The heart of Morocco is definately Marrakesh. We stayed here for 6 nights and still didn't get to see the half of it. In the stiffling 40 degree heat we wandered through the old Medina and observed the Moroccan way of life. Local farmers line the narrow alley ways with their fresh fruit and veg for sale while the kids run around playing tiggy and marbles. The local butcher shoos flies away from the beef carcasses hanging in the heat with what looks like a duster and the craftsmen tinker away making laterns, puffs, carpets and anything else you can imagine. There arez numerous alleys like these in Marrakesh but we didn't get to see them all. There were so many things that we would have loved to have bought but unfortunately our backpacks have little roo, to offer and the postage prices were through the roof. We did pick up a few pressies though!!!

We experienced a traditional hammam in Marrakesh. Ladies and gents separate so the boys went first. Half an hour later they came out looking youngter and refreshed. For $12 they got a body scrub followed by some muscly Moroccan man stretching all their limbs and muscles. At the time they thought it was great but ever since Trent has had trouble with knots in the muscles in his back. Our experience was a little different. First we went into a small room to change. We all emerged with togs on and were soon told to remove our tops so there we were Jeanette, Mary and myself in nothing but knickers. We were then shown to the hammam which was a large dim light room with nothing but a 3 small mats on the wet marble floor. We all had a good giggle when we saw the ladies who were to give us our scrub. One black and one white lady both very large and with boobs too big to do a mammogram on. With force these ladies used what felt like sandpaper to scub alll the dirt from our skin. It certainlu worked as you could see all the black dirt falling to the floor. To follow buckets of warm water were thrown over us before our a little lady of about 70 came in to give us all a little massage. I kinda bummed out with the massage. Being the last one I got about 30 seconds. Oh well it zas a great laugh.