Casablanca

Since I was about 19, I have dreamed of travelling to Morocco. And here we are in Casablanca. We booked our hotel, the Best Western Hotel Toubkal, using air miles. The hotel is quite close to a train station, so we thought we could take the train from the airport. However, it was after 10:00 p.m. when we arrived, and when we got to the train station, we saw that the next train wouldn’t be for about an hour.

We decided to fork out and take a taxi. Expensive, but so much faster, and of course easier than taking our bags on the train.

The hotel is nice, although since I requested a non-smoking room, I was a bit surprised to see an ashtray on the desk. We noticed that rooms on the floor below say “no smoking room” on the doors, so I think they made a mistake.

Breakfast was excellent, with some of the freshest, most delicious bread and rolls I’ve ever eaten, great coffee, boiled eggs, cheese, meat, yogurt, oranges, mint tea, and some sausages that I didn’t taste but Dave said were really good.

After breakfast, we set out to explore. One of the main sights in Casablanca is the biggest mosque in Africa, set right on the Atlantic. On Google Maps it looks like it would be a nice walk along the coast to the mosque, so we headed west to the ocean. Instead of arriving at a nice walkway along the ocean, we came to a massive construction site. The road and everything else in that area is boarded off, broken up and torn apart. 
So, we took the high road instead. We did stumble upon Rick's Cafe, which was so completely nondescript and faceless that we didn't even take a photo. It was almost literally a hole in the wall.

The ocean, when we finally were able to see it, was magnificent. It was low tide and we saw quite a few people wading in the tide pools. Some of them were collecting something; we couldn't tell what.

The mosque is impressive. Huge. Modern. Elegant. My photos don't do it justice. They also don't show just how close the mosque is to the water.

 

By this time, we were about ready for lunch, so we used Google Maps to search for nearby restaurants. It directed us to one further up the coast, a relatively pleasant walk through a sort of park/walkway, which was under construction. When we arrived at the spot where the restaurant was supposed to be, we saw -- nothing. Except more construction.

A taxi came along, so we decided to get a ride back to the train station near our hotel. 

Once there, we had a tasty lunch at "Restaurant les fleurs".

Dave had a lamb tagine, and I had chicken couscous, served with whole wheat Moroccan bread. Everything was delicious. 

This photo of Restaurant Les Fleurs is courtesy of TripAdvisor

After lunch, we were ready for more exploring and decided to check out the old medina, which we had passed through unawares on our way to the mosque. This time we paid more attention.

There were orange vendors...

narrow alleys...

... and cats.

These women were heading for the shopping area...

... and these women were getting water from a public fountain. 

We meandered through the market, enjoying the sights, but not buying anything, until it started getting dark and time to head back to our hotel. Actually I did buy 2 postcards.