perennialsteps

Day 3: Marrakesh-Tizi n'Tichka-Ait Benhaddou-Ourzazate-Zagora-M'Hamid

It was still dark in Marrakesh at 6.30 am during this time. And I smiled because if I were in Jakarta by that time, I would have been already at the office or Starbucks, Skyline branch. It was Monday! Our Sahara trip was started from Marrakesh at around 7.30 am with Abdel and Abdou from http://www.saharaservices.info/ as our guide for the 3 day trip. We spent our first day on the road for 9 hours.

People were starting to go to work as we headed out of Marrakesh. We passed by a park where usually uses as a place for pre-wedding photo session. The buildings are getting lesser as we got closer to High Atlas Mountains. The straight roads become sinuous like a snake walking on the sand dunes. The rocky mountains, and sometimes pine trees, accompanied us as we went along the edge. I wondered whether any slides ever happened, how the lane looks like at night, etc. Nevertheless, those questions never came up from my mouth as I’d prefer to just take pleasure in absorbing the scenic scenery with my eyes. At some parts of the mountains, Berber mud brick houses were built. With its shadow, the clouds above gave another color of light black on the surface of the mountains.

We had a stop at Tizi n’Tichka pass where we could see the winding road ascending and descending...tasting a bit parts of the immense mountain range. The green colors from the trees show up as spots among the rocks. The chill wind that wafted out through the open window when we were inside the car now could freely cover us with its breeze as we were standing outside seeing the glaring view below. There are some rocks-made handcraft sellers at the stop. Amazingly, they did not bother the visitors with being too pushy in offering their products. Abdel explained to us that The Atlas Mountains comprises of three parts: High Atlas, Middle Atlas and Low Atlas areas.

We continued our journey to Ait Benhaddou, a UNESCO-protected red mud brick kasbah, that stood up gracefully. Some Hollywood films took their scene in Ait Benhaddou. We took some pictures of the kasbah from a hill. Kasbah itself means a castle/palace or the older section of a city. On our way to the hill, Abdel took the car out of the main lane. It was great to be on the bumpy road due to the nature contour (compared to be on the bumpy road due to pothole on the asphalt road). The combination of the green trees and grass, the brown land, the red kasbah, the blue sky and the white cloud were miraculous. We could also see from far away the peak of the High Atlas Mountain with its snow.

There were two women below us with their donkey carrying things walking along the field. For donkey aficionados, there are a lot of donkeys here using to carry things and people. It’s too bad that we didn’t explore more on Ait Benhaddou. Well, we should have spent more time in Morocco then. Meanwhile on the steep hill, the sheep peacefully had the grass that grows between the rocks as their lunch.

What about our lunch? We had our lunch at Agdz Café Restaurant after passing Ourzazate that welcomed its guest by palm trees on both side along Avenue Mohammed V (Most of the cities we visited in Morocco have the street with this name: Avenue Mohammed V). There are some film studios also. The kasbah with rocks mountains and sands seem really suit for filmmakers that needed a medieval era or Middle-East background. It does not mean the life there look like both the aforementioned background samples. Abdou bought a bag of nuts and dates and shared it with us. It was the most delicious nuts and dates I ever ate. He knew which one is the good one or I was just too hungry. Nooo, it’s for the first reason.

Back to the lunch, Agdz Café Restaurant is located in Agdz (guessing from the restaurant’s name), a city in between Ourzazate and Zagora. Moroccan seems to always have the bread that rather difficult to chew as the appetizer (It’s a different kind of bread as in Indonesia). We had big pieces of chicken roasted on skewer with the fried potatoes. Even though the meal were mouth-watering, we could not have it all due to its big portion compared to our normal portion standard. When it came to the drink, I had misunderstood it. I forgot that café in French means coffee. So I ordered café du chocolat as I was more focus on the chocolat. There were four groups in the restaurant that time. The classic difference between most of Asian and Caucasian guests is the Asian prefer to sit under the shadow avoiding the sunshine, while the Caucasian sit at the position looking for the sunshine.

There are a lot of palm trees in Agdz. But I don’t think the palms are the one that produce the crude palm oil (CPO). Malaysia and Indonesia, as the main producers of CPO, face environmental issues as the palm oil trees area was replacing the forest area. Meanwhile, there is no forest on this part of Morocco. Hence, my simple thought think that why they do not plant palm oil trees as there’s no way they will face environmental issues. Abdel did not familiar with the term crude palm oil. Meanwhile my simple thought is too lazy to search more on this. For instance, in what condition the palm oil that produces CPO can grow, or may be the palm trees in Morocco indeed produce CPO even if it were in insignificant amount. The thought can make me search more on Morocco’s GDP and what comprises it. I had even looked for its GDP per capita (I will add Economics as my interest on my Facebook account besides traveling after I wrote this). Let it become the mystery of the palm trees.

In between Agdz and Zagora, we had a stop at Draa Valey. The view there is soothing as the river that reflecting the bright blue color from the sky divides the sand fields. The Atlas Mountains elegantly guard the green valley. It was a beautiful sunny day with the wind and the sight cooled anyone’s mind off. It was one of my favorite moments in Morocco: sitting silently on the rocks while enjoying the Draa Valey. Even the river does not have any sound. It’s a very quiet river. Well, the silent sometimes was interrupted by a car passing-by the road. Not only the car passed by the road, but also the donkey-drawn cart with the locals passed by the road. But the later one passed by in silent. Viewing and hearing the silence of the donkey and the soundless river made me feel very reluctant to leave when Abdel asked us to be back into the car. While we were sitting on the valley, Abdou told us about the Moroccan custom when Idul Fitri and Idul Adha come. It’s basically the same with the celebration in Indonesia. The food is the difference.

I might fall asleep on our way to Zagora. All I knew, Abdel stopped the car in front of a sacred sign: Tombouctou 52 Jours (Timbuktu 52 days). It is sacred according to Donald Duck’s enthusiast. Timbuktu is a place where Donald Duck, the most handsome duck ever, runs away whenever he’s got into troubled. Nahh…Timbuktu is in Mali. After taking picture of the sign, Abdel took the opposite route from the Timbuktu way. Ohhh, I thought we were heading to Timbuktu :) Yeahhhh…in your wildest dream. There are lines of palm trees along both side of the route covering it with its shade.

Afterward, the side of the road turned into sand dunes. In a rare occasion, we met other cars in passing on the street. We reached M’Hamid, a 40 km away from Algeria border, on the afternoon and stayed a night at Hotel Kasbah Sahara Services (300m on right after M’Hamid entry). It was a comfortable and a unique one made from red mud-brick. The hotel has rooms with en-suite bathroom and rooms with separate bathroom on the courtyard. Moroccan men seem to have the custom to kiss each other cheek for someone whom they do not meet regularly in short period (the word short is a relative time measurement).

We were having our dinner at 8.30 pm: bread as the appetizer, Moroccan chicken as the main course (I forgot the name of the meal. It’s a chicken with Moroccan mixed spices, not only Moroccan born chicken), and fruits as the dessert. The meal are delicious and the staffs are very friendly. There was a man who always asks whether the food is good or not. Nahh, it is a great one. They even have wine that I had to skip. My previous alcohol drinking was caused mostly by boredom. Meanwhile, bored was the non-existence feeling for me while I had my holiday in Morocco so far. While we were having our dinner, other guests just arrived: four Germans. I only had a conversation with them on the next morning. One of them had been spending a month in Padang, Indonesia several years ago. He even still remembers some words such as terima kasih, selamat malam, etc. Finishing the dinner, I and B spend a little while in front of the hotel. It’s so dark there with the sky full of the stars. My stomach was full as well. But I didn’t feel good about it. A good sleep might heal it. I had a very peaceful sleep that night with the temperature inside the room was warm enough.

Day 4: M’Hamid-Erg Chegaga

After having the breakfast in the morning, I was successfully throwing up my dinner and breakfast at the same time. Not all great food can make peace with my stomach. It’s a little bit sensitive to some cooking spices (I don’t know which one). Even with empty stomach, I still joined the camel riding from 9 to 12 am. At first, I felt terrified seeing how tall the camel is. I still remember the horror of riding a horse on the way up to Mount Bromo. I didn’t have guts to be on the horse again when I descended Mount Bromo at that time. The camel experience was somewhat different with the horse one given the dissimilarity of the landscape between mountain and desert. Besides, the camel is cuter than the horse.

Farhon, a 21 year old, became our camel riding guide. He speaks a little bit English, mixed by French. At a point, he had a stop and asked us to come down from the camel. Actually, he asked the camel to sit down. After tying the camel, he walked for a while and stretched out on his back just like that on the sand dunes. I confused what the hell is he doing? We just followed him and sitting on the sand dunes. The sand is cool even though the sun shines brightly. It was lovely to hear almost nothing. I heard the sound of birds since there are some trees on sand dunes with birds stopping by on it. We had not entered deeper into the sand dunes, but it already seemed as a border-less area.

We arrived back at the hotel around 12 am and I was very hungry due to the vomit part earlier. But the lunch was served at 12.30 pm. Then we just sat on the back terrace of the hotel. We met a French man who speaks English in somehow American accent. It’s a precious moment to have a conversation in English with unknown people (Usually I will have it in a mixed of French, English and body language). He told us about his journey and his next journey to Kenya in January. He also said that he met two Australian in the morning. After a while, he went to arrange things with the travel agent.

During our lunch, we met the other guests: three Canadian and a Moroccan with a wonderful little girl: Anissa. One of them seemed so surprised to meet Indonesians in Morocco. L’Indonesie!!! as she exclaimed with a big smile. The good news at lunch time: my stomach had made peace with the meal: Moroccan salad, roasted chicken with the fried potatoes and orange with some spice (ok, I got rid off the spice from the orange). Now it’s complete: a delicious and peaceful meal :) We would meet the German, the Canadian, the Moroccan, and the Australian in Erg-Chegaga on the afternoon.

I and B zoomed off to Erg-Chegaga with Abdel, Abdou and Brahim. The first bumpy road we had on the way to Ait Benhaddou is nothing compared to the bumpy road on the sand dunes on the way to Erg-Chegaga. Moving fast by a 4WD on uneven sand dunes and got bouncing were an incredible one. Not to mention the stunning landscape view surrounding us and the soft sand flew inside the car. There are some permanent tend with its dwell when we were heading to our base camp.

Finally we arrived. As Abdel parked the car, I just got out, put my backpack inside the tent and wandered around the sand dunes. It was out of my expectation in a positive way. I never thought of doing hiking on sand dunes. But, we did hiking and sliding on our way down. I never hike sand dunes before. It gave different feel on your feet compared to hike a hill or mountain. Climbing, descending, climbing, and descending and so on along the edge of the hill made of sands. In the desert, I’d prefer the descending part as I could just do sliding on the sand dunes. And the soft sand will fill in the shoes for sure. I would just sit serenely on the sand when I got tired and took a look at the magnificent scenery. This time no sounds heard. Some people asked me: what can you do in the desert? Nothing… It is the greatness of doing nothing.

We met the Germans on their way back to the tent. When the dark about to embrace the sky, it was only me, B and two Australians whom once told by the French man left on the sand dune. The Australians were on the other side of sand dune peak. The sun gave the sand dunes gold effect at noon, meanwhile at night it is the shine of the moon turned to gave the sand dunes light gold effect color. The shimmering sand dunes with it mountainous contour, the moon and the stars embedded on the dark sky covered me with an astonishment.

Unfortunately, the astonishment have blurred my sense of direction at night: I was not able to point the exact direction to our tent. Neither did B. Aka we were successfully lost. I was looking at the Australian because from the way they walked confidently, it appeared that they knew about the direction better than me (It’s dark enough that I couldn’t even see other people face). So, we teamed up with them. It just then we had different opinion. I and B insisted to go the right side as we saw a light on that side, meanwhile they insisted to go the left side. So we split up. However, on our way to the right side, we were not able to locate the light again. For me, it would be better to get lost in the desert with three other people than with only one other people. So, I and B went back to the place where we decided to go on our way. We met them also at that point. So we tried to track our back together and found an empty base camp. We went to the right side and found our tent with Abdel, Abdou, the Germans, the Canadians, and the Moroccan having a conversation on the tent terrace.

I had a superb dinner as every meal is a new thing for me: the moroccan soup and tagine. After finishing the dinner, almost everyone joined the campfire and listened to Brahim and friends playing/singing Moroccan traditional music. I went into the tent earlier and wished they will play the music until I fell asleep. They did :)