[This trip report was originally posted to the forums on Trip Advisor.]
March 7 & 8, 2019
We took a red eye flight on Air Portugal from Toronto that connected in Lisbon, and finally landed in Marrakech around 3:30 pm on a Friday afternoon. At the airport, we breezed through immigration, and got some cash from an ATM before wandering outside and finding our driver for the week, Abdul. We hired Abdul through Marrakech Tours Specialist, and had a great experience with him. Abdul took us to the medina entrance closest to our hotel, and arranged for a local with a cart to take our baggage and lead us through the souks to Riad Dar Essalam.
At the Riad, we had customary mint welcome tea and cookies before being led to our room, which, as it was dubbed the ‘Royal Suite’, was very grand indeed! We settled in and then headed directly to Jemma el Fnaa.
We walked a lap around the square and saw the snake charmers, drummers, orange juice vendors, touts, snail soup stalls, etc.
We went to Grand Balcon du Cafe Glacier, ordered some drinks, and took them upstairs to a table at the railing so we could watch the activity happening below. Eventually we gave up our table and walked through the medina back to our Riad.
It was all fascinating, but we were pretty wiped out from the flight, so it was also a bit overwhelming. And loud! Not to worry, we would be back.
After a short rest in our room, we went down to the in-house restaurant for dinner (brochettes, couscous and vegetable tajine), complete with musicians and belly dancers. Ar that point we couldn’t keep our eyes open any longer, and we finally called it a night.
Cook Family Travels 