Day 2 in Casablanca.

Well, we managed to stay awake until about 9pm last night in an effort to get over our jet lag as soon as possible. So once we got back to our hotel after supper Naomi finished up yesterday’s blog post we called it a night. NO problem falling asleep. And although the mattress on the bed in our hotel room was kinda hard, it felt so great to just stretch out and rest our weary bodies. After a great sleep, I awoke completely refreshed and ready for another day of adventures. I reached for my phone and squinted to read the time. Seven o’clock. PERFECT. Wait a minute. Take a closer look. What? oh boy! ONE o’clock. Hmmm. That’s not very good at all. I knew I wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep, but I decided to lie back down and ‘rest’ for a while. The next time I looked at my phone it was 8:00. Yeah. That’s really good.

I showered and rummaged through my neatly organized luggage to find just the right t-shirt for the day. Then I headed downstairs to find a coffee. A very friendly waiter happily poured me a cup which I took back upstairs. Now Naomi was done her shower and MaryLou was already texting us: Waiting in the lobby. Want to go for breakfast?

And that’s how we began our day.

We had breakfast at the coffee shop across the street from our hotel. Very fine breakfast and good coffee. MaryLou had signed us up for a free walking tour of the Old Medina. Soon after breakfast we headed out, intending to walk the 30 minutes to the ‘meeting place’ just outside the Medina. It soon became apparent that our pace would not get us there in time. We ordered an Uber and that got us there with a few minutes to spare. And then the guide texts to say he’ll be 10 minutes late.

Amin introduced himself to us and suggested we climb up a few flights of stairs so we could look out over the wall that surrounds the Medina (old city), from where we could see the big Casablanca harbour and the many big ships that were out on the Atlantic awaiting their turn to enter the port. Amin grew up in the Medina and told us many stories of how in more recent times the old buildings inside and outside the walls are being gradually replaced by modern malls and hotels and more tourist-friendly structures.

Old Medina is a maze of narrow alleys and traditional souks selling textiles, jewelry, spices, food, and much more.

I think our two-hour tour lasted nearly 3 hours. Amin showed us how to buy tram tickets and got us on the right one back to our hotel. We decided we should check out a pub near our hotel and maybe have a cold local beer before going back to our rooms. No luck with that. Google Maps let us down. So did numerous people I stopped to ask for help. It seemed that as soon as I explained that what we wanted was a BEER to drink, they immediately shut down. So no alcohol in this country? Really? Is a wee little cup of espresso the only ‘adult’ drink in town?

Back at our hotel we stopped in at the restaurant. Do you have beer? Yes! Two local beers to choose from. The waiter showed us to a ‘private’ room next to the cafeteria and was pleased to bring us nice ‘Casablanca’ beers and frosted glasses. Not great, but not terrible. We had a fine hour chatting with the Driedgers. Then up to our rooms for a bit of relaxing before meeting downstairs to go out for dinner at six.

We ordered two plates of ‘mixte plato’, one for each couple to share. That was plenty, and it was quite tasty! Fries, rice, sausages, olives, tomatoes, onions, delicious baked bread, and more. Spicy Dijon mustard to top it off. And the cook was super friendly and seemed pleased to have us there.

A short walk after supper and then back to our rooms. Time to read a bit of news, maybe do a sudoku or wordle puzzle. Look through our photos and update the blog. By 11:00pm it was time to turn in. (Not really sleepy yet, but we’ve got to get into the routine.)