At 4pm I was meeting a man named Abdul outside the museum of the city fortification and going on as walking tour of the Kasbah and Medina. A kasbah is a fortified area inside the city walls of the medina. The most famous medina in Morocco (and perhaps the world) is in Marrakech (which I visited in 2019 and you can read about it here – https://midnightmurphy.com/2019/10/02/an-irish-goat-in-morocco. Tangier’s is impressive. Abdul explained how wealthy Europeans have in recent years been buying up property in the Old Town for their holiday homes and that locals are moving out to newer suburbs (Tangier is a city of over a million people while only fifty thousand live in the thousand-year-old medina). He is a local of the area so was greeted by many of the shop and stall holders in the warren of lanes and alleys. He took me to the fruit market; the butcher’s market; the grand square, the carpet store and the herb and spice store where an enterprising salesman tried to sell me hair regrowth serum. Bravely I resisted. He explained to me that the yellow earring on the dog indicated that the dog was a street dog that had been both neutered and vaccinated. Dogs tend not to be household pets in Morocco for religious reasons but instead are more looked after as community animals with neighbourhoods adopting local dogs and taking care of them. The walking tour was a fascinating insight into life in the old town. For example, he pointed out that at the doorways of nearly all the house there was a plastic bottle filled with water and saffron – apparently this discourages the cat population from using the doorway for toilet purposes. He asked me if I’d taken the ferry from Talifa in Spain that morning pointing towards the land over the sea I had seen at breakfast.

That evening we dined on the coast again and I enjoyed a lamb tagine – a Moroccan stew of slow cooked meat and vegetables.

The following morning, we were being picked up at 9am by Hicham in front of the old walls. He was driving us a hundred kilometres east to see the blue town of Chefchaouen. The journey lasted two hours and we were given four hours to explore the town. Located in the Rif Mountains, the buildings and streets of the old town are painted in various shades of blue. Leather goods, pottery and paintings are sold in stalls and shops in the laneways of the old town. I practised my haggling skills getting the price of a scroll reduced from fifteen to eleven dirham and a painting reduced from 350 to 250 dirham. It is likely I could have gotten a further reduction, but I felt reasonably satisfied with my efforts. Chefchaouen is a spectacularly beautiful town and a must visit for anyone travelling to Morocco. There is no clear explanation as to why the townspeople decided to paint the town blue. I am just glad that they did.

Traffic on the way back was chaotic so the journey took longer than earlier one. I dined on seafood pizza that evening and as was normal at this stage we were a magnet for cats looking for a combination of affection and food.

We had another early night – days of twenty kilometres walks can tire you out.

We checked out at eleven the next day and were picked up by Omar once again, who took us back to the airport for our flight back to Madrid and then onwards to Ireland. Morocco has become one of my favourite countries to visit. Next December I am already planning a trip to Seville and Rabat to see more of these two spectacular countries.