Our First Hour in Africa

I am writing this in a very beautiful, refurbished guesthouse at the top of the Casbah (old walled city) in Tangier, Morocco.  The last two days here have been quite amazing, and given some of the events, I'm surprised to find myself sitting on a red velvet sofa in front of a chimney (fireplace) with a green and white tile fountain bubbling away in the entrance hallway to my right.  Taylor is three floors up, relaxing in our gorgeously appointed room.  I can hear our host Aziz talking to the guy who is here to bring us tea, and I think he answers the phone, answers the door and cleans.  He also built the fire.

We arrived yesterday morning on the ferry from Tarifa, Spain.

Here's our ferry.  Notice the ominous sky.  When we got off the ferry in Tangier, it was raining!

I thought the inside of the ferry kind of looked like a casino.  This lady was knitting for most of the trip.

 We understood that Aziz would meet us at the dock with a sign with our name on it.  When we got off the ferry, we had to walk further than I expected to get to the ferry terminal.  This surprised me, as I thought we'd get off the boat, and there would be Aziz.  We wandered through streams of people, both locals and tour groups, and didn't see anyone with a sign for us.  We did see other guides greeting their people.  Finally a man from the tourist department asked if he could help.  I told him we were to meet Aziz.  The man replied, "Oh, Aziz," and walked outside the terminal.  We followed.

Eventually another man came up to me and said, "Are you looking for Aziz?  Are you Taylor Dennen?"  I said, "Yes," and told Taylor this was our man, and we began to follow.   Taylor hadn't heard my brief conversation and wasn't sure what we were doing.  I asked the man if he was Aziz and he said "No, I'm the driver."  "Where is Aziz?"  He replied "We'll see Aziz," and he led us to his mini van and we got in. By now, both Taylor and I were wondering if we had made a huge mistake by jumping in a vehicle with a stranger in a strange country, but we were stuck, with our luggage in the back.

This man started driving through town, giving us his tour speech and we just listened and observed.

He took us to a mosque, and told us about it and asked if we wanted to take pictures.  We didn't know what else to do so we got out and I snapped pictures, wondering if the car, with our worldly possessions would disappear.

I was as interested in the people as I was in the mosque.

 We eventually got back in the car and continued driving. About 45 minutes into his tour, our driver stopped the car on the side of the road and we just sat. This naturally made us a little nervous, but it was a nice neighborhood, so we held tight  Eventually, another man, wearing a bright blue sweater, opened the sliding door and stuck his hand in to shake ours, saying, "Welcome to Morocco.  I'm Aziz."  He then jumped into the front seat and asked if Mohammad had done a good job.  So now we knew:  Mohammad was our driver, and Aziz was finally with us.

I will write more about this amazing day later, but know, the day ended with Taylor and me sitting on the rooftop patio of La Maison Blanche at the top of the Casba, sipping Moroccan mint tea.

All is well with the world, for this day and moment.

Tarifa

We are now in Tarifa, Spain's southern most town.  I am writing this from the rooftop patio of Hostal Africa where we will spend the night.  The hotel is in the heart of the old walled part of town. It is quite breezy and chilly, but I'm in a covered area so I'm very comfortable, luxuriating in the fact that I'm here. I can hear the ocean and  I anticipate a spectacular sunset.

Hostal Africa.

I'm sitting here right now.

The view from my rooftop aerie.

At a glance, this town is similar to Oregon and Washington beach towns off season - cold, windy and dreary.  The difference being there is a marvelous town wall with a castle, and we can look across the water at Africa.  The most important is that we can see both the Mediterranean and the Atlantic Oceans at the same time.

Kayakers on the Mediterranean. Africa is in the distance.

A castle near the beach that is situated so it has a view of both the Mediterranean and the Atlantic Oceans.

The Atlantic Ocean.

Tomorrow we will be in Tangier, Morocco.  We leave on the 9 a.m. ferry.  Aziz will meet us at the dock for his "Gran Tour" of the city.