Here we are again in Restingar Smir... |
First stop on our tour was Restingar Smir, Morocco. We wasted no time booking a taxi up to Chefchaouen though. Moustafa arrived in his newish blue taxi (well, a slightly newer model than last year’s ancient Mercedes) to carry us over the Riff mountains to our hotel, this time inside the Medina and very close to the central Plaza Uta el-Hammam. We set off to explore the old city; it was Sunday and many visitors were milling about to celebrate (something – we never did find out what). There were merchants and market stalls galore, concerts by school children and plenty of local people in traditional dress to add colour to the mountain village’s Berber blue and white colour scheme.
We'll have one of those, one of those, oh and one of those... |
So, after a
hard afternoon of souvenir shopping we wandered back to our hotel (Dar Mounir)
for a quiet glass of “medicine’ up on the terrace and to admire the view in the
evening cool. We were quite close to the
restored Kasbah and a large 15th c mosque with an unusual octagonal
tower so as the muezzin’s call rang around the valley, we tried to imagine how
it must have been when it was the stronghold of Berber Moulay Ali ben Rachid. Christians
were forbidden entry back then. Infidel
travellers found inside the medina were killed; that is until the Spanish
occupied the village in the 1920’s.
Dinner was local fare and we found ourselves scaling steep stairs up into the colourful outdoor terrace of Aladdin’s Lamp. Whilst feasting on tagines of beef & prunes, chicken & preserved lemon and highly fragrant couscous (not to mention delectable crème caramels), we were able to watch the evening goings on in the town square below.
Plaza Uta el-Hammam |
Mohammed,
who had promised us a “clean taxi with airconditioning” for our return trip,
handed us over to the driver of what could have been Mustafa’s very ancient
Mercedes from last year. It was old, it
rattled and the brakes burned as we barrelled back down the mountain road
towards Smir. We would make it,
inshallah.
From:
La Linea, Spain Lat/Long: 36:09.53N 05:21.35W
Date/Time: 08/06/13: 1200
To:
Restingar Smir, Morocco Lat/Long: 35:45.25N 5:20.518W Date/Time: 08/06/13: 1730Time Taken: 26nm (4.5hrs) Distance (this year): 207.5nm (33hrs)
Distance Total (since 2008): 11032.5nm Weather: W15-20kts; 0.5m swell; cool
Fastest Speed: Sped along under sail (all of the way!!) doing 8.4kts at times
No comments:
Post a Comment