First Trip to Morocco

December 1972 - January 1973

As November 1972 dawned I was deep into my second year of an MBA program at U of T. My head which should have been focused on getting a job and growing up was instead lost in a fog of wanderlust I hadn't expunged while vagabonding in Europe and Asia in 1971.

My girlfriend was scheduled to head home to Vancouver over Christmas so I decided to use a late arriving student loan and the teeny tiny bit of lunch money I had and head over to Europe during the break.

I landed in Madrid on December 15 with the expectation of hitchhiking for two weeks and then flying home from Amsterdam. I wanted to see the big cities of Europe. In 1971 I had landed in Lisbon with the same plan but ended up in Nepal.

Two days later after touristing thru the Prado, the Modern Art museum known as Reina Sofia, and the El Rastro flea market I was on my way  to Granada, an iconic destination in the wrong direction.

I remember at El Rastro agonizing about buying a man’s lonely wedding ring with a date in 1937 engraved inside. That was during the Spanish Civil War. I wonder how long he survived after the wedding. Or whether the wizened vendor was selling a family jewel because he needed the money.

The unstable thing about hitchhiking long distances  is that each morning when you wake up you don't know where you'll be sleeping. You're a slave to the rides you get and the people you meet. Six days later on the 23rd after many rides and meeting about a dozen people I arrived in Fez in Morocco. From Granada I had drifted thru Malaga, Torremolinos, Marbella, Algeciras, Ceuta and Tetuán.

Torremolinos was a place I wanted to go after devouring The Drifters by James Michener but there was nothing to hold me there. Marbella was a more appetizing place. It reminded me of Palm Springs. I would have stayed longer but I didn't have the right clothes.

My time in Fez was a magical few days. I suppose Christmas can produce special memories no matter where it is celebrated.

My ride into Fez was with a couple from California circulating around Europe in a van. We fell in with a number of travelers in our hotel and at a close by campground. This group included people from six countries. Another couple was schlepping two cute toddlers.

I took on an out sized role in the planning, shopping and preparation of our international Christmas dinner. That included buying a live turkey in the medina and later wringing and slicing the neck of said turkey as the menu came together.

It was a really good party. We bonded over a crumb of sadness brought on by being away from home and loved ones.

One woman, Charley, asked me to call her mom when I returned to Toronto. Charley was a North Yorker and had been away for some time and outta touch. She wanted me to tell her mom she was alive and OK.

My trip lasted another 10 days with visits to Marrakesh, Essaouira, Goulimine, Mirleft, Sidi Ifni, etched into my memory.

Like anyone who’s been to Marrakesh I loved it. The medina and central market, Jemaa el-Fnaa, seemed timeless. I doubt this old medina would have looked different 100 years earlier. I bought a goat skin jacket for $26.

For the next few days I hooked up with a guy named John who had a Land Rover and a few other passengers for a tour to the south.

We reached Essaouira as the sun was setting over the Atlantic. This is the number one sunset of all the beauties I’ve been privileged to see. It had everything. Amazing sun bathed colours. Ominous clouds. Winds buffeting the audience. It was my first sunset over the Atlantic. You always remember your first.

We drove five hours to Goulimine in the south the next day. It’s a small city that’s grown up at the western edge of the Sahara. If I hadn’t been so broke and hadn't already paid for the next semester at U of T I would have bought into the 21 day camel journey to Timbuktu offered up to travelers looking for a sandy thrill.

Sidi Ifni on the coast had different architecture than the rest of Morocco. For most of the time between the 1400s and just three years earlier in 1969 Sidi Ifni was owned by Spain. So it had some of the same architecture as old Los Angeles near where I lived in the 60s. But Sidi Ifni was in a state of decay. I remember the Spanish architecture, beaten down Moroccans, a morose atmosphere. I loved it there.

Mirleft was up the coast a bit. It was a substantial bit of nothingness, including no running water or electricity. Lots of mud buildings. A few restaurants and places to stay and because of the beach a number of backpackers called it home for weeks on end. I asked one guy who was just sitting around sunning himself, not unlike a dog, what he did all day. He slowly looked up at me “Been busy today. Took a shit.”

The end of the ride with John and the Land Rover found me in Agadir retrieving my passport. My diary doesn’t indicate why I was handling that peculiar task again. It had also happened in 1971 twice, on Corfu and in Kandahar.

From Agadir my travel up to Casablanca to catch a plane to Lisbon and Toronto was a mish mash of failed hitchhiking, unexpected bus rides and different sleeping arrangements.

One nite I was stuck in a very small coastal village that had no hotel or bus station. I was taken in by a good samaritan who let me sleep in a small room in his small house next to the big highway.

When I got back to Toronto I had to borrow money and sell valuables to survive. And boy was it worth it. Great memories that would be cheap at twice the price.

November 14, 2018

January 10, 2019