Then one well-proportioned young fellow looks directly at you, right at YOU , and discretely lowers the band of his shorts displaying his junk with a come hither look. Our day began bright and clear, the temperature sitting at perhaps 6C or 7C in Fez as we headed out with an early start. The full-day driving journey from Fez to Marrakech took our group of 5 Canadians, Moroccan guide Redouane, and driver, Fouad, over the Middle Atlas Mountains through a schizophrenic set of agricultural fields and orchards.
Our trek morphed from huge lush green fields of hay and orange orchards, to dry scrub land with prickly pear cactus in abundance. As we climbed the grey morning hills, the air grew cooler and cooler, and then β¦ surprise, we were in snowy terrain.
Maureen looked out the van windows and pointed out to us the spray of almond blooms hanging pretty pink, like delicate earrings in the trees, with white snow clinging to the branches and as a backdrop. Well constructed, rocky fences surrounded fields almost as if we were in the highlands of Scotland.
We stopped for a short break of cafe con leche in a white-enshrouded alpine town called Ifrane. Some of us frolicked, and froze our unprotected hands in a cold and wet impromptu snowball fight and then participated in the classic Canadian winter ritual of pushing a powerless car down a hill for a jump start.
Not a scene we had anticipated in Morocco β¦. Within 15 minutes of leaving Ifrane, we were back into the green, sumptuous farm land we were more accustomed to β and had expected β in Morocco. Sometimes small, often enormous flocks of sheep, scattered either side of the road, always, always, always accompanied by a solitary shepherd.
