On Friday, May 27th, Anthony woke us up at 5am... but we went back to sleep. Later we went to get a sim for his phone and started venturing out into what Anthony coined as "French-Arab-Africa". According to Anthony's experience as a native of the land (born in Uganda), this was a good description of the local culture - Moroccans speak French, drive like arabs and, of course, live in Africa.
After walking around a bit, we were ready for brunch so we went to a good kebab joint with lots of good hummus and other flavorful dips. Then we went to the King's Palace and wandered around the palace grounds for a while.
They had a lot of military at the actual palace itself and, as we approached, it became clear that we were not welcome... we got that message when they grabbed their guns and started yelling at us.
Around that time we decided to head over to the Medina. It was there that Anthony met a guy who showed us his secret stash then took us up on his terrace to show us the view over Rabat. After that we went to Chellah - an ancient citadel with Roman ruins and landscaped gardens. Unfortunately, we couldn't get in without a special pass so we.made our way over to a cool restaurant for some dinner.
We actually had to find a guy with a lantern whose job it is to lead us the place. Then we went down some stairs into an underground entrance leading into a dining area that was literally quite "cool". After eating some Tajin, and other traditional Moroccan food, we went back to the flat and Anthony went across the street to haggle for some dresses - for his sisters... of course.
Apparently, they locked the doors and tried to rob him. Fortunately, Anthony didn't have $5000 on him so they let him go across to our flat to get it. He locked up the flat and hid in his room while the ladies yelled and hammered on the door all night. Strangely enough, Stefan and I didn't hear any of it but the next morning Anthony assured us that we had indeed been under siege for a good while.
The next day we went to a church where they sang for us and then we went to the Medina again for some delicious sugar cane drink. Later, for lunch, we had some Tajin with chicken and then hit the open road passing through Casa Blanca on our way to Marrakech.
We had a little car trouble on the way, and had to get a pull start from some guys, but eventually we arrived in town. From there we were guided up into the mountains by our host who, after meeting us in a small town, decided to call up his buddy so we could stay at his place which was a lot closer.
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