City of Souks. Review on Marrakesh

Morocco is just 14 Km from Gibraltar, at the tip of Southern Spain. It is so close yet so different for a European break as you could wish for.

Arriving in the evening, I headed straight to Medina, the peach walled old town which is about 4 Km from the airport and within half an hour I was in a different world. Whizzing through the strong smelling alleyways, spiralling like snakes, I arrived at my hotel, Riad Les Cigognes, a kind of upmarket B & B

Almost all the architecture is of Moorish design ; behind doors and walls is a hidden world of tiled courtyards with citrus trees, palms, bougainvillaea and fountains. Though old properties in Medina and the nearby Kasbah are now being refurbished to provide beautiful and peaceful accommodation.

We had to spend two days hiking up the High Atlas Mountains, Toubkal, in the Berber villages of Morocco, at 4000 meters is the country's highest but we were trekking only at 2000 m just above the village of Imlil. which has a collection of small hotels, cafes and shops, selling almost everything. Imlil is and hour and a half by road from Marrakech, the last 20 minutes on a swaying mountain dirt track. The villagers have opted not to have the track paved as they like to retain their semi isolation and do not want to be inundated by the tourists and their cars. We walked for 45 minutes to Armend which is the closest village to Toubkal. The Gite d'Omar, a lovely café cum hotel is run by Fatima and her daughter in-law who bakes fresh bread daily and cook delicious Tajines meat and vegetable stew cooked in earthenware.

We climbed to the Tizi ; a mountain pass that gave us a spectacular view into the neighbouring Techeddirt valley. The sun was already strong burning my face. In the late afternoons the temperature began to fall and by the evening I had to wear a jacket and a sweater to keep myself warm. Descending through the sweet smelling pines and junipers, we could see the summit of Toubkal in the distance, a faint triangular point against the blue sky. Later as the first star of the evening rose in the sky, dark blobs on the mountains started moving across down the slopes. The shepherds and their flocks were coming home.

Returning to Marrakech was a cultural shock; number of people, rapidly changing smells sounds and sights. On Saturday nights Medina seems to attract all to the city. There is some sort of entertainment for everyone snake charmers, fire-eaters, musicians, monkey tames and storey tellers.

Marrakech has four distinct parts, Kasbah, the medina, the Jewish mellah and

Gueliz, the new part of the town built by French in the last century. There are many historical places to see, including the sere Majorelle Gardens now owned by Yves Saint Laurent. The souks are the most popular with the tourist, with over 3000 shops selling Berber jewellery, leather goods, carpets and spices. You can actually see carpets being woven and wool being dyed using pomegranate and saffron.

It was a very short trip – 4 nights precisely, during which I had to take care of some business too, and I must have missed on many sights. Yet this is another reason for a return trip sometimes in the future.