Monday morning, start of a new week, start of a holiday now we’ve caught up with our sleep, so where to go? In the end we settled on the Museum of the Confluences which holds Islamic art and has a world famous coffee shop. But wait I hear you say, Marrakech museums don’t open on Mondays but we’d Googled it and it was open, Yay……………… It was closed. Obviously.

So we Decided to visit the Maison de Photagraphie a museum which holds wonderful displays of historic photos and which Google also said was open. On the way a friendly local warned us to keep to the right to avoid being flattened by the motorcycles we are constantly dodging in the narrow lanes in the Medina. We thanked him and as we walked on (on the right) he asked where we were going and when we told him he informed us it was closed. Oh no, we said, we Googled it but he explained that it was normally open but today was unexpectedly closed for refurbishment; we could, however, go to the weekly Berber Market which was in the same direction and gave us instructions to find it.

Not long after he bumped along beside us on his moped and we joked about crazy Moroccans on their motorcycles. Just then we came to a junction and a young man crossed in front of us and the first guy called him back as he knew him and asked him to show us to the weekly Berber Market (can you see where this is going? We could). Young man sets off with us and after a while when I asked him he confessed that we had passed the Berber Market but he would love to show us his family’s shop. Nice try sunshine but no thanks and we said our goodbyes and headed back the way we came. We’ve subsequently had other locals tell us that the place we’re going to is closed in an attempt to divert us for their gain. Nice try.

We ended up in a small square with a café so sat down for some refreshment. As we were sitting there I had a strong sense of dejá-vue as I looked around and said to Mrs Sixwheeler “we’ve been here before” and so it was. About fifteen years ago we’d had tea with a friendly taxi driver there and he waited there for us while we visited the Museum of Marrakech which was just opposite and clearly very open so after our drinks in we went.

I have to say it was a bit sad; on our earlier visit it was recently restored with some great displays and it gives every appearance now that nothing has been done to it since. It’s still a magnificent building but all the best displays have gone and it needs a good spruce up. Anyway we had a wander around and ‘les toilettes’ were clean and free. Here are a few pictures.

After the museum we wandered around some local lanes which are far enough away from the tourist area to be quite interesting and with some good quality products. We had some lunch and looked at a nice place for some dinner tonight.

Walked slowly back to the riad for a siesta and the headed out to eat. Dodged all the “barkers” for every restaurant, shop and street vendor on the way before arriving at Kui Zin having not checked reviews or anything but we’d fallen on our feet. We both had the chicken brochures and they were excellent as was dessert.

A nice slow walk back with the streets a bit quieter and off to bed as we have an early start tomorrow, a trip to the seaside, we’re going to Essaouira for the day. To be continued…

31 March 2022