Marrakech Day 12

Our last full day in Marrakech.   When we got into our Riad  last night the man at the desk asked when we were coming for breakfast. We said about the same time around 8:30.  He told us there would be a time change tonight. We struggled to figure out if we lost an hour  or gained an hour, so he was gesturing and trying to get me to change my watch.  I finally gave up, went to our room and looked it up on the internet. They were going from daylight saving time to standard time so we gained an hour.  Our guide said he would pick us up at 10, so I called him to ensure that it was the new 10. After much discussion we agreed to use the standard time.
We woke up early and had quite a wait until breakfast. We are getting a little tired of the breakfasts here as they consist various types of bread and yogurt.  Bacon and eggs sounds heavenly.  Our local guide came for us at the Riad.  His name was Abdul as well so we called him Abdul II.  He walked us out to meet Abdul I.  From the car we walked to the Bahia Palace. One hundred and sixty nine rooms, took 7 years to build.  The sultan who had the palace built had 4 wives (all that was allowed any more and it was jail for him), and a harem of 24 concubines. The  floors and the walls up to about 6 feet are all covered in small handcut tiles of every room.  The ceiling of Every room is covered with hand carved cedar and stained with natural pigments. Poppy for red, indigo for blue, saffron for yellow, and charcoal for black.  The wall were hung with rugs in the winter for warmth.  Above the wall tiles and around the arches is carved plaster there are usually Koran sayings.  The rooms are spectacular.   We left the palace amazed at the amount and quality of the artisans.   We also saw the mosque, Koranic school and the segregated room with no adornment at all and only a loudspeaker for them to hear the Iman.

From the palace we took the car to visit the Saadian Tombs.  The tombs are in an area like a garden which had been closed off for many years. The tombs are covered in mosaic tiles and each has a different pattern.  The wives and children are buried here.  The descendants of the prophet are inside. When he French took over Morocco as a protectorate in 1912 when they reopened the narrow alley after an aerial survey in 1917.  The entrance was bricked in during the 17th century.  Again very fine carvings and mosaic tile work (know as Andalusian tradition). Our guide took us to where the important women were buried and told us to look around a bit and line up in the queue to see the important room and he left us. We stood in line for almost 40 minutes in the blistering sun before we got a 1 minute peak into the important men's tomb.  Impressive but not worth the wait.  Looked  around for our guide, couldn't find him so started out. He came running out of the shade where he had been waiting.

 Then he took us to the Place Jemaa el Fna  square.  We had been there yesterday and had looked around a bit. He asked what shopping we had to do. We said maybe some tee shirts.  He marched us across the square to a tee shirt shop, he said which sold quality tee shirts.  We were able to pick out a few, but the price was out of this world.  We said no way and started to leave. The sales man dropped the price by 30%, we said no we could buy them cheaper at another store.  His were much better quality and made in Morocco he said. Still no.  We said we would be satisfied with the cheaper ones.  Give us your price. I gave him what was the price another store which didn't have what we wanted, but came down to.  The sales man cut the price to about 40% of the opening price.  When I said let’s leave it, the guide stepped in with a compromise offer just a little higher than we offered.   We said okay, the guide and salesman argued (I think) andlike.  in the end we got the lower price..  The guide walked us out side and offered to walk us back to our hotel.  We said we could find our way back.  Our all day tour lasted less than 3 hours.  We think our guide was not interested in us because we said no carpets, no leather, and no jewelry.   They get commissions on the big stuff.
So we had the afternoon to ourselves .  We each had a panini for lunch, watched a handler chase a monkey which had gotten loose and then spent a couple of hours walking around Jemaa el Fna square and the various alleys running off the square.  We are now more confident in navigating around.  When we go down an alley we both look for reference points and point them out to each other.  We make no more than one turn down an off shoot of the alley and go as far as we feel comfortable or reach another branch and we turn back and walk to the square before taking another.  Jemaa el Fna is the main square in the medina. There are acrobats, snake chargers, story tellers, monkeys, birds, henna ladies by the score and dozens and dozens of people hawking their wares.  There are carts selling fruits and vegetables and even a plant nursery .

L We headed back to our room to get out of the heat and have a rest. On the way back dogging mopeds, scooters,  donkey carts and bicycles we stopped to talk to Canada. Canada is a shop owner who recognized the flag on our day packs and hollered out hey Canada every time we passed. With or without our packs, he recognizes us, and we pass by his shop several times a day. A very pleasant young man.  After our rest we headed out for dinner, back to the square. We selected a restaurant with an upstairs balcony so we could look over the sea of people.  The meal wasn't the best, but the view was great, and a large part of the square appeared to be packed. It was getting dark and we were leaving in the morning so decided to call it a night.