Assilah, Morocco
Sylvia, Sarah, Me, and Jess
Two weekends ago I went to Assilah, Morocco for my friend, Jess' bachelorette party. Everyone always says... 'wow, Africa for a bachelorette party,' and it wasn't your typical bachelorette party by any means, but it was a great excuse for a great group of girls to go to Africa. Sarah (one of the girls) and I left from Madrid on Friday and the plan was to meet Jess (bride-to-be), first, in Tanger then Sylvia (other girl) was coming later because of work (they were both taking the ferry from the south of Spain) . Well, Jessica's ferry was canceled due to strong winds so she was going to be late so Sarah and I decided to wait around in Tanger because Jess would probably get in a few hours later. Our tour guide, Rashid, took Sarah and I around Tanger for a bit to explore. We ate lunch in a very Moroccan place... had enough food for 30 people, then went to have a mint tea. The mint tea was awesome. Defintely was one of my favorite things there. Had real fresh mint leaves and you could get it w/ or w/o sugar. I think I had 3 instead of one after lunch that day since I am such a huge mint fan! While we kept waiting for the bride-to-be, ferries kept getting canceled, and our perfectly planned trip started off on the wrong foot. Jess and Sylvia didn't end up arriving until midnight into Morocco instead of 12:30 pm. To top it off, instead of taking the fast 30 min ferry they had to take the slow 2.5 hr ferry (and in Spain, everything is always late or takes longer than normal...its just the life here... so I think it was actually like a 3 hr ferry). Sarah and I did head back to Assilah once we found out they wouldn't be arriving any time soon and went to our house, which reminded me a lot of a 'Real World sort of place', then bummed around. Here are a few photos of the pad... and the pictures don't really do it justice, but it was fabbbbbulous!
We weren't real lucky with the weather as it rained there the whole time, but we made the most of it with our rainjackets! We took advantage of any sunlight to walk around the medina(the inner part of the pueblo that is blocked off by walls) and shop. There were some nice shops and we bargained for some good deals. 1 euro was equilavent to 11 deerhams (sp?) so we had a beneficial exchange rate. I bought a nice leather bag, I believe it was made from camel leather, and Jess got a great bag too. There were a lot of men in Morocco... you don't see the women out in the streets at all. If you do see any women, they are very covered up. They pray 5 times a day there and when they do it is put over a loud speaker for everyone to hear. Drinking alcohol is against their religion there as well (not that I drink alcohol or anything...) so our bachelorette party was not getting out of hand by any means. I have to admit I was a bit nervous being there at first, but after the first few days, the people were very friendly and wouldn't harm a fly. It was a bummer that we weren't able to go to the beaches because we all packed for summer weather and the beaches were beautiful. Our tour guide and taxi cab driver were great people and I would go back there to visit again--hoping for some beach weather! Here are some more pics for u to see!
The mint tea
Getting dumped on with rain...
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