Anyways, last night when we arrived in Rabat, we first had lunch where we got our first taste of traditional Moroccan cuisine. Well, atleast mom did when she ordered a tajine - B and I stuck to grilled chicken. Then we visited ruins in Chellah - looked a lot like ruins in Rome, which make sense because some of the ruins date back to the same period. The guide book tells me that some if the others are from the Merinide period in the 14th period. Re walking was a bit treacherous, but mainly because we kept chasing cool action shots. Also, the whole site is on an incline, so while getting to the picturesque bits was pleasant, getting back to the car was a bit of a pain.
After that we headed on towards Hassan tower, which was built by one of the old kings, but never finished. It's in the same complex as the mausoleum of the current kings father - I think both of them were called Hassan, but might be getting them confused. The view from the complex is really nice, but mainly shows off how the whole of Morocco is under construction. The current king is apparently very progressive and has been making lots of improvements to the infrastructure of the country. Oh, the other cool bit about the complex is the fact that the horses at the gates sit on horseback. Ridiculously well-behaved horses who tolerate all sorts of tourists taking pictures.
Another royal type thing we did was visit the kings palace. It's a massive compound with nice gardens, but also houses for other ministers - it's a modern space, essentially being a house where the king sometimes lives rather than a classic palace as you'd think of them in Europe. Apparently the king has palaces all over Morocco and moves around a lot, though I suppose Rabat being the capital this was the main one.
Then we headed back to the downtown area to checkin to our hotel. Initially, we were meant to be in one room with an extra bed brought in. The room was decently sized but especially after our bags were in there wasn't space for an extra bed, so we ended up getting a second room for mom. Anyways, after settling in, we went off to find bandaids for mom. The pharmacy next door had already closed for the day, so we ended up just wandering.
We stopped for an espresso and had fun selecting some pastries to try. The coffee here is very good, but very strong. After that little break, we ended up wandering some more, ending up near the train station, which was really lively. Still no pharmacies though.
When we got back to our hotel, we initially just meant to have a quick break to check email (no wifi - just the one cable to split) before heading off to dinner. But then we turned on the tv, and Love Actually was playing. And in English! I ended up sitting through most of the movie, before leaving when there was finally a commercial. We ordered pizza from a place bear the hotel, and then I went back to the room to continue the movie while mom and B waited for it. There was a bit of a delay restarting the movie, since the tv in moms room didn't seem to have the channel - or at the very least didn't have them in the same order. Anyways, it all worked out. We had a nice night having yummy pizza (thin crust with plenty of cheese) while finishing the movie.
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Right now we're on the road to Meknes. Right now we're passing through farmland and fields, but a little while back we passed cork forest - the bark gets stripped every 6 months, so the bottoms of all the trees are bare. There are people picnicking bellow the trees, and also animals grazing. Oh, and men by the side of the road selling what are apparently giant acorns that people eat here.
This morning before leaving Rabat, we headed to the kasbah de Oudaias, the oldest part if the city. We wandered re little alleyways a bit - ended up picking up a guide, which we didn't really need, but was helpful for picture taking purposes. There's a nice view of the ocean, and of the beach on Sale, the city across the river from Rabat. The weather is cloudy today, which I don't mind as I forgot my sunglasses at home. We should be in Meknes soonish, and then I think also visit Volubilis before ending up in Fes for the night, were apparently we'll be staying in a traditional riad.
Oh, and interesting tidbit about our driver - apparently he drove the King of Sweden 2 years back when he visited Morocco.
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