14 November: Fez to Marrakech

We left Fez on an early train (08h50) this morning and got into Marrakech at about 5pm.

Am thankfully in the girl's single room tonight at the Hotel de la Menara and I am thrilled. Let me explain the single room: there are an odd number of girl's so we've been "alternating" the single room. This is the first time I've had it ... and the last since from tomorrow I'll be sharing with Varen! And even better, I won't have to move tomorrow when Varen arrives, he'll just move into my room. The room is quite spacious compared to the other's I've stayed in so far.

Am also very pleased to be done sharing with the other girls. I think I've definitely hit my tour group limit with them (think it might've been the entire day's train journey spent chattering about all things Aussie that really did it! Am bored of hearing of their local celebs, tennis players, footy players, TV jingles and how they have the best wine - excuse me?) and am really looking forward to Varen joining. Someone familiar who I trust and enjoy the company of to break up the general Aussie-ness. I always seem to get to this point on tours tho and just need some space generally. At least the older crowd are generally more pleasant and express and interest in non-Aussie things ;)

Went for dinner at Summer's Moroccan family's house. Summer is our Tour Leader. She's originally from California but has been living in Morocco since 2002 and she's married a Moroccan man. Her "Moroccan Family" who we had dinner with is the family she lived with when she first came over to Morocco (I guess imagine it sorta like Rotary Exchange or something?). It's amazing to actually see something genuine and off the tourist-track. The inside of a middle-class Moroccan family home is absolutely nothing like ours back in South Africa! There were 3 stories and we only saw the first 2. On the first was the kitchen, one of the 3 bedrooms (I think there was one on each level?) and a giant sitting room. It had a built in couch (made to order) around the *entire* wall.

Almost all the wall space was tiled and there were pillars in the middle (I assume those were necessary to hold up the floors above!). The 2nd floor had two more similar sitting rooms, both surrounded by counches along the walls and completely tiled. The ceilings were also very ornate and decorated with carvings and painted all sorts of colours (sadly the photo's didn't come out very well because of the lighting).

It was also interesting to meet the family although the language was a bit of a problem with them all except her "sister", who is a teacher. It is such a different life!

After dinner, a few of us went to the Medina for a quick wander. Mostly just to see where it is for tomorrow morning. Varen should land at about 13h15 ... can't wait!