Quite a ride, for sure. Casablanca? No need to go.
After another large and delicious breakfast at Riad Myra we set out for Chefchaouen. We have a steady light rain most of the way but that is just adding onto far too much rain in this area- rivers are flooded, there are lots of mudslides, rockslides and road washouts over deep ravines- it is difficult and stressful driving. But we made to the “blue city” and it is really lovely. But the river through the town is flooded and the road to the Spanish mosque is closed because of flooding. So we wandered around all the blue painted alleys and had a nice dinner at Cafe Clock and spent a nice evening at La petite Chefchaouen – it was a very modern place. I think we were the only guests there, the man running it was very nice- dried our wet clothes and made a wonderful breakfast for us in the morning.
Our time in Chefchaouen was too short- we would have like to have spent more time in this beautiful and artsy town. But we are scheduled in Rabat tonight so we have to make the dangerous drive back over the mountains. And it does not disappoint- the rivers are raging against the bridges and I deliberately avoid being on any bridge while there is another vehicle, especially a truck, on them- it just seems like the bridges don’t need any extra stress.. There are still plenty of mudslides and rockslides, although yesterday some of the road collapses were just marked with sticks and rocks, today there are some wire fences around them. I go past them with trepidation also, since you never know when more of it will collapse.
After driving through some of the poorest country we’ve seen thus far, we got into Rabat pretty easily and parked outside the gate of the old medina. It still seem weird to just give a guy sitting in a car some money for parking (50dh), but he was there the next day as well and helped guide us out of the parking space so I guess it is normal. We walked into the media and quickly found the lovely Riad Kalaa, so we’re getting used to finding our way around.
We are pretty tired from the drive but we did go to the unfinished mosque and the HUGE Mausoleum of Mohammed V . But such extravagance after driving through such poverty seemed tragic to me and I left feeling quite hollow. By the end of the day we were quite tired and just had left over cheese and bread and slept early.
In the morning it was a quick sight seeing tour of the garden and fort, then we headed up the coast towards Casablanca. The first part of the drive was stunning, with the huge waves of the Atlantic crashing on the shoreline, but as we went further north it became less interesting and then more industrial. We got into Casablanca fairly easily- not as crazy as Marrakech and Melinda has excellent navigational skills! We’ve both gotten used to some of the quirks of driving here by this point as well.
We stayed at the Hotel Odyssey, which was just an ok hotel, very modern but nothing seemed to work quite right. No AC, the water was just lukewarm warm (and like all places there, no good water containment in the shower).
I was feeling a cold coming on, but we did a walking tour of the parts of this big, boring city. I had wanted to go because of the movie (of course) but there’s no need to go there. I mean there is the Hassan II Mosque, the only mosque non Muslims can go into, but we “mosque” have gotten there too late, as we missed the last tour. Besides after seeing the old mosque in Kasbah Ellouze and all the other beautiful buildings we had seen I felt like we didn’t miss too much. My being sick probably didn’t help my lack of interest. We had also planned on going to Rick’s Cafe but after walking past it and seeing they didn’t open until 7:00, plus they were expensive, plus the menu had no real appeal to us, plus it was just a touristy thing (something we are usually just fine with) we opted to just find a restaurant near our hotel. Which we did and it was just fine and tasty.
Our overall impressions- Chefchaouen was really pretty and we wish we would have spent more time there. Rabat was just fine, and no regrets going there, but after seeing other cities we could have skipped it and not missed much. Casablanca has very little to offer- I’m sure it is an ok city, but there just isn’t that much there to see- and it is huge. Certainly could (and should) have skipped it. Looking back, we would have spent our time in Chefchaouen and our next city, Essaouira, and been much happier.