To Chefchaouen: Vibrant Colors

I was shocked at how green the hills around the north coast were- I had imagined the country to be entirely desert. I was equally as surprised by the mountains…that still had some snow on them!!! 

We drove the borrowed pick up to the top just so we could say that we’d touched snow in Africa. (Also, it was on the way to where we were heading anyway). We had a lovely little snow ball fight.


The people also wore very brightly colored clothing- ranging from modern tee shirts to women in bright scarves and wide straw hats with colorful yarn decorations. These were worn mostly by the people working in the countryside- we passed hundreds along the highway.

An exception to the bright clothing was the dark, pointy-hooded Obi Wan Kenobi cloaks worn by the majority of the older men that we saw.

To be fair, each of the towns that we visited had a very colorful market, but the entire town of Chefchaouen was a beautiful beautiful bright blue! The old town climbs up along the side of the mountain with small, winding paths, and stone homes and shops built into the rock.

Most of the doors are tiny- I felt like I had swallowed the ‘eat me’ cake from Alice in Wonderland. We climbed all the way up to where the city ends and nature trails begin. At the top along the river there is a place where the women bring their washing and a tiny market selling candy, fresh orange juice, etc. We started talking to an older man sitting in the square and he told us about how Chefchaouen got its name- it means 'to see the horns' (on the mountain).

The horns of Chefchaouen

We also found out that the reason the town seemed vaguely familiar to us was because Granada’s Albaicín was designed in imitation (however it is white as opposed to blue).

When we went back down into the blue labyrinth we found a cozy little place called Restaurant Granada for lunch. It is owned by a little old man who has cooked there every day for the past 6 decades, during which I imagine the establishment has changed very little.

 We had a delicious lunch: tagines of chicken and vegetables with couscous. A little old man in one of the aforementioned cloaks joined our table (one of two) and ate with his hands, no napkin, and drank something muddy looking out of a clay mug.

After lunch we walked around the town some more, looking into the shops and exploring more of the tiny streets. Some of the things that I found really interesting were the baskets of colored powders used as paint or dye. (More bright colors!)
When we finally found our way back down to the new part of town we discovered a giant truck full of armed military men- preparing for a protest that was apparently going to happen that evening. We paid the guy who insisted that he had been guarding our car and headed south.

(Immediately upon entering Morocco you are bombarded by people asking for tips for everything. "Give me those border control forms... I filled them out for you... tip?"; "I watched your car drive safely over that speed bump... tip?"; "Here's some tea for the drive... tip?". One of the most common of these occurrences is tipping car-watchers. It is practically impossible to park without someone letting you know that they will be guarding your vehicle until you return, whether you want them to or not.)

Fun Fact: Ketchup is a very popular flavor in Morocco!! Throughout our time there we saw quite a few different ketchup-flavored packaged food items.