Spain & Amsterdam - 2015

After all the excitement of Morocco, we settled into the 2 hour Iberia Airlines flight bound for Madrid where we would be staying for 2 nights before catching a train across Spain.  The primary reason for coming to Madrid was to catch up with our very good Spanish friends Pedro and Elena.

We have found getting through European immigration formalities a very different experience when compared to entering say the UK, USA and our own country.  Landing into Madrid simply involved a physical passport check, no documents to fill out, just a quick check of passport and walk out through the ‘Nothing To Declare’ gate.  The same thing happened when we landed into Amsterdam.

Pedro was at the airport to meet us and despite having last seen him in 2004, the conversation just picked up as if we had been chatting yesterday which was great.  The plan was for Pedro to drop us off at our hotel and then we would all meet again for dinner later that night.

Over a beautiful modern style Spanish meal, as their guests, we caught up with what had been happening in our respective lives and it was delightful that Elena was equally able to join in as a result of the hard work she had been doing learning English.  They now have a 7 year old daughter called Claudia, so we naturally heard a lot about her and were looking forward to meeting her the following night when we would join them for a home cooked Spanish dinner in their home.

During dinner we learnt first hand from our friends, just what impact the GFC had had on the Spanish economy with unemployment soaring to 27% and youth unemployment hitting 55%.  

Unlike Greece, Portugal and other European countries, the very proud Spanish have been steadfastly working on recovery.  Pedro told us that hundreds of thousands of people, including friends of theirs, are now living in South America to find work and restart their lives.  

This certainly made us appreciate just how Australia has fared during the same period.

We had been to Madrid a few times previously through work, but had not really spent time exploring it or truly appreciating it, so with our self guided walking tour and additional tips form Elena in hand, we set off early the following morning to slowly amble throughout the city.

Some the highlights of our meanderings were...

Sobrino de Botín

*  visiting Sobrino de Botín, the official oldest restaurant in the world originally established in 1725.

*  strolling around Plaza Mayor built on the site of a 15th-century market and used over time as a bullring, royal parade field and executioner’s stage. Talking of bullfighting, in Torre del Oro, a tiny Andalusian tiled bar in the plaza are gory bullfighting photos.

*  enjoying the aromas and colours of all the fine food on display in the Markets of San Miguel

*  weaving our way through numerous small alleys which exposed us to fine examples of historical buildings and their fine, elegant architecture.

*  admiring Palacio Real a solid granite structure comprises 2,800 rooms spread out over nearly 1,500,000 square feet (139,354 square meters), making it Western Europe’s largest palace.

*  learning about a little of the Spanish monarchy’s history at a monument remembering the deaths of bystanders, killed during an assassination attempt by bomb attack during the wedding procession of King Alfonso XIII in 1906.

*  admiring the large number of jamón legs hanging from the ceilings inside many shops. Jamón is dry cured ham and as we found out during dinner at Pedro and Elena’s home, it is both delicious and cut very very finely when served.

aaah.. jamón

*  enjoying watching the locals as we wandered through a beautiful autumn coloured park with its lake and families slowly rowing on it.

Spanish families enjoying themselves

*  experiencing the annual parade of traditionally dressed sheep farmers through the city.  This happens once a year as a cultural tradition and we were surprised to see them playing a form of bagpipe as well as what they wore as shoes.

traditionally dressed sheep farmers

All this was possible because of the unusually warm daytime weather during our time in Madrid.  It is certainly a very elegant and historical city.

Dinner at our friends was both a privilege and a treat.  We were genuinely quite overwhelmed by how much trouble they had gone to, ensuring we not only learned more about traditional Spanish food, but to enjoy extremely good quality food and wine.

The meal was based on a traditional tapas theme and during our meal we learnt about the right way to cut and serve the jamón and pintxos, the Basque form of tapas which is regarded as a key part of their local culture and social interaction.  We also enjoyed freshly cooked live clams, fine Spanish cheese, chorizo unlike anything we have tasted before, two types of exquisite anchovies, empanadas, yes it was quite a banquet combined with very good company.

Our very sincere thank you to Pedro and Elena and we hope we can return their hospitality sometime in Australia!

It was an early start the following morning as we worked our way to the main railway station in Madrid, Etosha to catch the first of two trains taking us north into Basque country, where we would be staying for 3 nights in the city of San Sebastian.

From Madrid to San Sebastian and then Bilbao

During our time away on this trip, there had been numerous times during casual discussions with other travellers when responding to their question of “where are you going?” and then mentioning San Sebastian, they would typically say, “its beautiful!”.

Well lets simply say… they were all right… it really is very beautiful!

The risk here is that I’m going to over do it and wax lyrical about this city, so it is simpler to say that almost as soon as we got off the train and starting walking across a very ornate bridge towards the main part of the city, we fell in love with this place.

It is undoubtably a holiday destination and a charming one at that.  There are two beautiful beaches here, one called Playa de la Concha with its large curved bay, two headlands at either end and an island in the mouth of the bay.

'The Beach'... one of the headlands and island

Locals and visitors were promenading along the large walkways following the curve of the bay from one end to the other whilst at low tide others enjoying the large beach and at high tide you can watch surfers and body boarders surfing on waves rebounding off the bays sea walls.

sea kayak surfing the sea wall

Then there’s Playa de Gros, a long golden beach back across the river, perfect for people wanting to surf their holiday away.

San Sebastian seems to be broken into sections, each of which offers a different experience.  There is the very active old town located across the bay’s eastern headland and then there is a commercial and shopping district, full of late-19th-century buildings extending to the banks of the river. 

On the opposite side of the river where the true surfing beach is, we wandered through a very relaxed little enclave and down at the western end of Playa de Concha where the funicular is located, there are very large upmarket and expensive homes.

pintxos on the bar...

Then there is the food!  Our friends in Madrid had educated us about the specialty we would find in San Sebastian… the basque form of tapas… the pintxos!

Every night whilst we stayed in San Sebastian, we visited the old town section of this beautiful place, found a quaint pintxos bar and made our selection from the large number of very creative choices, right off the top of the bar.  

Typically it cost €2 per pintxos and we could easily feed ourselves by sharing eight of them and when combined with a fresh glass of sangria, it was a very pleasant meal indeed.

...and so many to choose from

We really enjoyed our time in San Sebastian and Spain, but alas our trip was drawing to an end, so it was time to return to London to watch the rugby play off for 3rd place between South Africa and Argentina.  

Next was the big one, the grand final between NZ and Australia to be played in Twickenham.  We weren’t originally able to buy tickets for this match but just days before the match was to be played, tickets were available at a minimum of £500 or $1,070 each.  Hmmm… let’s think about this for 2 milliseconds… nup!

So on the afternoon of the big match, Jarad and I dressed in our Australian tops, wandered off down the street from his place in Twickenham, found a very typical small British pub with a big TV and settled in for a few hours to watch the game with the rest of the crowd, enjoying perhaps just a few too many pints, well that’s what it felt like the next morning.  It was great fun but a real pity we didn’t win!

The time had come however after 7 weeks and with farewells made, to start the long trip back home, but we had one last little flurry of exploration to make whilst avoiding all the pushbikes, back in and around Amsterdam for two nights.

During our camel trekking time in the Sahara, we had shared that experience with a couple from Holland and they had suggested we visit Delft, a 1 hour train trip from Amsterdam.  

Delft and yes the church leans

Heeding their advice, it was a great recommendation because Delft is a charming medieval town, founded around 1100, with numerous tree lined canals we enjoyed strolling along with numerous quaint cafes everywhere.

Delft

Delft is synonymous with its famous Delftware, that distinctive blue-and-white pottery and you were certainly constantly reminded of this, with shops around the edges of the main square with pottery in all forms on sale.

Centre square - Delft

There had been many parts to this trip, the rugby, the beauty and history of Scotland, the challenging of our sight, sound and smell senses in Morocco, the elegance and style of Spain and the pushbikes and canals of Amsterdam.  Then there was having that very special time with our family and close friends.

As promised, below you will find a few links with a limited selection of additional photos from the various primary places we visited during this trip which we hope will give you an additional sense of them.

CLICK HERE for more photos Spain 2015

CLICK HERE for more photos Amsterdam 2015

So till next time, stay well, enjoy and have fun!

Morocco - 2015

Back from Scotland and having enjoyed watching Australia’s intense battle with Wales in the rugby at Twickenham, it was time to re-pack for our next journey to somewhere totally new… Morocco  This time Jarad & Rachel, our son and daughter in-law were joining us for the experience as we settled in for the 3.5 hr flight from London.

So for those of you who are geographically challenged like me, Morocco is located in the very north of Africa as can seen by our flight path below.

As we got closer to our landing in Marrakech, the sense of trepidation Rob and I were feeling slowly increased, not because we were landing into a mainly Muslim country, instead wondering if anyone would actually be at the airport to meet us.

We had opted to take a private small group tour operated by a small local company called ‘Trips To Morocco’ having researched them extensively online and with some back/forth discussion via email, settled for our final itinerary and paid a small deposit.

Customs cleared and bags collected, we ventured into the arrivals hall to be confronted by lots of people holding up signs with surnames on them, ours not amongst them.  So we split up and started searching deeper into the throng and eventually found two guys standing well back holding a ‘Trips To Morocco’ sign. With a sense of relief, we introduced ourselves and began to get to know our guide for the next 12 days, Youssef and driver, M’barek.

The drive into Marrakech in the Toyota Prado 4WD, our vehicle for the next 13 days, was a great introduction to Morocco… bedlam, traffic seemingly coming at us from multiple simultaneous directions, horns being used like morse code between drivers, traffic lanes almost optional and speed limits seemingly just a guide.  Not all the cars around us liked using headlights despite it being around 8:30pm and this added to the heightened levels of adrenaline surge.

Inside courtyard of one of our Riads

Our itinerary included staying as much as possible in original Moroccan Riads which are a traditional form of house or ‘palace’ with courtyards and gardens in the middle of them, extending from the ground floor to ceiling.

“Wow!” was the single word which came out of all our mouths when we first saw the internal layout of our first Riad.  

Characteristically, all Riads look extremely plain on the outside as part of Moroccan culture not to show off what they own, but the insides were a very different story.

The next map shows where we travelled starting from Marrakech heading south into, up and across the High Atlas Mountains before going west towards part of the Sahara Desert.  Then it was north again finishing in Fez before travelling via Casablanca and back into Marrakech. 

Apart from the last leg of this trip, most of our time was spent travelling on smaller back roads through little villages and on a few occasions we headed overland using 4WD.  There were a few locations where we stayed a few nights but most times it was only overnight.  Each day usually started about 9am and not reaching our Riads until around 6:30pm to their traditional welcome of very sweet and scented mint/herbal tea.

serving welcome sweet mint tea the traditional way

This blog post is going to be far less about the where and what as hopefully the photos , probably too many, will tell more of that story, it will be more about the essence of Morocco, how it ‘confronts’, challenges and teaches you.  There will be a few standout experiences described in a little more detail though but let me stress right at the start, not once did we feel unsafe in Morocco.

Morocco essentially is very much a developing country and increasing tourism, in part triggered by what is happening in places like Syria, is accelerating Morocco’s wealth.  As a result of being a developing country, Morocco is full of complexity, vivid contrasts and is very diverse.

part of the contrasts in Morocco

Youssef and M’barek's homes are near the Sahara desert and they are proudly of Berber origins who have inhabited the country for thousands of years and also one of Morocco’s official languages. In 40BC the Romans annexed Morocco until the 5th century AD then Muslims conquered Morocco in the 8th century AD.  Consequently, the Muslim faith and Arabic language also dominate along with French as a result of them controlling part of Morocco from 1912 to 1956.  The French influence is also very visible in the abundance of baguettes and pastries throughout most of the country.

You learn very quickly to avoid taking pictures of people or their stores unless you ask for permission first. Seldom can you take a picture of women, most of whom wear the burka or hijab and then you learn why in the old parts of towns many doors have two knockers on them, one of which alerts the women in the house to cover up as strangers are entering.  Quite often however in the larger cities we would see younger women dressed like anywhere else in Europe, strolling the footpaths.

The city with the romantic name of Casablanca is a seething mess of more modern looking chaos, apart from the 3rd largest mosque in the world which was very beautiful.

outside Hassan II Mosque

and inside

In contrast, the very historical city of Fez, is the convergence of 3 cities, one built in the 9th Century, the next in the 12th Century and the final one in the 19th Century. The oldest medinas in Fez and Marrakech were fascinating to wander through or as they call it, places of a thousand maze like alleys and very many narrow ones around a metre wide.  Medinas in Morocco are the old parts of a town, typically walled and divided into quarters.  Inside the medinas are ‘souks’ believed to be of Berber origins meaning marketplace(s) and are where the shops are.

typical style shop in the souks within the medinas

We were warned to be careful in the medinas because of pickpockets and as one local guide told us, they are so good, “they will steal your socks before your shoes”.

Moroccan 4WD 'parked' in Medina alley

The medinas in both Fez and Marrakech were a favourite for many reasons, the small laneways, the aromatic smells wafting throughout them from the colourful spice markets and street food.  With very narrow alley ways, keeping an ear open for the sound of small motorbikes was crucial as they negotiate at speed past you, the occasional donkey also making their presence felt.

in spice market

olives, dates... all sorts of foods

then the pastries and biscuits

Away from the larger cities we stayed in a few smaller towns/villages and it was in these you saw the ‘Moroccan 4WD’… the donkey, toiling amongst run down buildings made out of terracotta coloured mud and straw bricks.  When driving through very barren areas we were quite often fooled by sun triggered shimmering specks scattered across the plains, only to realise this was coming from thousands of discarded empty plastic drink bottles strewn everywhere.

Moroccon 4WD

There is much grand beauty in Morroco’s mountains, valleys, gorges and waterways, including luxurious ski resort style towns, the equal of many in Switzerland, only to be countered after wandering along rocky 4WD tracks into the vast nothing, to meet a nomad family and sharing mint tea with them sitting cross legged where they are living in a cave.  Later we met another nomad family living in a camel and goat hair woven tent on the edge of the desert.

across mountains

and plains on the way to visit some nomads

in their cave

or tent

Whilst in the Sahara region, we went 4WD driving to fossick for fossils, something of abundance near the Sahara, visited a working oasis then walking through one of 350+ underground irrigation tunnels of 25+ kms each  Each tunnel had been hand carved by the local communities over centuries and due to changes caused by the climate, only are 56 of them are still in use.

inside hand carved irrigation tunnel

first sunset in the Sahara

A major highlight of our trip was getting to know more than we ever thought we would about camels, especially after riding them for 1.5 hrs out into the Sahara to stay overnight in nomad style tents.

We were all allocated our camel, then unceremoniously jolted a few metres into the air on its back and off 10 of us trekked in single file out into the reddish dunes of the desert.  These were single hump camels and you sat on this weird wrapping of cloths on top of the hump, a metal cross bar down low in front of you the only thing to hang onto.  

The first 10-15 minutes of camel riding on fairly flat sand riding out into the desert was the stuff of dreams until it came time to descend down into the first sand valley.  

heading off into the desert

Camels splay their legs out in some strange way to maintain traction and they rock backwards and forwards in a very jolting and ungainly way, at the same time your crutch and thighs trying to shape themselves around its hump whilst at the time clutching it. The romance of the experience was well and truly gone by 30 minutes and total pain in the thighs and bum in full force by 60 minutes… only 30 minutes to go.

When a camel is told to sit, you had better hang on because it feels like your face is going to be pummelled into the sand as it tilts its front legs down and squats on them.  It was over but it was funny watching everyone else doing what I was whilst walking to our camp, imitating a cowboy who has been on horseback for years… oh the pain!

our camp in the desert, camels in the background

Then the silence hits you and the colour and shadows of the desert all around you, contrasted by our tent camp nestled in a small valley and trussed up camels in the distance, waiting to inflict more pain on us during our return journey.  We had a great tagine based dinner that night at a table plonked in the Sahara sharing and enjoying the life stories of the fellow travellers.

dinner in the desert

Very early on in our trip we visited a number of deserted 16th century AD kasbahs which is a type of islamic city or fortress and was a place where important local leaders lived and provided defence to the community when a city was under attack. Each kasbah had high walls, usually without windows and inside they were adorned with intricate decoration.

large walled kasbah

ornate mud & straw brick construction

wandering through the corridors was a delight

example of internal decoration

or in part of the storage areas

Another very memorable event happened during our very short tour of the 3rd century AD Roman UNESCO recognised ruins at Volubilis located near Meknes in the Middle Atlas mountains. Volubilis covers a very large area and the tour started very well with fine examples of very detailed mosaic floors and the ruins of the buildings they adorned.  In the distance however was looming and large bank of dark thunderous clouds rapidly rolling towards us, our guide constantly trying to hurry us up.

Well things changed very quickly indeed as the clouds got closer and much larger and light rain started to fall.  Our guide had become very anxious indeed, as were all the other tourists roaming the site.  He soon told us to move quickly back towards the shelter near the entrance and not long after this advice, he started to run.  Some of us also picked up pace towards cover, but Rachel decided to instead run straight towards the storm to get a picture she had in mind.

the small aqua speck is Rachel running towards the storm

Jarad went after Rachel whilst Rob and I had to start running for cover as the rain from the storm pelted down and the winds roared all around us, footpaths quickly becoming small streams.  After 10 minutes or so, Jarad and Rachel appeared out of the still raining gloom, a huge broad smile all over Rachel’s face because despite both being totally soaked, she had achieved her goal.

all for this wonderful photo... good on her

Our tour of the Roman ruins was over as we drove out of the car park and past a few cars, unfortunately crushed by trees flattened by the storm onto them and along the road towards Fez having to slow frequently for minor flooding or rocks and debris strewn across the road.

We were also very privileged to be invited to M’barek’s home, meet his mother and enjoy, sitting cross legged on rugs on the lounge floor, for their warm hospitality, beautiful delicate biscuits and more of the mint tea   We had also met M’barek’s father, brother and some cousins during our time in country and it was a great opportunity along with other casual interactions with numerous local Moroccans, to witness their strong family bonds and very mischief sense of humour. 

The last few days of our travels were spent in and exploring Marrakech, its medina, souks and very famous Jemaa el-Fnaa, 10 acre square in the centre of the old town.  Late each afternoon, we would find a suitable balcony overlooking the square to watch what was going on.  

There were cobra snake charmers plying their trade, fortune tellers, very colourfully dressed former water carriers being paid for their picture and men with macaque monkeys we also saw in the mountains, being paid for letting them sit on tourists.  There were BBQ street food stalls, people everywhere trying to sell something to someone.

Traditional water carriers paid for a photo

snake charmer plying his trade

macaque on a tourist

macaque in the mountains

Inspired by the food stalls in the medinas and tagine based meals, we all booked ourselves into a half day cooking course to learn more about how to cook with tagines and the various spices used in Moroccan cuisine.

As the sun set behind the largest minaret in Marrakech, the market came further to life with the wafting smoke of the food stalls and ever increasing numbers of locals and tourists intermingling throughout.

Jemma el-Fnaa square Marrakech comes to life at sunset

So by now we hope you understand why we titled this blog ‘Mesmerising Morocco’ a country of complexity and contrasts and truly worthy of a visit.  After nearly 2,000 fascinating kms, we finally bade farewell to our new friends Youseff and M’barek after a truly enjoyable experience and headed off again but not back to the UK, but that’s for another post.

For photos of Morocco, please click on the link below:

CLICK HERE for more photos Morocco 2015