Day 4 of the Morocco Uncovered Tour: Chefchaouen, and then to Fes
Today was our first opportunity to do some exploring on our own. I woke up and got ready and went up to breakfast. I had slept pretty well. I ended up not having good pictures from inside the room because it was too dark and I had accidentally blurred the photos, but I took some right outside the room.
The first door to my hotel room. This door led to a small common area.The view from the pool area. It was still dark as it was on the earlier side, and you can tell it is a gloomy morning. But what a view of the town!Another angle of that door to the common area.
The breakfast at the hotel was pretty good. I ended up sitting with Barb and Graehm and enjoyed a variety of foods plus coffee. I had originally been planning to wander on my own for the morning but Steph and Alicia, two of the younger women on our tour, invited me to join them and suggested they could take pictures of me, and frankly that sounded like fun, so I did. I finished packing up my room and got my luggage out for later pickup, and off we went.
A few words about Chefchaouen as we learned from Aman (our guide), who was from there. He said in the early 2000s one street of houses decided to use blue paint and pictures of that street went viral on the internet. Over time, the whole town ended up painting themselves blue, various shades, in order to increase tourism and look cool on Instagram. So basically, it’s a really popular place, very beautiful, and the main reason is the internet. But it IS beautiful, and we just loved it. (Later he pointed out a town in the distance that he said was trying some green paint for tourism, and it did make me want to go there as well, also watch the socials for that one.)
As you can see, we took a lot of photos! It was hard not to. I have so many more on my camera roll. I didn’t choose my outfit to match or coordinate, but we saw many who did. We had a fun morning wandering around, and then we did some souvenir shopping before deciding to get lunch at Restaurant Aladin, which Aman said was the nicest one overlooking the main square.
We thought we had allowed enough time for lunch, but after waiting over 45 minutes for our food, we asked them if it could actually be to go (We had ordered sandwiches and pizza so this was possible) and then hurried back to the hotel to meet the group.
This woman was using the fountain to fill up her water jugAman standing at the door to the Riad/Hotel we stayed in.
By then it was pouring rain again, after a decent morning, thankfully! We headed out in the van to Fes, and the driver kept having to slow down for giant puddles and sometimes to divert around standing water and flooding along the route.
Inside the minivan. We could change seats, but mostly people stayed in the same as we were happy. I took a backseat where I could stretch my legs out in the aisle.
At one point there was a stand selling fresh oranges along the road and Aman hopped out and bought some for everybody.
One of the snacks I had bought. I thought the packaging was hilarious, and they ended up tasting good. I shared with people around me and this brand became a cult hit on our tour.
We made it to fez in the late afternoon and checked into the hotel for two nights. (So relaxing, two nights in one place!). Here we stayed at the Across Hotels and Spa which was a disappointment compared to the Riad in Chefchaouen, but was a perfectly serviceable hotel. It was in a nice location and just felt a bit more “corporate” or “chain.” After a little downtime, we all met downstairs to go to dinner together. We went to a restaurant in an old house where they served us a feast of Moroccan salads, chicken pastille, fresh fruit and cookies for dinner. It was New Year’s Eve at this point and one of the woman had brought some decor for us to use.
The Moroccan salads. These were amazing! Perhaps the best part of the meal. The chicken pastille. I enjoyed it, but it was an unusual dish. Chicken inside, flaky pastry and sugar around it. Reminded us of that Friends episode: “beef, good, jam, good”. The whole gang there with our decorations for New Years.Fresh fruit, a staple of Moroccan dinners.
And then we drove back to the hotel. It felt a bit sad to go to bed early on New Year’s Eve, but yet, what else to do? I think some people might have gone out, but more in their couple groups. I was also feeling a little bit “needing my personal space” so it was nice to go up to bed and relax, even though it felt lame, haha. I ended up giving Louie a call on Facetime, which was great, and felt so crazy: talking on facetime from another continent is always crazy, isn’t it?
The room. If you stay here, look in the closet for blankets, as they don’t put them on the bed!
Practical things: you could pay to have laundry done at this hotel. I took advantage of the time to sink wash some clothes which would have two days to dry. The heat was really effective in the rooms and it was nice and cozy, which I figured would also help with air drying.
Happy New Year to us! It was always sad spending New Year away from Louie–we’ve done it quite a few times–I would say this was one of the times I started to feel most home sick, but the next day was so much fun that I was again so grateful to be where I was. And you’ll have to wait to read about that until later. Day 5 of Morocco Uncovered, coming soon.
(If you are reading this, please give a comment! I love comments!)
Day 3: I woke up early and couldn’t sleep well. Either I shouldn’t have napped on the bus yesterday (impossible, I sleep so well on moving vehicles) or it was jet lag. Probably a combination.
I went upstairs to the rooftop restaurant for breakfast and enjoyed some nice views, fresh squeezed orange juice, coffee, and some other items. Breakfast in Morocco is a lot of bread and jam, but this hotel had a great spread overall, which made up for the room a bit.
Sunrise over my view of Meknes from the balcony.
We checked out of the hotel and went to meet our guide for a walking tour of Meknes Medina. I loved this place! I could have wandered for days through the alleys and looking at all the doors. The guide was the opposite of the day before in some ways, always fussing at us to get closer together and hurry up, stay together. He gave tons of information and was terrific.
This is my “I can’t believe I’m here and it’s just like I hoped” face.So many cats!
I took so many pictures as I didn’t even know where to look.
More of the overly trimmed trees.
According to the whats app plan, we visited the Old gate Bab Lakhmiss, the Jewish Quarter and the mausoleum of the founder of Meknes, Moulay Ismail.
At the end of the tour they took us into a little store with some handicrafts and showed up how people made ceramics and put wiring on them to make beautiful patterns. Of course they wanted us to buy things but it wasn’t uncomfortable, just an opportunity. When in Morocco, you do these things.
We got back on the bus, next stop was the grocery store again. We got supplies for a picnic lunch and then headed towards Volubilis. Lunch was at a cafe with a nice view that sold drinks and kefta but nothing else. Some of us ordered kefta to share and we had way too much, but it was delicious. I also enjoyed a fresh squeezed orange juice as well as a soda.
The view
After finishing our lunch it was a short drive to Volubilis, a Unesco World Heritage Site and ancient Roman ruins. In Morocco, did you know the romans made it that far south? We had a really nice tour through the area. It was fascinating to see how before the Arabs, the Romans were here first.
The town of Moulay IdrissJust hanging out on some Roman ruins. Totally normal.The arches made it feel like home.
Fun fact: the Australians didn’t know that St Louis has an arch! I enlightened everybody with this knowledge. They asked why?
Would you like this on the floor of your house? Amazing.Arches are great for framing picturesque towns on mountains, aren’t they?
From there we had a long drive on winding roads to Chefchaouen, our stop for the night. I should note that I took Dramamine each day when we started on the bus and if you are at all prone to motion sickness it’s worth doing. Several people felt ill on this drive, which was pretty until darkness fell.
The whole gang. I’m in there somewhere.
We got to Chefchaouen right after dark, and were amazed by our hotel: Dar Echchaouen Maison d’hôtes & Riad. It was a step up from the night before! Too bad it was already dark and we were only staying one night.
What usually happened when we got a hotel was that we got off the bus and waited a bit while somebody unloaded the luggage and our guide got the keys, then he would distribute each room based on our needs. This hotel: when we entered the gate there was a lovely courtyard, then various beautiful lobby rooms. My room was up a flight of stairs, back outside, and shared a common room with another room (which was the other single woman.) The room itself was large with a beautiful bathroom. It also had a view of the pool, which of course it was too cold to swim, but would be lovely. If you were at the pool, you could see the whole village on the hill.
But, we got settled quickly and then headed out for dinner as a group–not everybody joined but I wanted to.
Chefchaouen is known as the “Blue City”. You’ll see why. Also, our guide Aman was from Chefchaouen so he felt very at home here, and took us to one of his favorite restaurants, but first it was a walk through the medina.
This is the restaurant where we ate: Restaurant Bab Ssour.Goat cheese and jam. Chefchaouen is known for fresh goat cheese.Anchovy Tagine. Perhaps not for everybody but I absolutely adored this dish. It was a specialty as well.
And then it was back to the hotel for sleep. I was exhausted from sight-seeing, travel, and excitement. I will say: this was not a late night tour group. You could stay out later, of course, but I never wanted to as I was always exhausted by the end of the day, even after I was over jet lag. We were hopeful for a free morning in Chefchaouen on our own…hopeful that the weather would hold and we wouldn’t have rain! To be continued…
Day 2: Let’s go! We are in Morocco, we are touring, we are having fun!
My alarm went off at 6:30 am and it was still pitch black outside in Casablanca. I got ready and went downstairs for breakfast. I ran into Barb and Graehm again (this would become a thing, we basically became breakfast buddies as the earliest ones to get ready on the tour). I ate yogurt and some bread, juice, coffee. Nothing too exciting. I brought my bags down at 8 and then we headed out soon after.
This was the day we started traveling on our minibus, really, our home away from home for the next 10 days. I brought my backpack on board the first day, but just to let you know: I started just bringing my purse and a few things in a tote after that as the space wasn’t that big. I do wish I had brought a smaller zip up tote or something on this tour as I just used a disposable tote from a store (they give you these weird cloth feeling bags instead of plastic) for the whole tour. It worked fine though.
But the first day I had my backpack, and my suitcase (my glorious suitcase! how I love thee) was in the back of the van/minibus.
Our first destination was the Hassan II Mosque. I had seen the outside the day before, but this morning we would be going inside. It was still early so it wasn’t too crowded, just us and a few other small groups.
You can see it’s less crowded that the day before, but this picture of me isn’t as good…
We had to take off our shoes to enter the mosque and they gave us a little (cloth feeling) bag to put our shoes in and carry them around. What an amazing place! The detail in the decor is phenomenal, and the designers and builders spared no expense. The guide was excellent and we learned a lot…and I’ve forgotten a lot of it by now, but that’s the nature of the beast. We had a woman guide as well, which was quite rare for this trip.
Looking into the mosque.A door to the outside that would only be open during certain times.So many gorgeous tile patterns. I think this is the door that they said was made of titanium to avoid rust.I thought this sign was great. So fancy.
On the way out we used the bathroom which was very clean squat toilets. It turned out there might have a been a “western style” toilet as well, as I saw a line after I left, but it was nice not to wait in line, when the restroom was clean. Then we got back on the bus and headed to Rabat, after a quick stop at Rick’s Cafe, which is a replica from the movie Casablanca, which I have not seen (yet.)
Things I noticed on the drive: old buildings with so many satellite dishes on top. SO MANY. And lots of clothes hanging out the windows. I was just watching the world go by out the window and loving it.
We got to Rabat in about an hour and met a local guide there. Intrepid likes to use local guides to stimulate the economy and to provide the most authentic information.
We visited the Kasbah first. The guide had trouble keeping our group together–it was like herding cats. We were all overstimulated and didn’t want to walk around learning history, I think.
A sampling of doors, so many glorious and unique doors.
Great view over the ocean and several sides. I kept an eye out for marauders.A cat!We took a break for mint tea and sweets.The group.
Then we got back on the bus and rode to the ruins of a mosque that was unfinished, the Hassan Tower, built near the end of the 12th century. There was also a mausoleum there for Mohammad V, who died is 1961. You could take pictures of and with the guards, which was sort of fun.
Me standing by the guard.The Hassan TowerInside the Mausoleum.Guarding the tombWe saw a lot of these strangely trimmed trees throughout RabatIs this building screaming or just in awe?
I did feel like the guide was mostly just rushing us around for no real reason. He was nice and very knowledgeable, but there was a lot of hurry up and then wait…I might have preferred just a bit of free time and meeting up somewhere.
Lunch was at a restaurant by the river/estuary. One thing on the tour was there were some meals you had to paid for, but you would be taken somewhere for the meal. It made sense, but something to keep in mind. We ordered from a menu: I was going to order fish pastille but then they didn’t have that so I panic ordered fish tagine. It was not nearly so flavorful as the tagine the night before. It was…fine. A bit bland. And cost more than the tagine the night before. Oh well, you pay for the view.
Look at this vehicle!
We drove to Meknes next, stopping at a grocery store along the way. I love grocery stores in foreign countries, so I got a few things to snack on (lunch had been VERY late) as well as some sunscreen that I love.
We pulled up at the hotel, and I think we were all a bit disappointed by this one, the Hotel Swani. It was a bit outside of town in a grungy looking area, and while the hotel was perfectly safe and clean, it wasn’t too exciting. My room smelled of smoke and a hint of sewer, but I got the fan going and that helped. I did have a balcony, which was nice, though it was cold so I only popped out. Aman recommended we eat at the hotel restaurant and just rest, so I did that. You had to order the food first and then go up to the rooftop restaurant later. I wasn’t terribly hungry so I ordered soup and an appetizer, running into a few other tourmates when I did. We met up at the restaurant a little later and enjoyed a really tasty meal, so that was good. And then I went to bed: I was exhausted from the day and still recovering from jet lag.
Morocco: land of colors, excess, horns, arches, doorways, ceramics, and more!
Why did I go to Morocco? So many reasons, but I really wanted to travel somewhere DIFFERENT, and the pictures I’d seen made me so curious to see it for myself. I knew I needed a tour group, and did a lot of research about what was best, and ended up choosing the 13 day Morocco Uncovered trip with Intrepid Adventures, based on the small groups (maximum of 12), the itinerary, and the price. They also had great reviews, and seemed to be a very reputable company. Spoiler alert: I found everything to be true, and the tour was terrific. 13 days is a bit misleading, as they count their days the way musicians count intervals, and the 13th day is the day you have breakfast and then leave.
I hope that this series of blog posts can be fun to read as well as helpful for anyone looking to do this tour and having trouble finding information on it online! I researched very hard to see what actually happened on the tours and only found two blogs written about it, so I may be the third. In typical fashion, I will share a ton of photos with my writing and take awhile to finish recapping it (but I WILL FINISH) and I hope you enjoy hearing about my trip. If not, why are you in here??
Pre-Tour: I originally booked a ticket to fly to Casablanca through New York and then Paris. On Christmas morning, the day before I was to fly out, I got a text from Delta saying that that flight was canceled and I was rebooked for some flights the following day. Noooooo!!! I had planned to arrive 1 day early, and the rebooked flight would have me missing the welcome meeting. Not good at all. I got on the phone with Delta and managed to get a flight leaving the same day, and ultimately ended up with the same flight from Paris to Casablanca. Crisis averted.
Other pre-tour: I was planning to pack using just a carry-on suitcase, backpack, and purse I could stuff in the backpack. But then my last flight was with Air France and Air France has a strict carry-on weight limit of 12 kg, which is 26 pounds. This doesn’t seem too crazy, but when I started weighing things my suitcase weighed something like 22-23 pounds and then my backpack and purse were 10, and it was all just going to be too much. I decided I’d better just check my suitcase, and we put airtags on it and my backpack.
Sunset as the plane left St Louis–it was truly stunning!
But then my flight from Atlanta to Paris was delayed and I ended up missing that flight. No problem, I got booked on the next flight. However, this messed up my transfer with Intrepid–they were supposed to pick me up at the airport. I spent some time in the Paris Airport calling and leaving messages, unsure if I had gotten through.
I will say that I found this to be a challenge–flights get canceled and delayed all the time and it should have been easier for me to contact someone about this. I knew I could take a cab from the airport and it would be fine, but I was owed this transfer.
Anyway, when I landed in Casablanca I knew my bag wasn’t with me because of the airtag, so after clearing immigration and customs I immediately went to make a lost bag claim. Note about immigration: I somehow got the softest speaking immigration officer every, and had to ask him to repeat absolutely everything. As I stood there waiting to get my stamp I thought, hmm, if they send me back it’ll be because I just couldn’t hear this man.
(This was a quick entry into Moroccan society, haha!) The woman I was talking with about my luggage spoke English pretty well, but we were still struggling. And there was a dog barking loudly the whole time, and it was just a scene. (I also realized that lines were more of an idea and the best thing to do was just make yourself known and push your way in.) Anyway, I got a copy of the missing baggage form and then exchanged money, and needed to see if there was any chance Intrepid was there to pick me up. The answer was no, no sign of any transfer. And so then I was outside of the airport and it was fairly empty, and a few people kept asking me if I needed help, and I fended them off (because I was told that’s what you should do).
I was exhausted and it was after 10 pm Casablanca time at this point, so I probably missed a sign. I realized that I actually DID need help, and here is where I did something I shouldn’t have, but I was tired: I let a woman help me “find a cab” and then ended up that she drove me to the hotel. I was half worried that she was kidnapping me and the other half worried she was just scamming me, but she did get to me to the hotel at the agreed upon price, so I think I only ended up falling for the unlicensed cab scam and nothing more, and alls well that ends well.
I checked into the first Hotel, the Hotel Les Saisons, around 11 pm or so. Thankfully they were expecting me and had my room held, and that went just fine. Oh, and even though my suitcase was delayed, I did have all my toiletries with me as well as a change of underwear, so not all was lost. I got to the room and collapsed into bed.
The bed in my room. It was a nice enough room for two nights, the toilet worked, the shower worked, the bed was comfy, and it was almost warm enough.
Official start day of the tour:
Day 1: Casablanca. I had a day tour booked for this morning, since I was arriving early. I got up and went down for breakfast, where I met Barb and Graeme, another couple that would be on my tour. I wasn’t very hungry so I drank some coffee and juice and ate yogurt and a croissant. i talked with the hotel about my luggage and they said they would call when the office opened up.
The tour guide sent a cab to pick me up. It was raining and cold, so if you are going to Morocco in December, be aware that you will need things other than “desert wear.” After picking me up, the cabbie went to pick up another woman at her hotel. She was named Lori and was from Victoria, Canada, and we were the only two on the tour! This ended up being really fun and I was glad it wasn’t a private tour, but also it was great with just two people.
We met our tour guide Hicham outside of the Hassan II mosque. We didn’t go inside, but we got some pictures outside.
The mosque, you can see it was rainy and wet.I’d love to remove those people from the background but don’t know how. But as you can see, it was cool and rainy, but what a beautiful place.One more for the skies too. The Hassan II mosque with wet floor and intense skies.
We headed off on the tour, via the cab as needed and sometimes on foot: it was a walking tour mostly, but then we used the cab (the driver just waited) to get from place to place to walk around. We learned about the history of Casablanca as we went from place to place, and visited the old Medina and the new Medina.
This is me in front of the old fort for Casablanca, which is now a restaurant.Fun street murals, and just a sense of the streets. Little cars everywhere.Who doesn’t hug their fish like this? A picture of a mural with a woman hugging a fish.Palm trees and little cars.Little truck, check. Inanimate object that looks like a face, check!Such beautiful woodwork for a random door. Who knows what is behind it?Hashtag cats of Morocco. I couldn’t stop taking pictures. Look at this building!What about this door for your house?
We tried prickly pear fruit in the Medina, which left our tongues red. We walked up and down streets, and saw many more cats.
A cat sitting on a motorcycle. This was a surprisingly common occurence.Doors, electricity, and marble.It is important to note that I have not actually seen the movie Casablanca.A fruit and vegetable stand in the medinaBags of grains and who knows what.More cats! The other woman on the tour said I’d be taking a lot of pictures if I took pictures of all the cats. Whatever. I pay for extra cloud storage.A beautiful park.DoorsWhat a beautiful entrance way to somebody’s home.Arches, with cars.Arches, and me. Olives! So many olives. Did you know they are all from the same tree, just that they are different colors depending on how ripe.Pottery. Maybe just from China, maybe from Morocco. My first cup of mint tea. The Moroccans love a very sweet mint tea.
We ended the tour with mint tea and pastries.
the Hassan II mosque from across the sea/ocean.
My suitcase was still in Paris (thanks air tag) so the guide dropped me off at the mall where I bought a warm scarf and a pair of sweatpants to tide me over. I walked back to the hotel from there, without too many men yelling at me (the thing to do seemed to be to step in front of me and say “welcome to morocco” which was at a minimum, super annoying.) I knew I needed to eat something but my stomach felt bad–stress plus jet lag, poor combination. I ended up getting a cheese sandwich and fries at a nearby fast food style place.
I was grateful to be in Casablanca, but exhausted and a little (ranging to very) stressed out about my bag. Barb had said that morning that of course Intrepid would help, but I was unsure what they might do. Also, then I sort of hurt my ankle again walking around and luckily didn’t fall, but I was feeling like I had bitten off more than I could chew with this trip, and had some moments of doubt!
6:00 pm Time for the Welcome Meeting. It was in the hotel, and we met our guide Aman along with all the people. It ended up that it was 10 people from Australian (3 couples, 2 sets of women traveling as friends), 1 woman from Germany, and of course me. At this point my bag was “unknown” on the airtag rather than in Paris, so I thought, maybe it was on a plane. I talked with Aman and he said he would help, of course. He talked to a friend and said that after dinner we could go to the airport. We also set up a what’s app group with everybody in it for communication.
We went to dinner as a group (on our own dime, but I thought very reasonable) at a nearby restaurant. I had a chicken tagine with vegetables: note to reader, you will eat a lot of chicken tagines on this tour, so in retrospect I might have ordered something different, but it was delicious. My stomach was still funny so I figured chicken and vegetables would be good, and it was.
A tagineThe unveiling of the tagine!
The meal also came with bread and olives, which is very typical. I got terrific news during dinner, which was that my airtag was showing my bag at the Casablanca airport. Aman made some calls to determine the best course of action, and he said after we ate he and I would go in a cab to the airport. We got there and he walked with me as far as he could go–there were security checkpoints and I was only allowed past them because of my missing bag paperwork. I followed the airtag and ended up at the office from the previous night. I explained that my bag was THERE, and they went to look for it. I will say, without the airtag, I would not have known–they had not scanned it in yet, and while I’m sure they would have eventually done so, it is likely that I would have been without my suitcase for several days or longer, as they would have had to scan it, and then send it somewhere, which Aman had said would likely be to Fez, in four days, as we would be staying there for two nights.
I waited outside the office for a few stressful minutes until lo and behold, out walks the man with what can only be described as a “shit-eating grin” and my suitcase! I may have cried a few happy tears.
Now, this whole debacle cost me 600 dirham for the cab ride, and I couldn’t get a receipt to submit to insurance, because that’s not something they do, but I was incredibly relieved nonetheless. We got back close to 11 pm (the airport is a good 45-60 minutes from the hotel) and I was exhausted. I did a few organizing things as we were leaving the next morning, and went to bed. The next day would be starting on the early side, and I was happy to finally really feel like my vacation was starting.
I know I’ve been gone for awhile, but I’m back. And wow, I had an amazing trip to Morocco. I’m not going to tell you all about it today, just a little bit, because it’s the first day back teaching, and I’ve got a bit of a cold, and I’m still getting over jet lag, so it’s all just a little bit too much.
Highlights: riding a camel, shopping in the souks (markets), meeting my fellow tourmates, the food (so much tagine and couscous but still so good!), and all the colors. I would recommend this tour to anybody (unless you are more particular about hotels, but all of the hotels were safe and clean (though some of them were sandy). Did we always have enough water pressure and reliable hot water…eh.
Travel was…annoying. And it’s great to be home, as always. I am so glad I went and I plan to do another tour in the future.
I’m on the lead camel. That means mine was the smartest and most experienced.
On other notes: how awful is the world right now? Like, it’s just horrible here in the US. ICE just shooting people and beating up people on the streets, kidnapping people regardless of their immigration status. The federal reserve chair getting investigated by a corrupt DOJ, who knows what will happen to our money…RFK making up health stuff…invading Venezuela, threatening to invade GREENLAND, there are so many things I could list but it’s just so upsetting and awful and redundant.
And then looking around and knowing how many of my fellow countrypeople AGREE with it, that’s the worst part. Or one of the worst parts. That people are like, oh this is fine. Of course most people I know don’t think that, but they are there. And that to me is just…flabbergasting. And awful. And words that I can’t even think of, because I’m just so upset. People think, oh it’s not that bad. ICE just shot a woman on video and are getting away with it, that’s how bad it is. It could be you, it could be anyone.
How do we deal with all the constant stress? It’s been ten years of stress, and what I want, what so many of us want, is a day, a few days of just not having to think about that horrible man and his enablers, his followers, just a day or more of being able to know that they aren’t doing some new horrible thing to people. But we don’t get that.
So it was nice to be out of the country. It was nice to hear a car backfire and know that it wasn’t actually gunshots. You might say, oh, is Morocco safe? Yeah, it’s safer than here. You won’t get shot on the street. The vehicles aren’t so large that people can’t see over the front of them, though they do have a lot of pedestrian deaths: probably because the way you cross the road is to just cross the road and hope they see you. You aren’t supposed to walk around alone at night, but that’s the same here. And yes, there was police crackdowns and violence at some protests, but hey, that happens nightly here in various cities and at least Morocco doesn’t pretend to be some pillar of world freedom and then murder their own citizens.
So anyway! Like I said, how do you deal with this? How do we continue to live our lives and not be angry and stressed all the time?
WordPress asked if I would like to use AI Assistant? What on earth would be the point of that? Maybe I shoudl have AI write this post, and then instead of you reading it, AI could read it, and then we could all just go outside and enjoy the weather, I guess? More likely the powers that be would prefer we use that time to work some sort of factory job though, so I think instead I’ll just write this damn post by myself, thank you very much.
Now, I just spent a few minutes looking at pictures for a blog post about Vermont. Did you know that I never finished writing about that? Why yes, probably, because I’ve mentioned it. Now, I’ve already forgotten about how busy I was, because I finished up my college teaching a whole week ago which freed up about 12-13 hours in my weekly schedule and suddenly WHEEEE I have tons of free time, and my memory is short, not at all like an elephant. I’ve organized my closet, I went to a play AND a musical yesterday, and now I’m writing a blog post, can you believe it?
Look at me.
But one of these days. First however, there’s Christmas to deal with, and then I’m going to Morocco for two weeks (practically) so I’ll actually maybe tell you about that first. I finished up my church gig this morning, had a lovely lunch there with some colleagues and them came home and started using what is usually my teaching studio as a staging area for packing. Normally I don’t get to do this, so it is very exciting! My mother likes to pack for trips several months in advance and uses an extra bedroom for it. I suppose I could do that, because we do have a guest bedroom but I’m not going up and down a flight of stairs every time. Plus, when I go upstairs, Muriel (my cat) follows me and she has this horrible habit of jumping up on the bannisters and it drives me insane plus I’m worried she will inadvertently kill herself with her tricks. Best to just go across the hall for my packing.
It’s only a few days in advance, and a few of those days are still busy with work, plus I’m not entirely sure what other things are going on. I’m not in charge of Christmas, and I honestly don’t even know what we are doing. I fly out the next day, that’s what I’m doing. I’ll be happy just hanging out with Louie, as he’s been gone all week, and then I’ll be gone, so whatever is fine with me.
It’s also important to note that Miles is very sad. He loves Louie the most, more than anything, and when Louie is gone and I’m here, Miles is so sad. Miles will be so happy tonight when Louie gets home!
I made Sally’s Gingerbread Blossoms for my Cookie Exchange Party. They turned out really well. I didn’t freeze the cookies before adding the candies like she says (like, what?), but I did freeze the candies. I think they were pretty hot for awhile, so just don’t touch them after adding them until they are cooled. Unless you want to eat them right away when they are super melty, in which case, I recommend doing that, yes.
It’s nice to look ahead at about three weeks off from teaching. It’s going to be a lovely break. I am excited to take a break, to leave the country and see the world, to do something totally new and different, to have an adventure…and I’m hoping that somehow 2026 will be a better year than 2025. Personally 2025 was fine, but it’s been a slog and not good for a lot of people I know, and that makes it harder, you know? The whole empathy thing is a real pain sometimes.
If I don’t pop in again (which I might), happy holidays!
