July 14, 2014
The past two days were spent taking trips to other towns. The first trip was to Meknes, a town about an hour and a half from Ifrane, which we traveled to by taxis. However, the Moroccan taxis cabs being about the same size are sedans in America, they are expected to fit 6 people, 2 in the front passenger seat and 4 in the back seat. As can be seen from the selfie in Tim's collage on the left our ride was a a tight squeeze and wasn't the most comfortable situation.
Meknes is one of the Imperial cities and as such its gorgeous architecture and markets are more like the images most people think of when they think about Morocco. There were many other tour groups in Meknes which was a big change from the relative quite of Ifrane. The first stop was the royal granary which was to store the grain to feed the king's soldiers and multitude of horses, because who cares if the people starve... Other stops of the day include where the royal family was buried and a school for young boys in the area.
The last stop was the souk/marche/market, or whatever you want to call it. This was a bit of a struggle. Imagine a group of 15 foreigners trying to follow each other and stay together, in crowded market with extremely narrow passageways, yielding to donkeys, carts, and motor bikes every few seconds. It was a struggle. I think it was an interesting experience, but not one that I have a great desire to do again, especially after having someone in that crowded marketplace squeeze my ass while I was stopped to look back for the rest of the group. I was dressed very conservatively, but sometimes these things happen, thankfully I was the only one in our group who had this issue, so after a momentary flip out moment I moved on.
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