to the square.
For centuries, the square has been the nerve centre of the city. A Unesco world heritage site, it is the site of the "grand spectacle". In the past, it was the site of many beheadings, the heads of the victims pickled and suspended from the city gates. These days, its where food stalls and buskers converge every evening in an open air show.
We walked around the square, taking in the hustle and bustle. Any attempt to try and photograph anyone immediately results in a demand for money, so after taking a few, calculated long shots, we decided to heed the advice gleaned from our research and head for the terraces of one of the bars overlooking the square. Of course, many others had the same idea, and it was difficult to find place, but we managed to find a terrace where the entrance fee was a drink each.
Immediatel, things became easier as we used the zoom on the camera to shoot pictures. Snake charmers, monkey handlers, fire eaters, henna women, gnaoua musicians, storytellers, healers, palm readers, tooth extractors, ear cleaners.... it was wild, and frenetic and a cauldron of buskers and onlookers. Coming from India, where such "fairs" are the norm for most villages, it was probably not as exotic to us, but the energy and thrum of the crowds was infectious.
As the sun went down in a blaze of orange, the buskers ended their shift and started putting away their props. These gnaoua musicians changed into their normal street clothes, and everywhere around the square, the focus shifted from looking to eating.
The crowd on the terrace thinned out as well as tourists left to join the rush to assuage hunger pangs. The food stalls were fully set up and the griddles began sizzling with the first orders of the the evening.
We left the terrace cafe as well and walked amongst the food stalls with their offerings of dried fruits.....
.....snail soup....
......kebabs.....
.....and everything else. We had dinner reservations at one of the best restaurants in the city, so we were content to just look. We were invited by many touts to eat at their establishment, and on declining were simply urged to "come back tomorrow, remember , stall 31". There is definitely veggie fare to be had, but we did not want to chance eating on the street two days before leaving for home. Although if my experience with street food serves me well, I am sure, it would have been the best meal we had had in Morocco.
We left the square and headed to the restaurant, Dar Moha, a 10 minute walk away.
Dar Moha has consistently been rated the finest eating establishment in Marrakech. The one royal palace erstwhile house of designer Pierre Balmain has been converted into a chic gourmet paradise. Reservations are essential, and we were lucky to get one of the desired tables by the pool. There are other dining tables scattered throughout the different rooms of the house as well. The lighting is mainly candlelight, which makes for poor photos, but the ambience that evening was magical, and went a long way towards soothing our frayed nerves after the debacle that afternoon.
The menu is a set menu, but is great as it offers choices for the main course and dessert, and there were veggie options. The most fun part is the tasting menu of the hors d'oeuvres, 8 different types, each a twist on traditional fare, and absolutely delicious. The sweet onion paste and pepper puree are to die for, along with pumpkin mash, a nutty spinach treat, aubergines wrapped around dates, among others.
The mains were the ubiquitous couscous, very flavourful, and to the accompaniment of gnaoua musicians who strolled around the restaurant, challenging patrons to try and spin the tassels on their caps by rotating their heads. It was a beautiful meal, in beautiful surroundings, in a wonderful city.
The restaurant called for a taxi to take us back to the riad, and we tumbled into bed with some sweet and some not so sweet memories of our Marrakchi day.
