Setting the scene
I decided to pull a rash trip to Morocco for some winter sun with only a couple of weeks notice & little planning. The trip consisted of 3 days in Marrakesh & then 3 in Agadir (which will be my next post). Marrakesh was an incredible experience, however a series of unfortunate incidents definitely took the wind out of my sails! This article will cover some tourist sites, money, keeping safe & of course the travel tales for your amusement 🤭
Modern day Marrakesh
Marrakesh was founded in the 11th Century & has a truly unique authenticity. The architecture of the buildings bear such beautiful intricate art work without being unnecessarily ostentatious.
I am guilty of over using the term ‘hustle & bustle’, however I have never felt it more appropriate than to describe Marrakesh. Imagine visiting a real life Diagon Alley, the entire place is just buzzing with energy & dynamism.
In Marrakesh you can visit the most amazing Palaces, Medinas, Holy Buildings, Jardin’s, Museums & Restaurants. Whilst Marrakesh is utterly alluring, the trip was certainly not without hiccups shall we say!
For the first time, I brought my Kilt on this trip & bought a camera tripod so I could try & get some semi respectable photos to share on this blog. This is where the dramas began. I had found a beautiful place to take some photos (Parc El Harti), getting there early doors to avoid the massive crowds. Like a true amateur I had not done a trial run with the tripod / camera delay for photos. The tripod came with a little bag, which I placed on the ground beside the tripod when taking photos. As I was pulling a pose, a stray dog came running by & scooped up the camera bag & hightailed away from me. So I had to chase after the dog to get the bag back, he was having the time of his life, completely mugging me off, eventually I successfully managed to retrieve the bag.
As I returned to my tripod out of breath & almost dead, a couple of the gardeners had spotted the commotion & were fairly amused, I tied the bag around the neck of the tripod & then I tried to reattach my phone to the tripod stand. Disaster strikes, I drop my phone on the ground, the screen doesn’t even smash but it goes black & switches off. Now, not having a phone isn’t the end of the world, so long as you aren’t in a different continent with no idea which streets are which & you don’t speak any of the languages the locals do!
The gravity of the situation suddenly dawned on me, I had no way of knowing my way back to the hotel, but also lost my flight details, travel plans to get to Agadir (there isn’t a simple direct train, you have to go by bus) & didn’t even know the name of the hotel in Agadir I was supposed to be staying at. I was also upset that I had lost all of my photos from the first night.
I kick into Bear Grylls survival mode & manage to get myself back to my hotel (all whilst still in my kilt & attracting a fair bit of attention from locals). The hotel reception let me log into my Outlook account so I could print out everything I needed, as you can imagine I forgot my password, so had to do one of the ‘prove you are not a robot’ tests, but the test was bloody hard, you had to match off icons to an orbit, which I failed at twice. Not to panic, I checked Skyscanner & there was a flight home for the measly price of £450 (when the original flight to Morocco only cost £55 return) 😂.
Undeterred, I formulated a new plan, I would just buy a new phone, get logged into my Ryannair, booking.com, google maps & Barclays accounts from there, if I managed that I would be able to stay. I mainly needed the map capability. I found an Orange store on the map in hotel computer, went round & sat outside until opening time, turns out they don’t open on Sundays. The chap at hotel had forgot it was Sunday so said it would open, he then told me no phone stores would open on a Sunday. So I decided to go for a walk around a couple of blocks & clear my head. By sheer chance I stumbled upon a tech shop. From the outside it looked like your Young Gangsters Paradise, selling electric scooters & big ass speakers but I thought let’s give it a try & luckily I managed to get a phone. This whole ordeal almost broke my spirits, however I am truly blessed to even be in a position to go on a trip like this, so you just have to laugh when these things occur & power on!
The new phone cost me £250, which was pretty much my whole fun budget for Marrakesh🥲. This ordeal took up a half day & subsequently I did not get to see as many tourist sites as I had hoped. However, the ones I did visit were stunning!
Tourist sites ☀️
Marrakesh has a plethora of amazing things to do & see. I did not take a guided tour & walked everywhere as my hotel was only 15 minutes walk from the Medina & all of the action. It is important to call out, a lot of the tourist sites only accept cash & most of them charge 100 dirhams. This might sound trivial but the sites aren’t massive, so you could be getting through 4 or 5 in a day & the cost quickly adds up.
Places that I would definitely suggest visiting; Bab Doukkala, Dar El Bacha Museum, Ben Youssef Madrasa, The Medina of Marrakesh, Jemaa El Fnaa Square (utter chaos!), Le Jardin Secret, Koutoubia Mosque, Bahia Palace, Tinsmith Square, El Badi Palace & Le monde des Arts de la Parure. Although my phone broke, I have managed to salvage some of my photos from the first day, as I sent them to my friend Raj that evening, so he sent them back to my new phone, which was very lucky! Here are some of my favourites…
Keeping Safe 🥷🏼
Whilst Marrakesh felt very safe, it is still important to take reasonable precautions. There is a common scam where someone will accost you & say they work in your hotel & recognise you. This happened to me in Egypt too & isn’t so easy to spot because the person doesn’t have anything obvious to sell. My advice here (unless you do actually recognise them from hotel) is to tell them to jog on, or if you prefer the more polite approach just say they are mistaken.
Just always stay aware of your surroundings, making sure to keep your bag etc zipped up. Generally speaking though, most Moroccans are some of the loveliest most hospitable people I have met! So it is not worth letting a small minority of people ruin your experience. Realistically you could find a horror story online of any city that a tourist has experienced. The Medina streets are very tight & busy so can be a little overwhelming, but the experience is worth powering on through.
Money 💷
When I visited it was around 12 dirhams to £1 GBP. However, certainly in Marrakesh the cost of things worked out fairly similar to the UK. Some places only accept cash, so make sure to keep some on you. Most big hotels have ATM’s in the lobby, so you can withdraw there.
I wasn’t hassled for tips in most places, but it is still good to have some bills for good service. I suggest buying a water somewhere like McDonalds to break a big bill as when you withdraw, the ATM usually gives 200 / 100 bills.
Getting around 🚕
I walked everywhere & Morocco doesn’t have Uber. There was talk of a similar app on a couple of websites called InDrive, but it may be illegal to use, so not sure how wise it is. If taking a street Taxi just ensure they use the meter & you are absolutely clear where they are taking you.
Bonus tip ✅
If you don’t want a Magician to steal your watch, don’t go to the show! Unfortunately there is a lot of poverty in parts of Marrakesh & people have to do what they have to do to get by. If you don’t want someone to try & sell you things or take you on a magical mystery tour, tell them a polite but firm no. In particular people seem to congregate around the Carrefour markets, so just keep your wits about you & stay aware of your environment. It’s important to call out that whilst it is a pain if people are trying to sell you things, I never once felt threatened to hand over money or anything like that. A polite no was sufficient to be left alone.
I am completely new to blogging & only set this up to help people out on their journeys. If you have any questions about the article or feedback, please do leave a comment & I will get back to you. You can also subscribe for free to get a notification when my next post goes live. Thanks for taking the time to read through. Over the coming weeks & months I will be covering Agadir, Spain & Belgium!
Tyler's Travel Tales 