Maroc’ and Rolled Back Home

Sorry! We’ve been terribly delinquent in the blog upkeep, but we’ll try to do better.

I had some seriously mixed feelings about our time in Morocco. On one hand, the land was beautiful and mysterious… every experience was completely unique from anything I had ever encountered before. We climbed the highest mountain in North Africa, rode camels in the Western Sahara, saw the sun rise over sand dunes and wandered souk labyrinths. On the other hand, man, was it a hassle doing all of that! Constant badgering from all sides made everything – eating, sleeping, travel – a hassle! I mean, it makes traveling mainland China and every third world country I’ve ever visited seem like a luxury packaged tour! In retrospect we would probably do it all again. I mean, that 11 hr bus ride in the Sahara with no A/C wasn’t that bad, was it?!

Aforementioned camel ride

Pattie taking a shortcut to camp

Pattie and I toiled up Mt. Toubkal – one of the hardest hikes I’ve ever done. Day 1 was the easy day. We hiked up 6hrs and a couple thousand meters over mostly rock. Day 2 was rough! We woke up at 6am and hiked 3 grueling hrs to the summit, then came ALL the way down. In total, we did about 11hrs of hiking that day. Pattie swore he’d never climb anything again, but has since recinded that threat. We weren’t well prepared for the sudden change in altitude, but made it in good time and good spirits anyway. It was a hard couple of days, but totally worth it. The view from the top was breathtaking (or maybe it was the lack of oxygen to my brain?!). Either way, it was spectacular.

Day 1: 6hr hike to base camp

Day 2: Made it! View from 4,200 Meters

The rest of the trip went by smoothly. We headed to Bucharest to visit Pattie’s long lost relatives who were all very kind and generous. The city itself was not that impresive given Ceausescu’s lack of architectural aesthetic sensibility, but the country was bucolic and unfettered. We ate lots of feta and drank lots of tuica (a homemade liquor made from plums) and chatted into the wee hours of the night (well, mostly I listened and interjected with and occassional “da, un putine” or “nun, multimesc”).

Romanian Countryside

For our next and final leg of the trip, we took a comparatively luxurious 10hr airconditioned bus ride from Romania-Ukraine-Istanbul. In Istanbul, we saw some amazing architecture, ate some fish sandwiches and pined for home. Here’s a funny, although inaccurate depiction of Istanbul.