The little blue and white city on a hill

This past weekend, I went to the beautiful town of Chefchaouen and the coastal city Tangier! It was very very beautiful!
On Saturday, we left Rabat at around 8:30am, and drove to Chefchaouen, arriving around 1:30pm. After checking into our hotels (7 rooms total, we booked out the entire hotel) and unloading our bags, we went into the old Medina and ate lunch at the Casa Aladdin. It was a three-course meal that took 3 hours to eat! But it was yummy, and the waiters wore Aladdin pants and pointy-toed shoes. For my appetizer I had a French omelette, my entree was beef kebabs, and my dessert was crepes with chocolate and almonds. Delicious! After our 3-hour meal, we went on a guided tour with the cutest little Moroccan man ever. He would be like "Hello! Hello! come on! Yalla!" and when we were walking down a slope, he says "Don't ski without the snow! No skiing!" He was super cute. After that, we trekked up a hilltop and found ourselves on the top of a hill, looking down on the beautiful blue and white town. Here are some pictures!

On top of the hill: Chefchaouen

Tour guide explaining that these are the paints that they use for painting the houses!

A house in Chefchaouen 

On Sunday, we drove over to Tangier, on the coast of Rabat. There was a beautiful beach, where the water was very turquoise-y! We had lunch by the beach, then went on a guided tour of the Medina there.

My roommate, Maggie, and I

The tour guide took us to a "millionaire's house"

Moroccan shoes - in Morocco, they are called "Belgha". I do plan on buying a pair to wear in the States!

While leaving Tangier, we stopped by Les Grottes d'Hercules - Hercules' Cave. This Africa-shaped hole was very cool! There were little kiddies jumping off the edges here.

So it was a great weekend!
Upcoming:
- This weekend: Fes, Meknes, and Volubilis!
- Next weekend: Merzouga - the DESERT. Camel rides, turbans, sunrises on the dunes. All that good stuff.

Sending love from Morocco!

Late nights

Hello!

All has been going well this week! I have a new roommate now, Maggie, who is Italian and is here studying Arabic. Though sadly, she's only here for 3 weeks :( Anyway, Maggie is studying at the Qalam Center, so she has a bunch of classmates who also live in the Medina. We've been hanging out these past few nights, going to the cafe, the beach, and the carnival from last week. We mostly hang out with these two Russian guys, Arthur and Sergei, and there are sometimes two older adults who also join us. Here are some pretty pictures from these past few days!

Moroccan sunset by the beach 

I tried an orange juice by the side of the road the other day and it was pretty good! Here's my buddy Abdenol, who's squeezing my fresh orange juice. Only 4dh! (about 50cents)

This is Bab el Had, one of the main gates entering into the Medina. At night, there are lots and lots of people around here just hanging out, playing around

Late night Medina! This guy is selling fruit, but there are also other stands selling snail soup, corn-corn on the cob, and popcorn

So it's been a couple of late nights, going out with Arthur and Sergei, but then they always walk us back to our house when they drop us off. This weekend, I am joining them and some other people in their Arabic class on a northern excursion!! We are going to Tangier and Chefchaoun, which are two little towns up north. Supposedly, you can see Spain from the coast of Tangier! I will definitely take lots of pictures this weekend, but for now, here are some great photos of Chefchaoun and Tangier, courtesy of google. We will be leaving Saturday morning, and coming back Sunday night. I'll definitely write about the weekend when I return!

! وداعا