The Schengen Zone

 

I am returning to Morocco.  I left my bicycle in England with friends.  I'll be headed there at the end of December to pick it up.  I'll pack it up and fly to Marrakech.  Then make my way north towards Tangier and a ferry back to Europe.  Louise found a person renting their home in a town called Céret in the south of France near the Pyrenees and the Spanish border.  We'll be there for three months.

The Schengen Zone is something that just cropped up.  I was unaware of it up to now.  It is an area of several European Union countries that allow 90 day visas.  The rule is that a person can stay in this zone for a maximum of 90 days in 180.  After a full 90 days ne has to leave the zone for 90 days.

I discovered the Schengen Zone while exploring an extended visa and how to immigrate to France.  I realized that I needed to address this if I wanted to stay out of the US for he winter. I was looking for a place to go for the month of January allowing me another 3 months in France.  I looked at Albania but figured it would be pretty cold and Trump is eyeing it.  In my research I found a flight from Stansted Airport direct to Marrakech.  Stansted is very close to where my bike is and the airline takes bikes as long as they are disassembled and in a bag or box.  Stansted is also near Cambridge which has several bike shops and a train going directly to the airport.  So the plan is to repeat what I did before and ferry from Tangier to France or simply cross over to Spain, pack up the bike and go by train.

Other plans are to sell my house in Maine and move to France.  I have had nothing but problems renting the house out in the winter.  Students ruined my driveway and left the heat off freezing my plumbing.  I was furious and did not return their security deposit and one of them has told his father who is some kind of "karen" and says he's taking me to small claims court.  This is the final time I rent to students from the MMA.  Even Airbnb has been difficult this year. Really just one person who panicked when she saw a  few bugs.  I implored her to leave and refunded her her money.  There have been several cancellations from people from Canada and Europe.

On another note I exhibited some of my photos at the Library in Bluehill.  There have been some very nice comments and I have actually sold two of my photos.  I am inspired to get back to Morocco and France where there is no shortage of photo opportunities.

It's good to be writing in the blog again.  It has been way to long.  

Thailand

Chiangmai Mai, Thailand

December 2nd, 2024

I have not written in my blog for a long while and it feels a little rusty to return to it.  Like so many skills writing is something one must practice often to improve at.  

I am in Chiangmai Mai, Thailand.  Chiangmai Mai is in the far north.  It is an ancient walled city.  Some of the ramparts are still there as is the encapsulating moat that surrounds the old city.  Since the 11th century Chiang Mai has exploded well beyond its ancient square enclosure.  

To get to Chiang Mai it took a 15 hour flight from Boston to Seoul, Korea then another 5 hour flight to Bangkok.  Bangkok is just as I pictured it.  It is enormous, frenetic and altogether fascinating.  I was only in Bangkok for a day.  I was suffering from the remainder of a bad cold and some serious jet lag but I did go out at night for awhile and visited the chic part of town so I could buy a good cable for my ipad and phone. Yves St. Laurent, Tiffany and Apple all had their mega stores here.  It was bright and lit up for…Christmas!  The enormous Christmas trees did surprise me even though it shouldn’t.  Capitalism has a firm grasp on Thailand it seems.

The metro system is great once you figure it out.  You buy a ticket per trip although passes are available.  At the kiosk one buys a ticket or plastic token for you next stop.  You are charged more or less by the distance you are traveling.  Once you get off the train you must surrender your ticked or the token insuring no one can skip out without paying.

One great metro stop is Bang Pho.  This stop ends up at the river where you can get a ride up or down the river to several stops.  The boats are old and beat up.  The drivers speed up to the dock throw the transmission into reverse, tie up and are gone in less than a minute.  The stern man has a whistle that he blows confirming the activities happening at the end of the boat.  When the multitudes have gotten on the stern man blows his whistle removes the docking line and the boat takes off in a cloud of diesel  smoke.

December 10, Sukhothai, Thailand

Today was another good day in Thailand.  I slept well with he air conditioner on.  I woke up grabbed my camera and 

after some coffee headed out to see the ruins of the ancient capitol of Siam.  I had read that many of the exquisite ruins can be found away from the touristy center so that was where I headed first.  The ruins are supposed to be extensive and  a bicycle was suggested.  Not surprisingly I found a shop run by an old woman who handed me the most decrepit bike.  It’s one attribute was that it was “almost” my size.  It had a handy basket for my camera bag so off I went.  Pedaling was uncomfortable as the cramped position I was in didn’t make for a Tour De France spin but the machine did what it was supposed to do and got me down the road.  The noise the thing made when applying the brakes was disconcerting but it is flat here so a good coasting stop is adequate.  I pedaled for awhile and saw a sign for a “Wat” which I will call a church though that is not what it is.  A Wat is a holy place and come in many forms.  From a real temple to an elaborate monastery as well as the ruins I saw.  

The city was enormous and must have been extraordinary in the 14th century.  Three sets of walls each with its own moat!  Inside the wall the town was an elaborate display of over abundance and reverence to Buddha.  It still takes a lot of imagination to see what it must have been like.  When I road away from the city I found myself in a beautiful area of farmer’s fields and rice paddies.  Then, out of nowhere were these amazing ruins. I spent a lot of time photographing Wat Chetaphong because it had two statues of the Buddha n plaster over brick.  This is what I had been hoping for and I hope at least one of the photos comes out.

December 18th, 2024. Home

I cut the trip short.  Leah was in a car accident and I thought it best to get home.    I think, after 3 weeks I had had enough of Thailand.  The final nail on the coffin was my last bus ride from Sukhothai to Ayutthaya.  The bus driver forgot  about me and continued past Ayutthaya and continued on to Bangkok without letting me off.  I finally got the guy’s attention but by then it was too late.  I got a little put off and forgot my iPad on the bus.  When I realized what had happened I was already at the train station ready to go back to my reserved hotel now two hours away.  I decided to go back to the bus station.  There is no easy way to get there from the train station although they are close.  I had to take a cab.  With some difficulty I told the people at the bus company what had happened.  After a long wait they took me to the bus and the driver who said he hadn’t found it.  I left and after a quick call home I made the decision to check at the Apple Store in Bangkok to see how much security I had.  It was a good move as I found out what I pretty much knew; that with apple and a  secure passcode I was ok.  It was late and I was tired after walking all over Bangkok I bought a new IPAD and found a place to stay for the night.  

At the hotel the desk clerk advised me to make a police report which I did the next day.  The police were pretty good about it and with my report in hand I hoofed back to the bus station to demonstrate how serious I was.  They, too, took it seriously and I now made it back to the bus command center.  Here everybody had a police looking uniform except one woman, “Tina”,  who was very concerned.  This process took me well into the afternoon so I made my way back to the train station to wait for the slow, crammed train back to Ayutthaya where I had a reservation for the night.  I asked for another night so I could check out the town.  The next day I found a message on my cell that Tina had found my IPAD!  I was incredulous.  I said I would come get it the next day.  After visiting the ruins of the ancient capitol of Thailand I returned  to Bangkok where Tina took me on a long, long metro ride to a police station.  She had a little trouble but eventually a uniformed policeman appeared with the missing Ipad.  

I had had enough of Thailand at this point  and, after getting some distressing news that Leah, my eldest, had been in a car wreck decided to head home.  A day and a half later I am home.  Jet lag has got a firm grip on me and I have been up going through photos since 2:30 this morning.  

My conclusion regarding my trip to Thailand is that is wasn’t as successful as I had wanted.  Poor health, a bad train ride and finding myself constantly in very touristy areas made for an overall  poor experience.  If I were to do it again I would head to the less known region of Esan in the Northeast.  I do not know for sure but I believe that is where one could find less tourism and more reality.  My feeling is that because of the massive tourism industry Thai people are forced to accommodate the world.  Although they smile, I feel as if, underneath, they are not all that happy with foreigners.

Sobriety

Allauch, France

March1,2024

 

It is July 31st 2024.  I have left this on my desktop since writing it in March.  I decided not to publish it because I thought and still do think that no one will care nor wish to read it.  So today I am going to publish it.  If anyone does read this could you please leave a comment, good or bad it'll be ok.  Well, that's not true.  If the comment is cruel it'll be sad but maybe it will be justified.  I am not good with criticism so maybe it's time I learned.  So...here goes...I'm sending it...

Preface (warning): this post is unrelated to travel and is not a really a fun read.  In it I talk about my struggle with alcohol and drugs. Comments are welcome!

Today I am staying home. I am now really living in France.  That is to say I have stopped feeling as if I must be out sightseeing.  Today I am writing and processing photos. I have found a great online English speaking AA meeting.

Todays’, discussion concerned mental illness and a higher power,  two topics that can cause more than a few people to stop going to meetings.   

I figure this, if I poisoned my brain for half my life it is no wonder there was a little damage done. As to a Higher Power this has always been an easy one for me.  I am sure most people have thought about the origins of our world and of its end.  I don’t need to have studied philosophy to know that something far greater than me must be creating all this.  Even if everything  is simply a dream something is doing the dreaming.  I could go on about this but why.  Those books have already been written.

I have, as yet, to talk much about being in AA in my writing.  I have been afraid to let others know and that breaking my silence on this subject would make others turn away from me.  This is the same fear that has gripped me when I was drinking and drugging.  I am now 66 years old.  I think it's time to remove the shackles of silence regarding my addiction.  I am now coming up on my second ten year anniversary.  This means that I have been sober for a total of 21 years of my life.  Having started drinking at 15 means that I was destroying myself for just about 30 years.  It’s hard to overcome 30 years of personal destruction or any personalized destruction for that matter.  Over the years I have created and destroyed.  I have created wealth only to lose it.  Families, only to abandon them.  Jobs, only to  see them flitter away like birds flying south.  I have plunged deep into the oceans as a diver, flown high into the unfettered sky as a pilot.  I have taught young people things they needed to know and things they didn’t.  I have sailed, piloted ships and built houses.  During all of this I drank or anesthetized myself during most of it.  When I should have been attending the important functions of life I thought it wiser to drink.  The list is long and ominous as to the days of my life that I have wasted.

However, that is not the point of this episode of the “life and times of Geoffrey Huppé”.  Being here in France, taking the day off to write this is the point.  

This is the point:  I am now clean and sober for almost a solid ten years. When I put the drink down I began recovering from the destruction. Life is so much better.  I have had to change.

I know that I don’t handle difficult situations well.  I realize that I am afraid of certain people .  Usually people who are in authority.  I have come to realize that things in my early childhood did not help me and certainly hindered my maturation.  I do not choose to go into detail on this.  I have already said more than I really think I should have.  I have such a great fear of disappointing others that even a whisper of it will close me down.  

I have spent so much time beating up on myself that I have come to a point in my life that I simply don’t know what my next steps should be.  I tend to be scattered these days.  Now that I am clean I want so much to retrieve that which was lost.  I have always loved science and art.  I was ridiculed as a child if I did well in science.  I was supposed to be a liberal arts academic like my father.  However, that was never going to be it for me.  People thought I was good at art but I didn’t think so and never followed through despite it being the only  thing I was ever any good at.  So I have found myself taking up photography and drawing.  The photography combines art and science so I love it.  The drawing is fun as long as I do not take myself too seriously.  If I take myself seriously  I see how bad I am at it and I give up. I do not want to give up at the art.  So I have begun a new challenge for myself and that is to truly follow through with improving my photography/artistic skills.  If I can somehow tell myself that it is ok to fail then I will be alright.  If I go back to the self criticism that I hold on to it just will not fly.  

When I became an airline pilot at 42 years old I simply made a decision that that is what I was going to do.  I did not give myself an alternative.  I believe this is how I must approach the photography and art.  I can not give myself an out.  I also believe that it is the right way to live out the remaining years of my life.  It would be a wonder to create something beautiful before I move on.

March in Marseille

Allauch, France

March 10, 2024

The sun is brilliant this morning.  It is Sunday, a day to enjoy some of my final days here in the south of France.  I am no longer traveling. I feel now as if I am living here.  I have settled into a kind of regime.  I work on my photographs, writing and learning how to draw.  At noon there is a meeting then I walk up the hills or bike.  I have my neighborhood boulangerie, the tabac where I buy my public transport ticket for the day and my favorite supermarket are all a short walk away.  There is a small farmers market right near my home on Saturdays.  My walks are really the highlight of my day.  As I round a corner I see the village and the chateau on the cliffs above me.

The chateau is from the 12th century and little of it exists save the foundation of some round towers, a gatehouse, some walls and the church of Notre Dame.  Walking a little further the windmills appear on their perch above the town. I pass by the ecole maternelle and hear children playing in their courtyard.  My supermarket, the “carrefour”, is in a small group of buildings with a bank, a restaurant and a flower shop.  As I make my way around the traffic circle cars fly by and I realize that this is still the suburb of Marseille and the city is not far away.  I carefully cross at the pedestrian crosswalk and to my amazement the cars stop for me.  Only occasionally do they blow by me.  Most often they stop.  Here, the pedestrian seems to have the right of way.  The only place I know of this to be the case back home is in Camden. My path steepens now as I get closer to the village.  I have several choices as I approach.  I can continue on the main street that directs cars up the steep hill or find alternatives which climb steeply but are far  more enjoyable.  I take stone staircases and eventually pass by the cemetery

and continue on up to the chateau and spend a few moments watching men play Pétanque.  I can also take another route bringing me straight up to the village which sits like all medieval villages directly below the chateau.  Most of the homes are of the same pink sandstone color with orange tile roofs.  I pass by a small bank, a souvenir shop, the Mairie, and the church.  I try to follow a different path up the hill but I have done the trip enough times that I know each turn.  Climbing up the steep path there are Provençal trees attaching themselves to the rocky soil.  There are Cypress, Pines and Olive trees.  Cactus and Aloe grab on as well.  I was fortunate enough to be here when several trees that looked like dogwoods were in bloom.  Eventually I arrive at the summit and am never underwhelmed at the vista that meets me.  All of Marseille spreads itself out in front of me.  The islands off the coast and the Chateau D’if are clearly outlined.  The. Old port is visible as is the beautiful hill of Notre Dame de la Gard.  The modern high rises down nearer the new port are outlined by the sky blue water and the cliffs on the further shore of the bay.  I have a short climb left which takes me to the top of the hill.  The remnants of the castle walls are a reminder that people have been living here for ages.  I take a last look and take my alternative route back down the back side of the hill.  This is very steep and rocky.  Some of the stones roll making this path more difficult.  I do like the challenge.  I get to the bottom and start my new route home.  Each day a different but familiar path.  Each day is unique and yet familiar.  It is always enjoyable.  It always changes with the weather but remains the same in its beauty.  I have had the chance to imagine history and the people who laid each stone of the chateau and the stories that the place has seen. I head home stopping at the supermarket for a baguette and some Camembert.

Marseille, February

Marseille, France

February, 2024

I am surprised that it is now the end of February.  I have been in France now since arriving in Marseille on the first.  My apartment and my landlords are excellent.  I have a small studio apartment in a small village on the outskirts of Marseille called Allauch which is pronounced “Alau”.  Allauch is a little more than a village and I would call it a suburb of Marseille.  However, it maintains the character of a village and, when I climb up the hill, becomes a true Provençal hamlet with a ruined fortress and small church. 

As in most of France there is no shortage of beautiful sites.  Marseille has seen its share of hard times but that seems to be its character.  Marseille is a working town.  Of course in the downtown area there are some fine boutiques but Marseille has little of the panache of Paris.  Marseille is doable, to me, Paris is not.  Marseille has been around for a long time.  The free museum of Marseille proves this as the ancient port, created by the Greeks and Romans, is open to the public.   Marseille is so old that most of the construction is new.  Having been through many wars, and many upheavals, the really old part of town had to be leveled and was replaced with more modern French architecture.  Five story building all with large windows, small balconies and full length shutters adorn the large avenues of the down town.  There are still remnants of the old city but I have yet to find a Medieval looking building.  The Panier district is the closest to it but the Panier district owns its own character in a kind of shabby chic.  The Old Port is the center of everything that is besides the main railroad station St. Charles.  From St. Charles one can find any number of trains, buses and airport shuttles to take one anywhere.  The Metro is simple with just two lines.  There are trams that branch out everywhere the Metro misses and buses ply the rest of the metropolitan area.  A full day pass on all the public transport is 5 Euros.  

Today is Sunday.   It rained today.  I have spent a day at the table on the computer.  Today the thoughts are of home.  It’s such a dichotomy when I travel.  I just love traveling and visiting interesting places yet at the same time I look forward to my home and the projects I have in store for me there. 

Before I left I bought a motorcycle, a motorcycle that I’ve been looking at from awhile.  A friend of mine was retiring and let me know he was selling it.  This bike is a BMW 650 Enduro.  Enduro is what I call it.  Nowadays the enduro is called an “adventure” bike.  It is a much lighter bike than I’ve had in a very long time.  During my last two trips to Latin America I have found the heavy motorcycle to be really difficult in the hilly mountain towns.  In traffic, with a loaded motorcycle stopping and starting can be exhausting.  They are fantastic on the highway but rough anywhere else.  I look forward to riding it down some back roads in Maine and wherever else it leads me.

 

Morocco Finale

January 31, 2024

Ferry Tangier Med, Morocco Algeciras, Spain

Train to Marseille

Yesterday’s events have clouded the fine last few days in Morocco.  I arrived at the Tangier Med Port after a strenuous uphill and thrilling downhill. I was drinking a celebratory coffee when notification came to me by email that my return trip was cancelled.  No more information given than that.  A few phone numbers were listed, none of which were operational.  The message said I could wait for the next ferry which would depart in 10 days.  That was it.  I had to rally but I was taken aback.  There was another ferry returning which left today for France but I had read bad things about it and they were gong to charge me twice what the other company (La Meridional) charged.  I already had a place to stay, nearby, for the night so there was no hurry.  I bought a ticket on one of the many companies that serve the Strait of Gibralter for a ferry leaving the next day.

I spent an interesting evening in a coffee shop across the way from my lodging.  Morocco was in the knockout round playing for the African Cup in football.  The room was packed with men.  All drinking coffee or tea.  Where I had been offered a seat was in the back amongst guys smoking a lot of hash.  They did not offer to which I was thankful.  Morocco played poorly and lost.  This was disappointing.

The next day I road my bike to the terminal.  It was bittersweet to be leaving Morocco.  I had had a really wonderful time in there.  The country is fascinating yet it is the people that make the place a joy.  I was always an outsider but was never made to feel total disrespect.  Getting lost in the Medina is a right of passage I think.  Before google maps it must have been a real event.  So many of the little alleys lead you on to nowhere.  It seems impossible not to be confused and directionless.  

As I write this I. Am on my way to France on a high speed train.  I was not allowed to put my bike on Spanish trains.  Some of the local will take them.  At the station in Algeciras I was told they would not let me take the bike on the train if it was not completely bagged.  I had to spend an extra night, find a plastic

bag and some tape.  I spent about two hours in a 20 Euro pension taking the entire bike apart and trying to safely put the bike in two huge bags I found at a store that sold everything you could imagine.  The bags have worked well throughout the day.  It has not been without its difficulties though.  The bag is heavy and the rest of my gear hangs off me like and overladen Christmas Tree.  I will arrive tonight, ahead of schedule, and hopefully settle in for a couple weeks in Allauch in the hills above Marseille. 

Chefchouen

Chefchouen, Morocco

01/24/24

Apartment 1, Avenue Maghreb Arabe

I leave this great apartment tomorrow for Tetouen.  I was thinking of biking it but having seen the mountains I have decided to take the bus.  The plan is to finish the trip in Morocco by slowly making my way down along the Mediterranean coast back to Tangier Med and the ferry back to Marseille.  I am giving myself a break here because the last day will be pretty hilly. However, this way I arrive the day before departure. 

No matter how hard I tried to pack lightly my bags make any hill very difficult.  The last day will be a 23 km ride.  This doesn’t sound like much but I have learned that it is no fun to overextend.  I have a full day for this trip.  It still worries me.  My chest aches when I really have to push it.  I have to remind myself to breathe in through my nose and out through my mouth.  I havn’t had to do that for awhile…at least I havn’t had to remind myself to do it!

Chefchouen has been great. I seem to have made some friends here.  The owner of the apartment owns the cafe downstairs. There is football (soccer) every night because the African Cup is being played and Morocco is doing really well.  I walk everywhere.  It’s good exercise because the town is built into a mountain.  The old city is painted blue.  The blue color is theorized to represent the sky.  There are several stories as to why the paint became used.  I have read two accounts.  One is the migration of Jews from Spain during the inquisition and another is similar but blames WW II.   

There is a Kasbah that I visited yesterday.  It was a small castle built by the founding prince in the 15th century.  It was beautiful inside but, as my new friend Hatim says, “except the prison”.  He’s right.  The prison was pretty daunting.  The chains against the base of the wall made it evident that this was not a good pace to be…ever! He said the prisoners would be chained at the base of the wall but also around their neck.  There was electric lighting but when the place was in business there wouldn’t be.  Pitch black darkness, cold and miserable would have been the conditions.  It’s almost hard to imagine!  However, the stories of the princes, sultans and the like are filed with tales of their brutality.  For example there is the story of the designer of the beautiful door into ruler’s palace in Meknes.  The Sultan asked a simple but two edged question to the designer, “could you do any better?”  “Yes” the designer replied, assuming there was more work to be had, and immediately was decapitated!

Chefchouen is my favorite place in Morocco.  It is so much smaller than the larger cities.  The only other place this size that I’ve visited is Asilah.  Chefchouen has a little more to offer unless you are a beach person.  The stores in the old Medina are the same as in the other towns.  The weavers are still in their small shops with their looms.  As in Meknes and Tangier the men work on their sewing and fancy embroidery in tiny little shops.  I did, finally, talk to a person in the Medina here in Chefchouen.  He said he was a tour guide and he was standing outside his father’s shop.  Eventually he invited me into look at the carpets I had heard so much about.  They are incredible carpets.  Hand made by tribal women.  At least that’s how the story is told.  They are made of wool or a combination of wool and cactus or wool and silk?  The problem for me is the way the shop keeper sells.  I went to three different shops.  All had the same story of the  tribal women creating the carpets and how each woman had her own trademark built into the patterns of the carpet.  I was told how I would be supporting the Berber tribes in the hills.  The merchant then takes out carpet after carpet until I felt a sense of overwhelm.  They serve you tea.  Finally it comes down to price.  By the time negotiations are through the price has been halved or better and they have folded up the carpet they have decided you want.  I walked out.  

The deals are endless including shipping.  This is important.  I did finally decide to buy a small carpet and, after much discussion, decided to ship it myself.  DHL and FedEx are available and will be thrown in during negotiations.  The stories then will continue about how the sellers in Fes and Marrakech would be charging much more and the designs of the carpets are very particular to the the regions of Morocco and to the women who produce them.  I bought my beautiful wool carpet for $250 plus a small tip or “bacsheeshe”.  I then spent sometime figuring out the post office.  The post office is not a pace to be visited at noon!  It is also a bank and is a slow moving affair and very busy.  However, I learned that at the end of the day or when it first opens is the best time to go.  I did not bring my passport the first time I went.  They needed a copy to put on the shipping label.  So off my little rugs goes.  I wonder if I will ever see it again?  I hope so because it is quite beautiful and will be a great reminder of this trip and Morocco.

Meknes

Meknes, Morocco

1/18/2024

Recovery is today’s plan.  Yesterday I pushed just a little too hard.  I’m AOK but my body is just tired.  It was a forty mile round trip out to Volubilis, the outermost city of the Roman Empire in Africa.  Volubilis lies on a small rise above an incredibly fertile valley about twenty miles to the south of Meknes where I am staying in a beautiful Riad in the Medina.  There is no wonder why the Romans established their town here.  There is plenty of water, pitch black soil and a plethora of olive trees.  There was a temple, a forum and a triumphal arch.  There are beautiful mosaics in the few wealthy homes throughout the city.  Having seen Pompeii and Rome it becomes evident that this was a backwater town.  The palatial homes are few and and except for one or two not as luxurious.  Although, having been seriously plundered over the last 2000 years it is hard to tell just how luxurious they were.  These colonial  Romans had all the telltale accoutrements as their counterparts with pools, fountains and mosaics.  The impression left was that the wealthy tried to bring to Volubilis as much of Rome as could be copied.  The scale of the grandeur is just not there.  The Triumphal Arch is diminutive in comparison to its counterparts in and near Rome.  Volubilis was, in my opinion, a storehouse and refinery for Rome.  What I saw was small  rooms, one after another, with the same door opening.  Each door opening had a secure “hinge” of sorts.  There must has been hundreds, if not thousands of these rooms.  All with the same carved slots for some kind of secure door.  In many other ares were blocks which held some kind of wood contraption and obvious presses for either grain or certainly olive oil. Many of the blocks of stone hade grooves which must have been used as a transfer of a fluid of some sort be it water or oil.  So, in my opinion, Volubilis was an enormous storehouse for three items that fueled the Empire: olive oil, grain and wild animals sent to whet the Roman appetite for blood. I saw similar mosaics in Sicily depicting the importation of wild animals. It must have been very lucrative.  As in modern day sports there was money to be made in these sports.  I look no further than the superbowl as evidence of the money to be made in the arena.  We  do not draw as much blood but the thirst for violence has not diminished that much.  The money to be wrested from the populus is no less.

                                                                                            Triumphal Arch Volubilis

To get to Volubilis I had to fight with not just a few hills.  The way to the site was on a fairly major road that went into the mountains.  The hills were high and the road climbed in several places for miles.  Leaving Meknes was my first indicator of what I was in for.  I had noticed this hill on the bus ride in.  Gong down the slope I started talking to myself regarding what it was going to be like to return up the incline at the end of the day.  I tried not to think too much about the trip back, I knew this hill would be a serious hindrance.   I kept on going despite my trepidations.  The hills got no better throughout the day. I was right to acknowledge the final hill to Meknes.  I walked most of it.  My calculations in doing the trip up to the ruins did not fully compensate for the ruins themselves.  The walk amongst the old stones was an exercise in itself.

My stomach is not performing up to par today.  I knew this would happen in Morocco.  I have done well to avoid most obvious foods of concern.  I have had to eat and have thus suffered little inconvenience.  My solution is usually to find a “supermarché”.  They have food that is protected in plastic.  As much as I would like to be more adventurous; I hesitate. The street food in Morocco is tempting.  The open air markets are fascinating and colorful.  However, I see so much trash everywhere and other things that give me hesitation as in the bathrooms with no “papieres hygeniques”.  I m just fearful of the consequences of a bad dietary decision.  I still have two weeks to go in Morocco.  I m doing well, for now.

Morocco beat Tanzania 3 to 0 last night.

Meknes Morocco is a fascinating city.  The Medina is enormous and easy to get lost in.  I read that Meknes was not as touristic as Meknes.  I never made it to Fes due to a big rainstorm on the day i was supposed to go.  I am sure Fes would be fascinating but there was plenty to see and to wander through in old Meknes.  

Wandering through the Medinas in Morocco is never short of experiences.  From sheep heads to fine embroidery it is a never ending feast for the eyes.  Occasionally one is brought down a very dark alley only to turn a corner into brightness and a cornucopia of colors and smells.  The scent of “cat” is perpetual and everywhere.  It is mixed with the smell of a plentitude of spices and vendors cooking Kebab and Kefta.  Kefta is a mixture of ground meat.  It is heavily spiced and very tasty if you are a meat lover.  I had it a couple of times and it was very good and despite being very nervous of the outcome I had no troubles with my digestive tract.  The small stores are barely that.  Often they are closet sized and one will see people creating all manner of things in these spaces.  Most of the stalls are men sewing the complex designs of embroidery on women’s clothing.  Sometimes they have machines outside that are weaving colored threads.  Some of these shops sell only thread.  These were my favorite because of the different ways the shop keepers assemble their colorful threads.  Some of the shops are a perfect color chart with every hue of reds, greens, blues as well as silvers and gold.  There are meat shops, wood workers, metal workers, vegetable stands, mixed with electronic stores, clothing stores and old junk sellers. 

Meknes fell into disarray after its benefactor, Moulay Ismail, died.  He had turned Meknes into his personal residence.  The Bab al Mansour gate was covered up for renovation during my stay.  The door is supposed to be exquisite and I am quite positive it is.  However, there are lots of gateways with no shortage of striking beauty all over Meknes.  The palace museum was closed so I did not get a chance to see into the old palace.  I did wak around its expansive walls.  Moulay Ismail took advantage of Volubilis, twenty miles away, to embellish the palace with marble.  Moulay Ismail did not sound like a super nice guy and the rumor is that he killed on a whim.  It is also said that on hearing of his death the stones being transported up and down the hills from Volubilis were dropped and left on the spot.   I did not see any of these stones.

 

                                                           There are many cats but no rats

Leaving Meknes was bittersweet.  My riad was fantastic.  The young man who ran it was just great.  The breakfasts included with the $25 nightly fee was excellent.  He knew I loved coffee and I was never without.  It was such a filing breakfast that it lasted me the whole day.  I will miss Meknes.