April 14 – 16

For our hot air balloon ride the next day we needed to be up and out quite early, something like 6:30 so we walked out to the small plaza just outside the pedestrian lanes to the Riad.  After a short wait, a driver picked us up and then made a couple more pickups after which we drove some distance out of town to a reception center where we waited, drinking coffee or tea, to be shuttled out to the launch point. 

When we arrived, there were already a number of other outfits engaged in inflating their balloons, which is interesting to watch.  The balloon is laid out horizontally on the ground and a large burner and fan are positioned at the mouth and turned on, using hot air to gradually inflate, which takes some amount of time, let’s say five to ten minutes.  In our case just before the balloon reached full capacity, they had tied it off to the front of one of the pick-up trucks to keep it from floating away. 

We then climbed, not too gracefully I might add, into the gondola and were shortly airborne, a silent ascent that seems effortless except for the loud whooshing sound the heater jet makes each time the pilot injects more hot air into the balloon.  We didn’t ascend as high as some of the other balloons, but the distance didn’t seem to matter much as we viewed dozens of them against a backdrop of clear blue skies and the mountains we’d come from recently. 

While aloft, we moved slowly in the mild winds, drifting over the landscape below, allowing us to peek into the lives of farm owners and suburban dwellers, wondering which road led to which house, remarking as to how many of them were large walled compounds.  After a half hour or so (I truly lost track of the time) we came to our arrival zone, proceeded to descend and prepared for what would be a bumpy landing as the pilot maneuvers the balloon so that one edge of the gondola hits first, tipping us onto our backs and finally touching down. 

We disembarked and were shuttled back to the welcome center for a simple breakfast and then returned to the plaza for the walk to Riad Luzia.  Later in the morning, we stepped out to explore the neighborhood and do some souvenir shopping.  We stopped at a place I can’t remember for some lunch, an open-faced omelet of some sort for me and a Nutella crepe for Joanna.  I have no record of this stop in my listing of expenses and no real description, only the pictures to remind us of the meal.

Much later we returned to the nearby Tinsmiths Square in search of a place where we could have dinner with a drink, and found it at Le Tanjia Oriental, where we were seated at an upstairs balcony with a sweeping view of the square below.  We would order, and very much enjoy, a San Miguel beer for Joanna and a couple of Casablanca beers for me and a delicious Lamb with Prunes tagine, the meat cooked to tender and juicy perfection, the prunes imparting a rich sweetness that complimented the other ingredients.  Total price was 380 Dirhams ($43), another nice experience. 

The next morning, we enjoyed breakfast at the Riad, seated in a rooftop lounge we were served very nice omelets, fruit, bread and coffee.  Finished, we used the maps on our phone to walk through the medina to Marrakech’s Best Cycling Tour, for our scheduled bike tour of the city through Viator.  We’d be joined by a family of four from England, whose oldest son was an aspiring bike racer as we would discover later during a snack stop. 

We’ve enjoyed any number of bike tours before, but this one turned out to be an exercise in sphincter-clinching terror, as we rode into the heart of the medina, crowded with sellers on both sides of the narrow lanes while motor scooters, sped by us without warning and we continuously had to maneuver around donkey and hand carts.

We stopped midway in a small plaza near the Almoravid Koubba, to view some Roman ruins below grade.  Like so many other locations like this one, history often gets paved over, former city landmarks buried beneath the progress of following generations.  We then entered a shop where some of us participated in piecing together a small version of a tile tabletop, like we had witnessed back in Fes. 

From there we rode some more before taking a tea break in the lovely patio of a restaurant.  While there and talking to the oldest son of our fellow riders, the one who is a cyclist, he told us we would really enjoy Majorca (we would visit near the end of the trip) for a its great bike riding environment, as he trains there with his team. 

We left the restaurant for a harrowing return to the shop on a heavily trafficked series of streets and while maneuvering in a roundabout, I had an Audi sedan get close to me and bump my rear tire, almost tossing me to the ground.  I managed to stay upright and safely finish the ride, never before so glad to get off the bike. 

By now Joanna and I were hungry and so we walked around the corner to Café Clock, which bills itself as a cross cultural cafe chain based in Fez and Marrakech, where we were seated in a small patio and split a crispy chicken sandwich and enjoyed a date shake for Joanna and a Coke Zero for me.  Out tab came to just 100 Dirham ($11) as we were comped the shake due to the amount of time we had to wait for our food. 

We worked our way back to Riad Luzia for a restful afternoon before heading out in the early evening in search of a store where we could purchase a bottle of wine, which proved fruitless and so we stopped just outside the Square of Djemaa el-Fna for dinner at one of the many small competing restaurants in that area, Time Food.  We were seated at an outside table facing the busy pedestrian street and would enjoy, a mango juice and Pasticcio Poulet (baked pasta with chicken and melted cheese on top) for Joanna and a sparkling water and Pasta Bolognese for me.  Both dishes were very nice and with a tab of just 110 Dirham ($12.50) including a small tip, we couldn’t be any happier. 

That would conclude our time in Marrakech as we prepared for our train ride early the next morning to Rabat, where we would stay for two nights.  We began to feel comfortable navigating Morocco on our own and looked forward to Rabat and then Tangier to close out our stay in country.  We’ll cover them in our next post or two. 

Links

Le Tanjia: https://tanjiaoriental.com/

Marrakech’s Best Cycling Tour: https://www.viator.com/tours/Marrakech/Marrakech-Treasures-by-Bike/d5408-151754P2

Café Clock: https://www.cafeclock.com/new-page-5

Time Food: https://www.facebook.com/cafetimefood/