Morocco Uncovered, Travel

Morocco Uncovered with Intrepid

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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 medina
Bags 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.
Doors
What 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 tagine
The 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.

Coming soon: day 2, maybe even more…

Travel

Happy New Year!

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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?

Christmas

Winter Solstice Musings

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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!

Home, Thanksgiving, Travel

Thanksgiving in Clinton, South Carolina

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I have the morning off and I thought, maybe it’s not too late to tell you about our trip to South Carolina.

If you are a long time reader you’ll know this, but I grew up in Clinton, South Carolina, a small town in the upstate of South Carolina, and my parents still live there. Louie and I decided to drive down for Thanksgiving, but to go from Tuesday to Saturday to avoid the worst of the traffic.

We filled up on gas at the gas station right by the big Amoco sign. You can see it was already raining a bit: this theme continued for us on Tuesday. While the morning wasn’t too bad for weather, the afternoon got worse and we basically drove the whole afternoon and evening through heavy rain. The traffic got progressively worse through the day too until after evening and then the last few hours past Asheville things cleared up both weather and traffic. People ask how long the drive is: it can range from 10 hours to much longer. I made it in about 10 hours one time on Christmas Day: no traffic (no trucks!), no stops except for gas. I think it took us a little over 12 on Tuesday, and then you lose an hour for the time change. There’s a very heavy congestion area through Knoxville and then some construction zones on I-40 through the mountains where the road was washed out last year with the horrible flooding.

Anyway, we made it in after 10:00 and chatted with my parents a bit before going to bed.

The next day we all drove in Greenville to do some sightseeing. Schools aren’t out on Wednesdays in that area of the country so it wasn’t very busy and that was nice. We walked around and enjoyed some of the sights.

My mom wanted to sit on this swing because she said it was usually too crowded.

We also went to the BMW museum outside of Greenville. They built the factory in 1992-1994 and it has really changed the area from what it used to be–there is a factory tour you can take on some days but not the day we were there (and you have to sign up in advance anyway.)

This little car was one of my favorites. They had a bunch of older cars as well as some of the very newest models. This car had only three wheels and as you can see, opened in the front. Perhaps not super safe on the highways today.

Anyway, then we headed home on the back roads in order to avoid the Thanksgiving evening traffic.

The next day we prepared a small dinner for four. It was nice!

My dad had just come back from a bike ride, hence the slightly strange outfit.

For some reason the entire jam dish is on my place mat.

The next day we visited a nearby State Historic Site called Musgrove Mill. They have a few trails to hike with signs to read.

It is not too far away, but it wasn’t a State Historic Site until after I had moved away. It was from a Revolutionary War Battle. We also drove by where the first house we lived in Clinton used to be: it was torn down and a new house built in its place: probably the new house is nicer but the old one is brick and I preferred the look of it 🙂

As usual while we were gone, our cats were in good hands with the pet sitter.

A picture of my parents’ home: it’s a geodesic dome that my father built himself. We moved in around 1991.

Anyway, it was a nice visit, very low key, and then we drove back to St Louis on Saturday morning, with mostly pretty good traffic. There was snow in St Louis that day but no problem with the roads, and the snow was all done and cleared by the time we got home. That gave us a day to prepare for the week ahead and get ready.

When I took this picture, I had been sitting on the couch wondering where the cats were and then I heard some heavy breathing behind me!

I got some Christmas decorations set up.

These penguins are new to me this year. They look cute here, but the big one can be a little creepy and seem too large in real life. I’m not sure.

Anyway, now it’s mid December, and Thanksgiving is behind us–I’m glad I finally posted about it, and honestly, that didn’t seem so hard, haha. I just needed some time to sit down with it. I’ve just been stressed out as you know and feeling like a chicken running around. But the end of the year is near, things are winding down, and did you know (did I mention?) I am going to Morocco soon? I have a trip in less than two weeks, and so some of my time has also been spent making sure I have what I need for that, and working on my packing list.

Enjoy your weekend! We are getting some very cold weather!

Random thoughts

Two weeks until Christmas

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This semester.

One thing everybody says musicians do wrong is consider “busy-ness” as a mark of honor. How are you? “Busy” “Good!”

Except it’s not just musicians. It’s Americans. We are all too busy. There are a lot of reasons for that. Some of it is the culture, we feel like we need to stay busy to keep up. We feel like we need to do all of these activities to make sure that our kids are doing all the THINGS that the other kids are doing. Or we need to stay busy for work reasons: if you are a freelancer you stay busy to work more, to make more money. Maybe to buy more stuff, maybe to save more, to save for a rainy day, to save for when you get sick and have to pay for that surgery, that out of pocket bill, that unexpected health emergency, losing a job and the associated insurance, etc. Really all of everybody’s money worries are health care, right? Or is that just in our household?

Maybe you stay busy just to avoid looking directly at the horrors going on in your country. Maybe if you take on more students than ever, more gigs than ever, maybe if you pack your schedule just a little bit fuller you can avoid reading one more news article about the human rights violations in our country, the people being deported who have lived here for decades who are also possibly citizens, the people being murdered on fishing boats, the people being held indefinitely for who knows why, maybe just being brown skinned people who might have overstayed a visa, but also just might be citizens. And in no particular order: the articles about wide spread corruption, the attacks on the press, the freedom of speech, attacks on women, college campuses, reproductive rights, the economic downturn, my friends who have lost their jobs, attacks on trans people and lgbtq rights, the weaponization of the justice department, attacks on vaccines and the dismantling of the CDC and the NIH, the complete corruption of the Supreme Court, and…I could go on.

So maybe when we say we are busy, maybe we are avoiding that. Some of us might be. Are we hiding our heads in the sand? Probably. Do we wish we could do more? Of course we do. But sometimes what that more is is doing what we are already doing: teaching music to kids, one kid at a time. Playing music. I voted, so many times. I’ve made calls. I’ve shown up at protests–and I’ll keep doing what I can of those things, but I think what I can do now is my thing, to touch people, one on one. My students will grow up to be better people because of music, I hope. I hope.

So I’ll just keep being busy. It is the best thing for me. Busy keeps me sane. The best part of having 34 hours of teaching is that when December comes around and some of those students are done (thanks Wash U for being done earlier!) it makes the Christmas season feel a little easier!

Random thoughts

Winter is coming

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We had an absolutely gorgeous fall day on Saturday. The sun was shining, the leaves on the trees were a variety of beautiful colors. I had ONE small thing on my calendar, a two hour morning rehearsal, and then, the day off! I made a corn casserole for a neighborhood event (yes, our neighborhood has events)–we had a chili cook-off, and while I did not enter a chili, I made a side dish. I relaxed in the afternoon, enjoyed my down time. Regular readers know this is a rare occasion.

Now, I also spent some time catching up on emails and a FEW work related things, because being self employed really means work never stops, but I also read a bit and relaxed. And did laundry, and dishes, and such. And then in the late afternoon Louie and I walked over to the little park where the chili cook-off was being held and enjoyed the chilis and the side dishes and the animals (alpacas and turtles and goats and rabbits you could pet!) and chatted with neighbors and his family who also live in our neighborhood.

And then it got dark, because yes, winter is coming and it is now pitch black by 5:30 and then we went home and watched TV for a few hours and it was just simply glorious to be at home and we heard the wind outside and it sounded quite ominous.

And the next day it was cold. Very cold, the radiators were kicking in, and the cats love that, yes, but…what? It was cold, and windy, and the temperatures were in the 30s with “feels like 18” and that seemed not like a glorious fall day at all. And it was overcast, partly sunny, and it was my first day off in a long time, and I wanted to sleep in, but of course I woke up at 7 am because of whatever, hormones, patterns, the state of the world, the dry air. But nonetheless it was still a nice day, and did I practice for my upcoming performances that I am stressed out about? No, I did not.

We went for a long walk around Forest Park, which was pleasant at first until it was very cold and windy, and I did way too much research/brainstorming for a trip next summer, and I read and browsed the internet, and emailed getting things scheduled properly for this week which is a disaster.

And now it is Monday. And it will be a good week. I hope. Maybe. It looks like at least marriage equality will stand!!! So this supreme court may be evil and corrupt, but they aren’t ruined everything!

thoughts about violin, teaching, running, life.