Around the Corner from Anywhere

The Ourika Valley is about an hour outside of Marrakech and was the last of the one-day excursions I was going on for the group. I'd requested to do this on a Monday because the brief write-up I'd already cleaned up had said that on Mondays they stopped by the weekly souk held in Ourika Town, and I figured if they mentioned it then it must be a good thing to do.

So, on Monday Abdul did his usual pickup of me outside my riad and off we went to the meeting point to collect the day's tourists. It was only the third of these trips but already I was feeling the comfort of routine slipping in. One day do a trip, the next day sort pictures and draft the brochure content, the next day do another trip, and so on. Throw in a weekend of hanging out with people and seeing other things about town and you've got the makings of a pretty normal week. And it was Monday, so here I was, up and at it again, ready to start week two. And this trip had the special treat of Abdul actually being the driver for it, so the day was off to an excellent start.

The fun thing about taking a day trip to the Ourika Valley is that, unlike the other ones where it does actually take four hours to get there so you're pretty much just trying to get there, see the place, and then come back, you actually get to stop a few times along the way and check out some other neat things. So while our destination was the Ourika Valley, which by the way meant another hike up some cascades, it also meant stopping a few times.

We did not stop for this. It's just the Atlas Mountains as we drive towards Ourika.

I've been attempting to perfect my "through the window of a moving vehicle" technique, and so far it totally remains a crap shoot. I think this one worked out okay. By the way, this technique ends up being quite similar to the "taking a picture while on a moving camel at sunset" technique. Similar f-stop. Same crap shoot.

First stop was the souk in Ourika. It was here that I learned that there are things I do not want to take pictures of. I mean, it's just not something I had pondered as of yet. Well, walking by a slaughter house that was being used and whose doors were wide open did more then get my ponder on, it gave me an answer. Camera up to get the shot. Camera down due to the realization that I'm not interested in capturing an image of that. Guess that eliminates a certain realm of photo-journalism for me as a future career option, but that's okay, I'm pretty sure me not wanting to be one in the first place did that already.

These are things I did want to take pictures of. Not that that makes them good pictures, but it does give them the winning attribute of being pictures that I can now show you.

We got dropped off at the top of the main street, mostly because it was not going to be possible for the van to get much further along, let alone turn around.

There was a sheep and goat sale going on at the souk and these guys were some of the sellers, taking a bit of a break.

Noah, Jake and I did not get to the sheep auction in the north of Scotland that my cousin John in Sussex had suggested we may want to check out. So I'm happy to say I did get to this one.

This is/was the post office. It has a lovely riverside view, which also meant that when the river flooded due to all the rain, it undermined the foundation and part of the building collapsed.

It was a quick stop, and I bustled around trying to get lots of pictures of different things. My theory on getting good pictures right now is somewhere at the "if you take enough of them then odds are at least one of them might actually be decent". I'm not sure if it is serving me well, but it does give you fair warning if you ever ask to come over and look at pictures from the trip.

These guys were just walking along when we made another stop along the way.

That stop was around here.

This wasn't our destination, but it did turn out to be an opportunity to cross a rickety bridge and then hike along some goat paths in the hills.

Or I guess in this case, sheep paths.

In ways it is good when there is a local guide, and in other ways, it is a shame. So I guess mixed blessing would be a decent term. In this particular case  a guide would have been useful, just so that I didn't have to be the one to stop asking myself "I wonder what's up and around that bend in the path?" Answering that question just results in going to find out, and then having to ask the question again, and then going to find out, and then having to ask the question again, and then... You get it.

But I did stop, and I did turn around, and I dutifully suggested to the couple of folks with really nice cameras that maybe it was time to go back. They, thankfully, acquiesced.

This shop marks about the beginning of our hike up and along the cascades. There are plenty of small-ish cascades to chose from, and depending on a number of factors, mostly where the guide wants to walk that day I imagine, you may end up seeing one or many during this walk.

Note that there are Coca-Cola signs painted everywhere. You see them when you're driving through the mountains, popping up on the sides of improbably placed buildings, or when you're wandering through a single street village, or, well, pretty much anywhere you can find a wall you can find a Coke logo. It makes me wonder about who is driving around painting all of these and whether or not Coke actually keeps track of everywhere they've painted their logo.

I swear to you that someone must have said "Monkies on three... two... one..." when we got on the path past the above store, their timing was that good.

So then we headed up, our destination being this cascade.

Which along the way meant crossing a few more rickety bridges. That's Karen by the way. She's a journalist from Hong Kong. And yes, she is wearing yellow boots, and yes, once we got talking and getting along a bit I started calling her Banana Feet. I did and I do blame Billy Connolly for that.

It also meant doing the closest thing to climbing I've done yet on this trip, as well as taking a couple of paths that were more difficult then when Jake, Noah, I and the others we were with, (I mention the others because you all need to understand that this was not my fault) unwittingly strayed off the path coming down from that big waterfall we had walked up the side of in Iceland.

The result, while no Icelandic fall I will admit, was still pretty wonderful.

And then it was time to find another way down, which meant being able to look out across the valley some more.

You know, for what I think was my favourite of the day trips, I'm a bit disappointed by the lack lustre blog entry that you've just suffered through. Sorry about that. Hoping the next one will be better. But, as Stephen Sondheim was once told, and since then has told anyone who has read Finishing the Hat, "Don't be afraid to not write a hit."

Well. I've certainly got that lesson down pat. Now, where's my Tony?