Rock the kasbah

So for day two in Marrakech we decided to visit some of the historical highlights of the old kasbah, which turned out to be a very short walk from our riad. Kasbahs (for those that don’t know) were the fortified quarters for the royal family and their guards, designed to be easily defended in the event of an attack. Even some of the smallest villages in morroco have kasbahs so its not really surprising that the one here is massive.

Our first stop was Bahia palace, originally constructed in 1860 and home to two different despotic viziers. Most of the palace is closed to the public but we saw some beautiful courtyards and the harem, which once housed 4 wives and 24 concubines (I can barely handle one! Wife I mean…).

Although the palace was badly looted as soon as the second owner died, its easy to imagine the grandeur Bahia must have once held, and much of the architectural detailing is still intact so you can really get a feel for the quality of craftsmanship invested here.

Next stop was Badi palace, built by the Sultan in the 16th century to greet and entertain foreign dignitaries. This place has also been looted but again, its easy for the imagination to fill in the blanks.

We paid an extra dollar each to see a 12th century minbar, which is basically a staircar for the imam to use to get to the pulpit and deliver his mosque sermons. It was restored by the MoMA so you’re not allowed to take any photos but I’m sure you can Google it… Its very impressive and I imagine the other imams suffered from quite a but of minbar envy.

The coolest thing about Badi is the giant storks nesting along the top if the walls…. They, and their nests, are massive… I kept waiting for them to swoop down at fly off with a small child but it never happened.

Our last stop for the day was the Saadian tombs, walled up by a loyal servant in 1603 and left undisturbed until 1917. The tombs themselves are beautifully ornate and still contain royal bodies and copious amounts of tourists all taking the same photos. Here’s one of ours:

Whoever packed my bag did a terrible job and left out, amongst other things, my sunglasses, so on the way back to the riad we stopped at a small roadside stall and I bought a genuine pair of Ron Bev’s which I discovered later have corrective lenses in them. I was also tempted to invest in another staple of the Moroccan marketplace, a pair of traditional Beats By Dre ™ but penny talked me out of it.

Before we left australia, I was told by one of my gym participants, Phil, not to buy anything made of leather if it still smelled funky. We took that advice on board and smelled Penny’s scamstravaganaza slippers extensively before proceeding with our investment. They checked out ok so we were surprised to get back to the riad and find that they now stunk, just liked the tannery. Penny insists on keeping them, so i imagine that by the end of the trip, we too will smell, just like the tannery.

Before dinner we went out to the main Medina square in quest of a snake charmer, who turned out to be more elusive than the lonely planet would have us believe.. We found one eventually and insulted him grievously by only offering 20d for a couple of photos:

For dinner, Penny ate at a fancy vegan cafe that catered almost exclusively to tourists. I decided to try my luck at one of the many street stalls that spring up at sunset. Penny’s meal was full of organic, farm fresh vegetables, cooked by two local women… She ate the whole thing and it looked delicious. Mine had the most disgusting, badly reheated meat I had ever seen so I played it safe and only ate the vegetables and cous cous. Mine was terrible… Also it had a bug in it… Its OK though because it was a cooked bug. I could tell because it was crunchy.. The half that I spat out looked kind of like a small roach.