5/2/15

marrakesh
We dropped off our car in Marrakesh which was a stressful little adventure. We were racing through the streets of downtown Marrakesh, trying to find the car rental place before it closed. That was the only moment of our road trip that we REALLY could've used that dang GPS. But we eventually found it with just a few minutes to spare.

We then headed to our guesthouse in the Marrakesh medina. We stayed at Sindi Sud. It was very cheap and very basic. But we were totally happy with it our first few nights there. After we were in Essaouira, we stayed there one more night and had an unpleasant encounter with the owner (read my trip advisor review here for full details).

We had some delicious meals in Marrakesh and enjoyed wandering the alleys. We also loved checking out Maison de la Photographie & having lunch on their beautiful patio. 

However, both on the way to the museum and back we had sketchy experiences with "faux guides" who wanted to show us the way. Both times we were adamant that we didn't want a guide but the guys kept lingering ahead of us and then forced us to pay them. On our way back, the guy took us to totally the wrong area and then kept pressuring us to give him more & more money (his buddy also showed up so we really didn't have a choice but to hand over the money!)

It left such a bad taste in my mouth and those guys are unfortunately the first thing I think of when I reflect on our time in Marrakesh. By the end of our time in Marrakesh, we were pros at making ZERO eye contact with anyone who was offering to give us directions or calling out to us. I hate that because I want to be friendly and talk to people who initiate conversation. 

It's also left me really suspicious of anyone who now offers to help us with directions. In Sri Lanka in December, we were trying to find a bus station and some guy offered to bring us to it. I didn't want to follow him but Mike said we should give him a chance. Mike was right to trust him because he was so helpful and brought us right to where we needed to be. And in that case, I absolutely wanted to give him some money for being so kind and helpful - but he refused to take it! I don't want to be jaded, so I really need to shake off these bad experiences in Morocco.

On to Essaouira next (our last stop in Morocco!)

5 comments:

  1. Beautiful pictures and a wonderful post about Marrakesh! Love it. xx

    ReplyDelete
  2. Lovely photos. Loved that you didn't just share the good experiences. I feel like many bloggers just advertise a place, but don't give you an honest account of a country/hotel.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I appreciate you saying that. It's hard to know how much to say. I don't want to give a country a bad rap because of a few bad experiences. And everybody who comes to Morocco is going to have a different experience so our experiences are definitely not universal. And we really did love the Sahara and Essaouira (coming up next) so I think I would still recommend it!

      Delete
  3. Take me to Marakesh!!!! Wonderful photography! :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Beautiful! And I appreciate your candidness about your experience. I had a similar negative experience in Jordan, and while I try to remember all of the positive things we saw, I still think about that experience first! It's hard to shake it.

    ReplyDelete

thanks so much for writing! i love hearing from you!

xo